I’ve been involved in recruitment for 16 years and set up my recruitment business nearly 2 years ago, yet I still struggle to know what to say when people (alright, my Mum) asks, “So, what sort of business are you?”.

Our unique way of looking at recruitment is so pioneering it’s hard to put us into any “recruitment” category…

• We’re not a traditional recruitment company, but we will find your next hire, doing all that a traditional recruitment business would do with our Flat Fee Recruitment Model
• We are not job board resellers, but we are transparent about our Job Board Advertising network and CV database services and use these tools to find your next hire, keeping costs to a minimum
• We don’t have the pretensions (or fees!) of a recruitment advertising agency, but we do provide Media Buying/Planning, Campaign Managment, Recruitment Outsource & Employee/Employer Branding and Communication services
• We would never join the bandwagon of ever growing “social media experts”, but we deliver effective Facebook Advertising Campaigns and provide simple Social Media Strategy & Consultancy for businesses

Bascially, we are a recruitment company to some, an ad agency to others and a marketing consultancy to the rest, but splendid to all!

So that’s as clear as mud still, then! Look, why not just get in touch and we’ll try and explain everything…

(Oh and we are also partners with the UK’s Recruitment SEO guru who runs our sister company Search Natives that will help get your site found, ethically…)

We would love you to use our flat fee service, that’s why we’re here. But Net Natives are here to shake up the prehistoric recruitment model and help every company become better at recruitment. We know that sometimes the best person is the friend of the friend already working for you. You just need to make sure you are getting the message out to them effectively.

These are the important rules to take into account when setting up an employer referral scheme:

Rule Number 1.

Plan, plan, plan is the name of the game. The more you put in, the more you put out.

Rule Number 2.

Create an employee focus group; ask your key stakeholders what would incentivise them to refer people. Empower ownership from day 1. How best to promote, what schemes would be best, are league tables relevant, that sort of thing. Remember that everyone is motivated differently; mix up the schemes and what people can get out of them. Have fun with the process.

Rule Number 3.

Give the scheme an identity, a name and maybe even a logo. Make it stand out; make everyone know what they are talking about. Establish timeframes and cut off points. Be clear with the message and incentives.

Rule Number 4.

Promote, Promote, Promote. You can offer your employees amazing incentives but if they don’t know your referral scheme exists you won’t get any referrals. Pretty obvious, really…

• Cleary explain the schemes with everyone in companywide of team meetings.
• Keep the schemes on the agendas.
• Use email, work notice boards, newsletters, whatever to keep everyone informed.
• Inform every new employee the scheme exists when they start working for your organisation.
• Even at interview stage let your candidates know about the scheme.
• If you use them, send out the details of the scheme with employee payslips.
• Encourage your staff to promote the scheme amongst each other and champion staff that uses innovative methods to promote it.

Rule Number 5.

Embrace and use relevant social media networks. Social Media sites are perfectly designed for you to promote a referral scheme as your employees and their friends are likely to use them. Take advantage of the fact that many of your employees will already be using them. Not only should you encourage your guys to use their own LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook network to promote the jobs and scheme you should at the very least…

Create a Referral Scheme Page on your Company page on Facebook and LinkedIn.

The page should have:

• Details of the incentives offered for successful referrals .
• Information on all the jobs that you are trying to fill.
• Details of all the methods staff can refer people. e.g. email, phone, facebook application form etc.
• Clear and eye catching imagery to get everyone engaged e.g. images and video.

Regularly tweet about your scheme on Twitter making sure you engage with your network.

Rule Number 6.

Keep your career page up to date – make sure that your career site (or work for us page) reflects the fact that you are hiring and is as clear as possible as to the process.

Rule Number 7.

Always respond to every referral – you should ALWAYS respond to every applicant, but even more so when it is a friend of an employee!

Final Rule

Measure & Review – the only way you’ll know if your referral scheme has been a success is if you can measure all the referrals you receive. Simple.

• Add all referred candidates to your applicant tracking system, even if it is just an excel spreadsheet. Even if they aren’t suitable for the role you’re recruiting for now, who knows, they could be perfect for a job you want to fill later on.
• Keep a referral database with a record of every referral made and who made the referral. This will be useful when you want to find out who to reward for the most successful referrals.
• Measure which methods work and increase that exposure. If you find a lot of people through, say, Facebook, maybe try some focused Facebook advertising next time round?

I think the key message is to give it a go and have a bit of fun with the format. If you need any help with structuring, branding or implementing your scheme, just get in contact.I hope this has been useful.

