There’s Gold in Your ATS — But Can You Mine It?
Whether you realize it or not, there’s gold buried inside your applicant tracking system (ATS) or candidate relationship management (CRM) system — candidate gold.
And yet, despite the enormous investments organizations are making in their recruitment and hiring processes, valuable data is too often cast aside to languish within these software tools. Highly skilled silver-medal applicants from your previous jobs are ripe for the taking, and you don’t need a map to find them.
Even better, you don’t even have to do it manually. Through a combination of rediscovery and reengagement, powered by artificial intelligence (AI), you can access this candidate data, clean up existing talent profiles in your ATS, and identify potential matches automatically, all while barely lifting a finger. This dynamic approach allows recruiters and hiring managers to surface overlooked candidates and ensure future interactions with talent inspire interest at every turn. Here’s how:
Step 1: Revitalize Your Existing Database
Somewhere inside your ATS or CRM is a candidate who wasn’t selected for a previous role for one reason or another but who might be a fit for a current requisition. With so many industries reporting massive talent shortages, isn’t it time you found out what happened to that candidate?
Between the opportunity to update outdated or incomplete talent profiles and the ability to reengage previous candidates, talent rediscovery bumps qualified candidates back to the top of your list while yielding significant insights into your past recruiting efforts and outcomes. Using multichannel engagement, you can connect with existing talent communities, enrich existing profiles in your ATS, and identify interest among potential candidates. Once the process is complete, what was previously a mess of outdated resumes and half-finished profiles will become a powerful source of qualified candidates, which facilitates easier outreach and provides a clear path forward for your recruiting process.
Step 2: Segment for Success
When you refresh your ATS, you welcome old candidates back into your talent pools and talent communities. Some will be hot, others cold, and still others you’ll want to keep warm. To reengage candidates and get them active in your pipeline again, you need to think about talent pool segmentation.
Simply put, talent pool segmentation means dividing candidates into smaller groups based on certain relevant criteria, such as shared skill sets or dates of last contact. Ideally, the resulting segments should correspond with current and future hiring needs — e.g., if you need more marketing talent, you should have a segment dedicated to skilled marketing candidates.
Smart, AI-driven technologies can assist in the segmentation process to open up new conversations, send out compelling updates to key candidates, and even move candidates into different workflows as needed. In this way, talent pool segmentation keeps you top of mind with qualified candidates while banishing the dreaded “recruiting black hole” without adding hours to your day. In fact, this type of engagement can save you time you would otherwise have to spend on sourcing and administrative tasks.
Step 3: Appraise and Apprise
According to a tweet from Aptitude Research, “only 51 percent of companies have a planned sequence of communications throughout the applicant lifecycle.” This does not bode well for recruiting effectiveness, especially when it comes to reengaging rediscovered talent. These candidates were declined by your company before, which means reigniting their interest — and keeping it fed — may require some smart strategizing.
After making an effort to reengage candidates by segment, you should create and share tailored messages that bring candidates up to speed and let them know what has happened with the company since you last spoke. These communications educate candidates while sparking new conversations that allow you to better understand their backgrounds, qualifications, and career goals. In turn, you can promote your employer brand, reinforce a positive relationship between company and candidate, and establish a regular rhythm for future communication. Armed with more details about each candidate, you can connect the right job seekers with the best-fit opportunities while automating key steps in your recruiting process.
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You are sitting on a metaphorical goldmine. Without a strategy for candidate rediscovery, segmentation, and engagement, you will never know its full worth. In today’s tight talent market, employers can’t afford to lose out on any candidates — especially not those already in their pipelines. By combining the right technology with a curated content strategy that accounts for candidate segments, you’ll be able to keep the pipeline flowing.
Bennett Sung is head of marketing at AllyO.