Social Recruiting and Your Executive Job Search

Are you a senior-level executive still hesitating to embrace social networking for your job search and healthy career management?

Did you know that more than 90% of employers will use social networks and social media to find talent in 2012?

That’s what Jobvite, a leading recruitment platform for the social Web, found in their 2012 Social Recruiting Survey, after polling more than 1,000 human resources and recruitment professionals on their social recruiting activities and intentions.

Social recruiting has become a necessary and highly effective way for them to quickly assess a large candidate pool and identify good-fit talent. And it costs them less than sorting through thousands of resumes and saves the expense of posting to job boards.

Now in its fifth year, the survey shows that recruiters no longer focus just on LinkedIn. They’re relying more heavily on the other 2 in the “big 3”, Twitter and Facebook:

- 66% now use Facebook.
- 54% now use Twitter.
- LinkedIn use jumped to 93% of respondents, compared to 87% in 2011 and 78% in 2010.

What results did social networking deliver?

73% of employers successfully hired a candidate through social media, compared with 63% in 2011 and 58% in 2010.
Of those social hires, 89% were found on LinkedIn, 25% on Facebook and 15% on Twitter.
Since implementing social recruiting, almost half (49%) received more candidates to choose from.
43% said the quality of applicants has improved.
33% are seeing more employee referrals, which typically lead to the most valuable hires.
20% reported it takes less time to hire when using social recruiting.

Despite findings like these, and many other solid indications that social recruiting has arrived, the message is still not sinking in with some executive job seekers.

Too often, the client prospects I speak with shy away from having any social media presence because they worry about online safety.

Some also worry that, if they’re easy to find, they’ll be inundated with requests to pick their brain or make introductions.

But many executive job seekers are starting to get it. More and more they’ll have at least a LinkedIn profile, and sometimes a Facebook or Twitter account, or other social network presence.

They’re positioning themselves to be found and qualified by recruiters and hiring decision makers at their target companies.

How can you keep pace with these social-savvy competitors in the executive job market if you’re not even in the game?

Self-Google or Doom Your Executive Job Search

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