A slight tangent to the usual online recruitment stories and thoughts is the fact that we have signed up to the 10:10 Project to commit to cutting our carbon emissions. We are now a…

You can follow any twitter activity with the #1010 tag.

We are a small online recruitment business, so our impact is already pretty negligable, but we’ll do our best to try to do more…By putting this post out to our friends and subscribers, we hope to encourage others to get involved.

Twitter’s is never out of the news, whether with rallying cries against those damn Yankees criticising the NHS or the power of citizen journalism helping mobilise radical thought in Iran.

But I can’t help feeling its mighty PR machine has missed a trick by not ascribing Twitter’s influence over the gradual global recovery from recession.

Twitter has been perfectly placed during this period of slow trade and rising unemployment to be used as the effective business tool for the quick witted. Twitter’s reach and ability to bring together like minded people has provided a platform for business growth for those businesses willing to embrace it.

Though we are not in the same league as Dell, Net Natives can directly attribute £1000s of revenues generated by twitter to our business model. Real revenues for our online recruitment services, not “how to use twitter” or other idiots’ guide and abstract revenues.

And I still haven’t cracked it or think I am using it to its maximum potential. I still think before I tweet (cardinal sin, I know), don’t put out enough personal information; engage enough with my audience, or whatever else I am constantly instructed to do by another twitterers. But, so what…I (and my company) are having a go – getting involved and using the medium.

But, whilst I am an evangelist, I am an old fashioned sort of fella at heart. When I started work, the only means for communication was the phone and fax (why do people still insist on faxes!), so I still use the telephone call as my primary communication tool, where I can. But, we are now in the business of mixed mediums.

I use Twitter, but don’t rely on it. I don’t agree with comments that mandate sole faith in social media and proclaim the end of other mediums. This short term view will not help develop business, but will restrict growth and scope. In my business, online recruitment, the key is to maximise all avenues (be it recruitment advertising, SEO, SEM, social media, referrals – whatever, do it all but do them well).

I started with the question, “Can Twitter end the recession?” I suppose the answer is yes, but not on its own…

I wanted to put down some thoughts about employee referrals as there doesn’t seem to be a lot of information or help out there for businesses. Probably because it erodes the revenues of recruitment companies and the agencies charge a fortune to put something in place. Well, nuts to that. If it’s worth knowing, it’s worth sharing…

And look, of course, we want you to use our online flat fee recruitment service, that’s why we’re here. But let’s all try and shake up the prehistoric recruitment model and help each other become better at recruitment.
We know that sometimes the best person is the friend of the friend already working for you. You just need to make sure you are getting the message out to that you are hiring effectively to your cheerleaders.
My thoughts here should be seen as a basic structure and you can always ask call me for more advice if you need it.

Before you put any referral schemes in place consider the five key elements:
1. What type of people are your schemes aimed at?
2. Is there are defined timescale for the schemes?
3. What sort of bonus should the hires reflect?
4. How do the schemes fit with the culture of your company?
5. How will you promote your schemes?

So Rule Number 1. Plan, plan, plan is the name of the game. The more you put in, the more you put out.
Rule Number 2. Create an employee focus group, ask your key stakeholders what would incentivise them to refer people. Empower ownership from day 1.

How best to promote, what schemes would be best, are league table relevant, that sort of thing.
Remember that everyone is motivated differently, mix up the schemes and what people can get out of them.

Have fun with the process.

Rule Number 3. Give the scheme an identity, a name and maybe even a logo. Make it stand out, make everyone know what they are talking about.

Establish timeframes and cut off points.

Be clear with the message and incentives

Rule Number 4. Promote Promote Promote You can offer your employees amazing incentives but if they don’t know your referral scheme exists you won’t get any referrals. Pretty obvious, really…
1. Cleary explain the schemes with everyone in companywide of team meetings. Keep the schemes on the agendas.
2. Use email, work notice boards, newsletters, whatever it takes to keep everyone informed
3. Inform every new employee the scheme exists when they start working for your organisation
4. Even at interview stage, let your candidates know about the scheme
5. If you use them, send out the details of the scheme with employee payslips (this is a great medium with sales people!)

Rule Number 5. Embrace and use relevant social media networks. I may make this a seperate post, as this could be such a big topic because social media sites are perfectly designed for you to promote a referral scheme.

Take advantage of the fact that many of your employees will already be using them and it is direct. USE SOCIAL MEDIA!

