How Recruiters can use Blogging to Attract Talent

 The link between blogging and attracting talent may not seem immediately obvious to employers and recruiters. I mean, when you need talent now, tomorrow or next month, what good will blogging do? How can turning pen to paper (or fingertip to keyboard) and penning many passages of lyrical beauty help your business solve today’s talent attraction problems ?

Candidates are hungry for industry and job-related blog content

First, some 2011 research from Ask Your Target Market  claims that around 50 percent of people read blogs sometimes and just over half of them do this to find out about topics related to their industry, e.g. job-related stuff.

I expect blog readership to be much higher now as a substantially higher proportion of the population now has smartphones from which to access blogs regularly. This growth in smartphone ownership should not be underestimated. For example, there are now more than 100 million US smartphone users, having increased 13 percent since October alone. Also, with 5 inch screens set to dominate sales in 2013, you can now expect to see a very active blog audience who is hungrier than ever for blog content relating to its industry, career and job search. And employers and recruiters should respond to this opportunity as there is a burgeoning pool of passive and active talent just waiting to be drawn to your corporate career site through a well-targeted blogging strategy.

Blogging for talent strategy must be well targeted

It’s important that you develop a well-targeted blogging scheme for talent strategy. You are not looking to compete with the big career portals on generalist career topics, like resumes, interviews, etc., as there is already a fierce battle going on for the top 10 slots on Google for these kind of items, which you’re likely to struggle to compete in.

So, an effective blogging strategy for employers and recruiters must differentiate itself from a career portal or industry blog  so that it adds value to the candidate audience in some way. Ideally, employer or corporate careers blogs should be tightly focused around their industry, the roles they hire for and all within the context of skill development and career advancement. This is potentially a great way to attract qualified and talented candidates to your corporate careers blog who may be in the hunt for a job or career with you or a company like you, now or in the future.

So, what kind of content should you use in your employer blog?

I think there are several types of blog content that will be useful in attracting qualified and relevant talent to your employer website or recruiting site. First, we know that talent is drawn to companies with a great culture, personality and spirit; so, encourage some of your most engaging hiring managers and specialists to blog occasionally on industry and profession-related topics so the correct keywords are there to draw relevant talent who can at the same time see and be inspired by your  most engaging people and great culture.

Recruiters and talent specialists can get in on the blogging act too; but, as I said earlier, I do not recommend that you blog on general career topics as it is too competitive a space and if you do attract talent, it is unlikely to be specific to your business as your content is not serving as a filter.

I think you can add most value by blogging on career-related topics, but within the firm context of your industry, profession or company. A great series of articles for your employer blog might be, “6 Top Tips to Get a Job as a [ a role you hire for].” This can be repeated across all the roles you recruit for and you can make it specific to your company, sector or geographic location. You can replicate this approach across the whole range of careers topics, such as resumes, interviews, pay rises, promotions etc., but make sure it is firmly contextualized around your industry, profession, culture and roles you hire for.