A promoted tweet came across my feed about a month ago that caught my attention. It was the new CEO of a San Francisco startup talking about recruiting, and communicating with candidates. I immediately liked the idea because it stood out.
Think about how common the narrative for San Francisco startups has become. We hear with great frequency that candidates should want to work at a San Francisco startup because:
- “We’re well funded”
- “We’re in hyper-growth mode”
- “We’ve got a great office”
- “We’ve got awesome perks”
Make no mistake, those are all great benefits. They’re just not going to help you stand out from the competition in San Francisco. You’ve got to have a better hook in today’s employment market, and that’s not limited to San Francisco.
Brent Franson seems to get that. Brent became CEO of Euclid in November 2014. On the surface, Euclid appears to have all of the boxes checked: $23M in funding, crazy growth, multiple jobs posted, great location in San Francisco, and so on. Yet, Brent decided to put himself out in the open on Twitter to talk about what sets Euclid apart beyond the boxes they already have checked.
Yes, his first tweet does speak of crazy growth. However, the dialogue that ensues shows an opportunity to interact with candidates (and potential customers) in an open and transparent manner. Below is the first in a series of three promoted tweets by Brent that I’ve seen since early November.
The impact
The first instinct is to judge the impact of the campaign by how many hires have come from it. However, that’s short-sighted in today’s market. The impact can actually be much wider on Euclid’s business:
- Hires — Of course, this is the #1 desired result
- Quality Applicants — This helps build a strong candidate pipeline
- Followers — Another way to build a strong candidate pipeline
- Customers — Prospects like to see how you handle yourself
- Branding — Your Employer and Consumer can brands grow as a result
The two keys to making this campaign successful are responsiveness and transparency. Twitter allows a “behind-the-scenes” look at a person and company that is unique on social media. People feel like they are getting to know you through your actions and responses.
In addition, candidates (and customers) often search multiple sites to find as much relevant information as possible about your company during the decision-making process. Learning more about the leader(s) can help make a positive impression.
There could be a direct impact on this particular candidate’s thought process. And there can also be an impact on other candidates reading it because of Brent’s responsiveness and transparency.
The reality
Bringing hiring managers closer to the recruiting process is like utopia for Talent Acquisition teams. Technologies like Twitter and mobile make it possible to make a big impact with a small investment of time. That’s critical for hiring managers because they don’t have much time to spare.
However, you have to know you’re going to get wild cards when taking to Twitter. You’re going to hear from folks who may not agree with you, or folks who just want to have a little fun with your take. How you handle the wild cards is what’s most important. Reality can definitely be leveraged into a positive impact, even if it doesn’t appear so on the surface.
Is it working?
I reached out to Brent directly to get his take on how this has worked. Here’s what he had to say:
- Why did you decide to take to Twitter? “Twitter has a connected, intelligent, and technologically savvy audience. We wanted to expand our reach as we’re hiring as quickly as we can in a competitive environment”
- How much time has it taken out of your daily/weekly routine? “Not much. Twitter has been great at helping us setup the campaign and responding to posts only takes a few minutes a day. It’s probably a total of 3-4 hours/week”
- What impact has Euclid seen from the campaign? “To date we’ve seen more than 4x the number of resumes since we launched the campaign”
I welcome feedback from others who have taken to Twitter for recruiting as well. The jury is out, but Brent’s story is certainly compelling.
Ongig is the first ever Employer Branding SaaS — it allows enterprises to create, distribute and measure interactive job descriptions at scale. American Express, Autodesk, Intel and Yelp are among the early users of the Ongig SaaS.
Image: The Sweet Spot