Not only should you encourage your guys to use their own LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook network to promote the jobs and scheme you should at the very least…

1. Create a Referral Scheme Page on your Company page on Facebook and LinkedIn.
The page should have:
a. Details of the incentives offered for successful referrals
b. Information on all the jobs that you are trying to fill.
c. Details of all the methods staff can refer people .
e.g. email, phone, facebook application form etc.
d. Clear and eye catching imagery to get everyone engaged
e.g. images and video.
2. Regularly tweet about your scheme on Twitter making sure you engage with your network.

Rule Number 6. Keep your career page up to date – Again, I may expand on this later as this is a massive subject. Suffice to say, make sure that your career site (or work for us page) reflects the fact that you are hiring and is as clear as possible as to your recruitment process.

Rule Number 7. Always respond to every referral – you should ALWAYS respond to every applicant, but even more so when it is a friend of an employee!

Final Rule. Measure & Review - the only way you’ll know if your referral scheme has been a success is if you can measure all the referrals you receive. Simple.
1. Add all referred candidates to your applicant tracking system, even if it is just an excel spreadsheet. Even if they aren’t suitable for the role you’re recruiting for now, who knows, they could be perfect for a job you want to fill later on. Your candidates are your clients
2. Keep a referral database with a record of every referral made and who made the referral. This will be useful when you want to find out who to reward for the most successful referrals.
3. Measure which methods work and increase that exposure. If you find a lot of people through, say, Facebook, maybe try some focused Facebook advertising next time round?

I hope this has been useful. I think the key message is to give it a go and have a bit of fun with the format. I would love to hear about other ideas and schemes , though, so please get involved or get in contact.

Real quick one this, but thought I would share a little about social bookmarking which I personally use and always recommend to clients as part of their social media strategy. All it does, is simply allow you to save your bookmarks online, tag them with relevant keywords and share them with others (hence the “social” part).

My favourites are hardly unique:

• Delicious – for all websites Net Natives’ Delicious Page.

and

• Digg – a social bookmarking site designed specifically for news items. Users can vote on different links (“digging”) and the most “dugg” stories will appear on the site’s home page. e.g. Take a look at Net Natives’ Digg Page.

Delicious and Digg are just 2 of hundreds of social bookmarking sites including Technorati, Reddit, Stumbleupon and Ma.gnolia to name but a few. We’d recommend playing around with different sites as each has a different slant.

Why should you use social bookmarking?

1. It allows you to view your favourite sites from anywhere in the world, as your bookmarks are on a website and not stored on your computer’s hardware

2. They are fantastic for search engine optimisation. Google’s search algorythm takes into account what websites your site is listed on and how popular those sites are. As websites like Digg and Delicious are very popular, having your business site bookmarked on these sites should improve your Google ranking

3. They are excellent for promotion. Add your facebook page, twitter page, Blog, MySpace page and any other online presence you have to these site as they have millions of users and are an easy and free method to increase your online exposure

4. To improve internal business communication. As bookmarks are saved online it allows potentially hundreds of employees within a business to view them simultaneously saving time, money and encouraging interaction

You’ll see at the bottom of this blog post there is a social bookmarking tool bar allowing you to add this very blog to a variety of different sites. It’s easy to add this to your own blog and is available from GetSocial.

Told you this was a quick one. But hopefully useful. I am always up for hearing about any good social bookmarking suggestions or possible uses, so please get in touch.

Hey, Don here again. We’ve just done some pretty nifty social media strategy for one of the Further Education Colleges and I wanted to talk about our experiences and pass on some stuff we picked up along the way. Interested to know if you have any thoughts or ideas to what we came across.

Just quickly, it’s probably best to explain how and why a flat fee online recruitment business gets involved in social media strategy. Simple really, it’s all about engagement. We use all manner of the most relevant and innovative online tools to help our clients better engage with their potential and current employees.

In the case of the FE college we used our tricky little social media skills to help with their enrolment and employer engagement programmes.

This is, of course, not a definitive list, but if you are considering a social media strategy (and you most certainly should), this will give you some ideas to get you going…

1. Most Futher Education and Higher Education Colleges have banned use of social media in the colleges – don’t, you need to embrace them, they aren’t going away!

2. EVERY College is already represented somewhere on some of the social media sites – you are already “out there.”

3. There are fragmented strategies across the different departments and curriculum areas – they need to be co-ordinated and structured

4. You will already have some wonderful blogging activity with your lecturers and students – capitalise on it

5. All of the FEs have wonderful content and events that can be promoted through social media sites

6. You have a number of different stakeholders involved (different types of students, lecturers, staff, employer partners, etc) and you need effective campaigns for each.

