How Do You Stack Up to Other Recruiters on LinkedIn?
According to the 2014 Global Sourcing Survey, 96 percent of recruiters are the proud owners of a LinkedIn account. The survey, conducted by Social Talent and Alexander Mann Solutions, took a look at what 400 sourcers around the world had to say about the importance of LinkedIn in recruiting. Social Talent pulled together this infographic to highlight the most interesting findings concerning the current state of LinkedIn recruiting. Curious to see if your LinkedIn recruiting efforts match up to what other recruiters around the world are doing? Then, ask yourself these four questions and see what your answers reveal. The first question is pretty simple: Do you have a LinkedIn account? If you answered yes, then congrats! Go ahead and continue on with the rest of the questions to see if you’re using LinkedIn to its fullest advantage.
- What type of LinkedIn account do you have? (percent of recruiters that have this account)
- Basic (Free) (49 percent)
- Recruiter Professional Services or Recruiter Corporate (33 percent)
- Talent Basic, Talent Finder, or Talent Pro (11 percent)
- Business, Business Plus, or Executive (6 percent)
Recruiters who pay for a premium service scored 26 percent higher, and recruiters who have access to LinkedIn Recruiter scored 38 percent higher, on questions concerning sourcing tactics, like using Boolean operators, advanced search terms, and other related searching tasks. If you have access to a premium service, chances are you know a little more about sourcing techniques.
2. How many connections do you have?
- <500
- 501-2,000
- 2,001 – 10,000
Recruiters who answer A. are 10 times more likely to be in the lowest response rate category. Thankfully, they’re not alone: 20 percent of recruiters have less than 500 connections.
If you answered B. or C., you’re hanging with the 53 percent of recruiters who have between 501-2,000 connections and the 27 percent of recruiters who have from 2,001- 10,000 connections. What does this matter? Well, it means you’re at an advantage for a higher candidate response rate.
3. What’s your favorite way to reach out to a potential candidate?
- Send an InMail (38 percent of recruiters favor this)
- Send a connection request (30 percent)
- Send an email (21 percent)
- Give them a jingle! (6 percent)
If you answered A. or B., then you’re probably seeing an average response rate of 20-40 percent, like the rest of the recruiters who choose to contact passive candidates via LinkedIn.
If you answered D., then consider yourself one of the lucky few who know what it really takes to get a response. In fact, half of all recruiters who use the phone to connect with talent report response rates of 40 percent or higher.
How Do U.S. Recruiters Stack Up Against the Rest of the World?
Recruiters in the Americas are much more likely to pay for LinkedIn Premium accounts — 61 percent do, in fact. They are also more likely to engage passive talent by using InMails to reach out. However, they come in second-to-last in response rates: less than 10 percent. Yikes!
North American recruiters are also more likely to be either highly connected or barely connected at all. In fact, Northern American recruiters are 33 percent more likely to be considered a “Super Connector” (having more than 2,000 connections) than their EMEA counterparts, and there are fewer “average” recruiters in North America than anywhere else in the world. This means there’s a huge gap in North American sourcing success.
With recruiters either being the best of the best, or the worst of the worst, it’s apparent that sourcing efforts need some attention. One of the most compelling findings in this study is the conclusion that North American sourcers are relying too heavily on InMails and not enough on other social networking sites. In fact, 52 percent of recruiters use no professional networking sites other than LinkedIn in their recruiting practices. Small business owner Rebekah Campbell explained her reasoning for solely using LinkedIn in this New York Times article “Why I Do All My Recruiting Through LinkedIn” :
“As a small-business owner, I recognize that building the right team is crucial. We only have room for A-plus players, who will always be in good positions and may require quite a bit of convincing to leave. LinkedIn gives us access to the passive job hunter market that used to be available only through expensive recruiters, and it helps us seek out top quality candidates from within other companies.” – Rebekah Campbell
While this method works for a small business owner like Rebekah, it is most definitely not what recruiters should use as a best practice in social recruiting. There’s an evident need for recruiters in North America to leverage other social networking sites — and pick up the phone already!