Mapping and optimising your digital candidate journey

Increasingly, candidates expect to be able to apply for jobs digitally. It offers a more convenient method of application for candidates, and it can cut hiring costs for employers.

But using digital hiring methods requires effective mapping and optimisation. We’ve picked some of the most effective methods of providing a smooth and effective digital candidate journey.

Awareness

Choosing where to post your job ads or source new talent is vital in finding the best candidates. Using tried and tested marketing approaches can help you to reach out to new candidates digitally. Undertake research into your ideal candidates and build personas for them, find out where online is the best place to reach them, whether that’s on job sites like Indeed, or social media platforms like LinkedIn or Twitter.

Additionally, through AI, it’s possible to automatically advertise your job opening to candidates across multiple job sites in minutes, freeing up the time that recruiters would normally spend uploading and reaching out manually. This means that recruitment strategies can be targeted and efficient, even reaching a larger pool of passive candidates who may not be seeking a new role at the time. This means that AI can narrow the candidate pool and the quality of candidates applying will be much higher across the board, so you can spend less time looking at unsuitable CVs.

Consideration and interest

Employer branding here is key. When a potential applicant is considering whether to spend time applying for a job, they are likely to be scouring your company website. It’s therefore important to be very clear about what your company offers its employees, the kind of company culture you nurture, and the benefits that applicants can expect to receive if hired. This is your employee value proposition.

An organisation’s employee value proposition (EVP) refers to the core benefits that are offered to employees. This can include training opportunities, flexible work schedules, company culture, uniform, access to a company car, and any other employee perks or benefits that come with working for the organisation.

Your EVP forms the centre of your employer brand as a powerful tool in attracting the skills and people you need. It’s a good idea to pinpoint exactly what your EVP is, which in health and social care settings can include a varied workday, flexible hours, and a fulfilling role that makes a difference.

Including recruitment pages on your website and including recruitment within your digital marketing and outreach strategy is an ideal place to showcase your employer branding and EVP.

It’s important to be honest here, try not to exaggerate how great your business is for employees, and manage expectations smartly to ensure new employees are not faced with a shock when they start their new job. This protects your turnover rates, and helps you to identify employees who are a good fit for the company.

Application

Digital applications are a great way manage and quickly identify promising applications, as well as provide a convenient way for candidates to apply digitally.

Be careful about the length of your application, however, as long and complex application forms tend to have high drop off rates. Consider exactly what information you need to know from a candidate and try to simplify the input fields as much as possible – if an answer can be multiple choice or a tick box then not only is it quicker for applicants to complete, but also quicker for you to analyse.  

Selection

When there’s a high candidate to position ratio, AI technology can speed up the decision making process by analysing applications and video interviews to group candidates into highly recommended, recommended, and not recommended in a way that correlates well with the company’s own assessments. This has been shown to cut time to hire in half, reduce candidate dropout rates by 30%, and triple cost savings.

Additionally, AI can be a useful tool to combat the unconscious bias of recruiters. AI can be programmed to ignore certain pieces of information when screening candidates, such as ethnicity or immigrant status, removing any unconscious biases that recruiters may have towards people from minority backgrounds and making the process fairer and more inclusive.

Throughout your selection process, it’s important to plan and deliver regular updates and consistent communication with candidates. This ensures that candidates are aware of the process of their application, and increases engagement, while lack of communication, and not notifying an applicant of the outcome of their submission leads to candidates feeling less inclined to apply again in the future.

AI can automate communications to candidates at key points in the recruitment process, whether that’s acknowledging receipt of an application, inviting to interview or letting them know that their application has been unsuccessful. This makes a better experience for all candidates and saves recruiters a lot of time.

Hiring and onboarding

Once a job has been offered and accepted, it’s then time to go through screening and onboarding processes. In the UK, it’s a legal requirement for all employees to undergo a right to work check, to ensure that they’re legally able to work and earn money in this country.

Until very recently, this process had to include meeting the new employee in person and handling their physical, original documents that prove identification and right to work in order to satisfy the legal requirements.

Now, however, since the pandemic made it impossible to meet in person, this process can be done online using a certified identification verification service provider. This means that employees have a smoother onboarding process and can be based anywhere in the world.

It’s important to still be open to face to face meetings, however, as digital right to work checks require a valid UK passport. 1 in 5 candidates don’t have this, so in order to maintain fair hiring practices, ensure whether or not a candidate can undergo right to work checks digitally doesn’t impact on who is offered the job.

How can Reed Screening help?

With over 60 years of experience in recruitment, and over 10 years’ experience as screening specialists, Reed Screening is ideally placed to advise your organisation on the best way to ensure that your digital recruitment processes are beneficial to your company’s performance.

At Reed Screening, we’re dedicated to making the recruitment journey as smooth as possible for both employers and candidates, to help our clients source and retain the talent they need. Speak to our team today to find out how we can streamline and enhance your recruitment journey.