7. These campaigns need to be “joined up”

8. There are many ways to get around the issue of “opt in” for people representation on video sites

9. Most of the FE Colleges’ organic Swearch Engine Optimisation (SEO) is not enhanced to its best capabilities, which can be rectified and managed through an effective social media campaign

10. Every single FE College’s Employer Engagement campaigns would be enormously improved by effective use of business social media tools such as LinkedIn

OK, so some quick things you need to do immediately

1. Work out where you are already represented through social media

2. Create a social media policy – work out what you need it for, who it will effect AND who will take responsibility

3. Get the most use out of Google as you possibly can (maps, images, tools etc.)

4. Engage all stakeholders, the students, the faculty members, alumni, businesses, everyone…

5. Represent yourself on the most popular mediums (and use them!)
a. Twitter
b. Facebook
c. Myspace
d. Bebo
e. LinkedIn
f. Flicr
g. YouTube

6. Link your social media sites with relevant content from your blogs and college content

7. Interchange the content on with each social media

8. Get yourself registered on the relevant social bookmarking sites

9. Create targeted advertising campaigns on Facebook for niche courses

10. Promote your social media activity across your off line marketing materials as well on email signatures, etc.

11. Measure and track activity using online social media tools such as howsociable

And a final couple of points here

1. Be comfortable with what you are doing and who you are online (some sites will “feel” better than others to use)

2. Don’t be intrusive but get involved

3. Be consistent and responsive (get involved, again)

4. Don’t forget it is for the long term, so make it part of your strategy

There was so much more to what we did and found out and I am going to expand on a few things that I think will be interesting (particularly about Facebook advertising and Twitter), but feel free to let me know what you think. Or get in touch if you want to find out more.

I wrote a post back in April about this subject and my concerns over certain “experts” involvement in social media and recruitment and how the subject has not, and possibly, cannot define itself due to the ;

• changing nature of the medium
• concerns over some legal issues
• the brand is represented by personalities who can be transient

I am a massive advocate of social media; you’re reading this, so it works, and as a progressive online recruitment business we are getting more and more involved in the subject matter, helping clients better engage directly with potential candidates, their employees and clients.

But, and here is the massive BUT, the Barkers and Penna fall out has proven that NOONE can be certain of getting it right. The interesting point with Barkers is that here is a company that is professing to be all things social media and has yet scored a spectacular own goal by not adhering to some simple truths about the medium.

This is not to say that Penna were wrong to buy the business, they have done exactly the right thing; they have bought a great brand and fit for their business for a song because it wasn’t able to adjust to the new economy. But their staff and suppliers are hurting and are social media savvy. So far the social media experts of the Barkers business have been silent on the matter of redundancies and client/supplier obligations and this could have a potential detrimental effect on their brand.

I know that Penna/Barkers are dealing under the obligations of being a public listed company, but why are they not using the medium themselves to make micro announcements, to continue brand building and positioning themselves as the partner of choice for their clients, suppliers and employees? Where are the responses to the blogs, forums and tweets that are asking for this engagement? Where are the creative solutions?

What we have is the old problem of individuals being tied to the demands of the brand, but as all “social media experts” know, this does not cut it with the new world of work.

And no, I don’t have the answers, we are all entering into territory we have never been before – social media is not definitive, it changes and the rules and game is changing with it. That’s fine, but you have to be honest in what you know, what you can do and what this means to your brand. Always be open, always engage, always empower.

If the experts can’t get it right, what help is there for the rest of us…?

As always, welcome your comments and thoughts…

Posted April 29th 2009

This is just a small post this one, but one I thought would be timely considering that the focus for the onrec conference is social media and that there is a new social media in recruitment conference soon to be held.

I think it is interesting that for each of these conferences there will be no external industry guides to provide some factual ideology and thoughts. I would have thought that a sensible debate on the legal raimifactions needs to be addressed – by experts, not salesman. There has already been a case of Bank refusing  to allow HR to use social media for recruitment due to legal implications. The obvious problems of perceived discrimination and privacy violation are likely to rear their ugly heads.

Also was interested to read in the FT yesterday that 60% of Twitter users fail to tweet again in the following month. If that’s the case, where does that leave the next big thing?

Lots of “experts” seem to be coming out of the wood work for these conferences. Not sure how we have all become experts by being merely early adopters, identifiers and users. I can’t talk, I have just finished a detailled social media strategy for a large college. But there are many issues around social media and it is easy to represent yourself online when YOU are the brand not a transient employee.

Would be interested to know people’s thoughts in this one. As always comments are warmly welcomed.