The Employer Engagement Guide: 3 Ways to Create a Cracking Candidate Experience

Check out Part Four of the Employer Engagement Guide. Want to improve your candidate experience? We’ve pulled together a few steps you can take to deliver an exceptional candidate experience.

In the last 10 years or so, the world of recruitment has experienced a full-throttle shift. Candidate positions are opening at an alarming rate, so they have more decision-making control than ever before. Jobseekers can choose to be pickier. Consequently, companies are boosting their recruitment tactics to target the best candidates. Thus, candidate experience is the trending buzzword in the world of recruitment.

Want to improve your candidate experience? We’ve pulled together a few steps you can take to deliver a brilliant candidate experience. However, before we go on, let’s define what the term candidate experience means.

What does candidate experience mean?

Essentially, candidate experience means how the applicant views a would-be employer. It involved every point of contact between the company and job seeker, from the first touchpoint through to the job offer acceptance.

Your goal as an employer is to deliver a positive candidate experience so that the job seeker feels respected and appreciated during the entire process.

Why is a good candidate experience in recruitment vital?

If a candidate feels uneducated, distressed, or ignored, this can damage your recruitment experience and reputation, reflecting poorly on your firm as a whole.

Instead, a good candidate experience is advantageous in more ways than one. For example, it helps:

• Form your company branding
• Boost your brand awareness
• Get hold of great candidates
• Entice more jobseekers
• Make you stand out from your competitors
• Enhances the quality of talent
• Attract more clients

How to create the best candidate experience

In light of this, check out our three steps to create a better candidate experience.

1. Streamline your application process

The users of today, particularly generation Z, expect your website to be easy on the eye and easy to use. Today’s jobseekers want to get what they need swiftly, in the least amount of clicks they can.

Whether your candidate’s older or younger, be sure that your entire application process is silky-smooth. To make sure this occurs, think about the below:

Review your existing application process

Imagine you’re the candidate. Can you remove any redundant steps? Are there any faults and bugs? If yes, then make your application process easier to use. For example, work with a job platform that provides speedy, on-site applications or automates specific elements.

Make your site mobile-friendly  

More and more site traffic comes from mobile devices, so your application process needs to cater to today’s jobseekers’ customs and requirements. A recent survey shows that around 62 per cent of jobseekers use mobile devices to search for positions. So, ensure your job adverts are optimised for mobile and easy to find.

Job adverts

In a battle to obtain top talent, you need to seize the best candidates before other companies do. With this in mind, your job advertisements are less about lists of requirements. They’re more about encouraging jobseekers to apply to become part of your team.

Specify what they can get out of it and the reasons why they must select you. Describe what it’s like to work at your company, and what perks and benefits you offer. The key to a winning candidate experience is making your job adverts as alluring as possible to attract quality candidates.

2. Make your company brand stand out online 

If ever there were a sound piece of advice to give, it’d be this: treat your candidates as you’d treat your customers.

This saying couldn’t be more accurate, especially when it comes to creating a good candidate experience. In this day and age, you need to create an exceptional reputation for your firm that goes beyond the services or products you provide. You need to shout about your office being a brilliant place to work. Your aim? To have people coming across your online content and perceiving you as an outstanding employer.

So, think about the following:

• Upping your social media game. Focus your efforts on the most-used platforms and build an online presence.
• Launching a careers page. Upload some real-life snaps of your existing staff members with quotes about your firm’s culture.
• Run brand awareness ads to exemplify your company brand and boost your reputation as a place to work. You could even try out a video ad!

3. Create a clear, smooth, and stable communication process with jobseekers

The adage “communication is key” couldn’t be truer. Throughout the recruitment process, communication comes in numerous forms. To establish a top-quality candidate experience, create functioning communication channels coupled with excellent communication habits.

Here’s how:

Transparency

Jobseekers need to know the score. Candidates want to know whether or not they’ve made it to the next round of interviews – and fast. So, we advise being as responsive as possible with your candidates.

Your candidates need to know how to prepare, the length of time each process takes, and when they’re likely to hear back from you.

Integrity

Be truthful and clear before, during, and after interviews. As an employer, you want to create an honest, authentic environment. Once jobseekers notice you’re truthful with them, the more chance you have of them being truthful with you. Not only does this save time, but it also develops your reliability as an employer, so you build authentic relationships.

Discretion

Diplomatic rejection adds to a positive candidate experience. Since you won’t select every experienced candidate, it’s your responsibility to respectfully relay this information to the jobseekers you didn’t choose.

You can get free rejection letter templates on the internet and tweak them as you see fit. What’s more, consider giving rejected applicants constructive criticism. In doing so, there’s more chance of them re-applying at some point again.

A final note 

Delivering an exceptional candidate experience ensures your company brand stands out over other employers. In turn, you streamline your application process, forming an unswerving, transparent, and steady communication process with jobseekers. We recommend using an applicant tracking system (ATS) to monitor applicants.

If you need a hand finding top talent for your finance company, we’re here to help. Give us a call on +44(0)20 7971 7700 or drop us a line at info@markettalent.co.uk.