I had the opportunity to interview Chris Russell from RecTech. I was really impressed by my conversations with him over the phone on the state of recruitment marketing. I hope you enjoy reading this interview!
How did you get into recruitment marketing?
I got my start back in 1999 when I launched my own local job board network in Connecticut called AllCountyJobs. Each of the job sites focused on specific counties in the Northeast and I ran it for 13 years before selling it in 2012.
Along the way learned a lot about online recruiting like how to write a great job description, how to market jobs online and attract talent. I began writing and podcasting during that time and became the first ever to podcast jobs through a site called Jobs in Pods which had some success before the great recession hit. It was around this time that I got my nickname as ‘mad scientist of online recruiting’.
After selling my job boards I also became a recruiter for a software company and a small cruise line. So I have quite a unique skillset between being a vendor and practitioner.
Advice you would give someone starting out in recruiting?
Learn to leverage technology to do your job better. Today’s recruiter must be adept at using different tools and tactics to find and hire people. You need to be ‘digital savvy’ particularly around the sourcing function and how to engage prospective candidates. Never lose that human touch, but use recruiting technology to make yourself more efficient at your job.
Which companies do a job with employment branding?
That’s a tough question. I would say that most companies as a whole do a poor job of attracting talent. I’ve made it my mission to help them get better at it through RecTech Media. Recruiting marketing, but most recruiters and HR folks were not trained in that discipline so they fail when it comes to things like job advertising, writing job descriptions that sell, and communicating their employer’s value proposition.
But if I had to name a few I would point to firms like Gartner and Sodexo. Each of them does a great job with their brands when it comes to careers. They blog, are very active on social media and bring an authentic voice to their channels.
What’s changed in the recruitment marketing world in the past 5 years?
I’d say that recruitment marketing is more about visual and being authentic than ever before. Candidates expect to see pictures of your office, videos of employees and read your reviews on Glassdoor.
In fact channels like Instagram are basically the ‘visual Glassdoor’ for Millennials. Jobvite just did a study and the majority of those age 18-29 will look for a company’s photos on Instagram over sites like Linkedin and Facebook.
Future predictions on EB. What will change in the next 5 years?
I think we will see a renewed focus on job descriptions as their own landing page. Jobs are everywhere now so that page is often the first time a seeker learns about your company. It had better be visual and engaging. I think we will also see the advent of new roles like in-house recruitment marketers and social recruiters whose only role is to search for and find candidates off the major social channels.
Favorite chrome extension or tool?
I do a lot of blogging so my favorite tool that I use every day is called Snag It. I use it to capture screenshots and mark them up and also for screencast videos. It’s the best $50 I ever spent.
What types of services/consulting do you offer?
Employers can hire me on a part-time basis to handle all or some aspects of their recruitment marketing including managing their social media channels (I’ll create new content each week), rewriting job descriptions, manage their ATS and job board vendors, Facebook recruiting campaigns and even writing their Employer Value Proposition. I also do live teaching webinars at RecTechLive.com most of which are free to attend.
You can connect with Chris Russell here:
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