Are your Recruitment adverts appealing or appalling?

Your advert needs to really sell the role to your potential candidates – I know that sounds obvious but a list of skills a candidate “must” have and a list of responsibilities they can expect to do is really not going to stand out.

In my years of working with clients to help them maximise results from their advertising, it never ceased to amaze me how surprised some clients are when their adverts did not receive an influx of applicants (especially once I read the adverts).From my experience there are still companies who post vacancies in a hurry taking parts of a job spec and parts of a company brochure and throwing something together. This method is clearly flawed – but take a look on a couple of job boards and you will see many examples of this.

Consider why they would want to work for your organisation,

  • Do you offer a great work life balance?
  • Do you work with prestigious clients?
  • Is it a fun environment?
  • What progression is available?
  • What are the USP’s that you would talk to a client about when selling your services – as these things are all really important to your future employees too.
  • Talk about your benefits, the quirkier the better sometimes; do you get everyone sandwiches on Fridays, offer more holiday that most companies, have amazing Christmas parties?

Whilst you wouldn’t expect a Candidate to ask you about benefits in the early recruitment stages, you should use them to your advantage in your Advertising wherever possible to make you stand out in a list of ten similar jobs.

Finally, make it easy to apply. There is nothing more frustrating than finding a great job that appeals and to be faced with a long daunting form, covering everything in your CV. I appreciate that in some instances making the process challenging is necessary, but when searching for Key skills and talent which is hard to find you need to capture that spur of the moment response and the candidate who is in the early stages of considering a change – before they go to your competitor!