The Importance of Candidate Follow Up

The act of engaging job candidates both pre and post-interview is almost an art form. One that if done well is the perfect way to set your company apart as the employer of choice. All too often interviewers seem to forget that as an ambassador of their company, they are being judged just as much as the interviewees are. Especially in a candidate-driven market.

One of the biggest complaints candidates have in the job-hunting process is a lack of communication. In fact, research shows that 3 out of 5 candidates complain about being ghosted by recruiters.

Following up with every candidate who applies to your company - whether you decide to hire them or not - is a crucial stage in the recruitment process. It can be a deciding factor in whether you manage to claim top talent or not. But exactly what makes candidate follow-up such a critical step of the process? And, how do you master the art of it? Let’s take a look.

What Is Candidate Follow-Up?

Candidate follow-up means taking the time to keep in touch throughout the recruiting process. One of the quickest and easiest ways to improve your candidate experience is to incorporate automation into your process to maintain regular, transparent communication with everyone in your pipeline.

Follow-up should typically be done when a lead’s application is received, as they move through each stage of your recruiting funnel, and after each interview. It can include a simple, “we received your application” and go all the way up to scheduling interviews, or informing a candidate whether or not they were hired.

When you make an effort to send warm messages throughout the hiring process, it goes a long way toward making the candidate feel respected and appreciated. Now that we know what candidate follow-up is, let’s take a look at why it’s so important.

It Speaks Volumes About Your Brand

Your reputation is a significant part of your employer brand. Failing to respond to your candidates after they have submitted a resume, could reflect poorly on your company brand and culture, portraying you as indifferent or impolite. In the internet age, everything is more transparent.

Chances are high that future candidates will check out your Glassdoor employer profile, even before submitting an application. To help ensure you receive positive feedback from candidates, it's important to go the extra mile during the recruiting process. Negative feedback can damage a company’s credibility and could cost you that ideal candidate.

It Shows Respect

The application process can be stressful and time-consuming for a candidate. Studies show that on average a candidate can spend 1.5 to 2 hours per job application. In a perfect world, each candidate would receive a personalized response, but realistically without the help of automation, this can be an impossible task.

However, by utilizing Seiza’s recruitment automation platform, employers can reply to every single applicant in seconds without any additional effort. This feature allows hiring teams to engage 90% or more of the candidates who enter their pipeline.

It Keeps Top Talent Engaged

In the current labor market when it comes to employment, in-demand candidates hold all the cards. Effective candidate follow-up can help to keep quality candidates engaged in your hiring process. Seiza's research has found that 60% of candidates will move on to another opportunity if they haven’t heard back from a recruiter within a week.

When labor markets are tight, constant contact can be a game changer, particularly when hiring frontline workers or in high-volume industries.

It Closes More Top Candidates

In addition to keeping top candidates engaged in the process, effective follow-up can also help you convert applicants into hires faster. If a top candidate is in high demand it’s not unrealistic to expect that they could receive multiple offers.

Strong communication helps you provide a positive candidate experience, and stand out among your competitors. When it comes to the modern recruiting landscape, time is of the essence, with the help of automation you can turn speed into your competitive advantage.

How Automated SMS Follow-Up Works

Let's say you're interested in a candidate. How can you hope to reach them first before the competition approaches them? Automation is the answer. The faster you make contact with a candidate, the more likely you will be to hire them.

Seiza automation allows you to use simple workflows to automate sending an SMS to candidates each time they move to a new stage in the recruiting funnel.

Why SMS Instead of Email?

We’ll start with some striking facts:

Email only has a 20% open rate, SMS, on the other hand, has a 98% open rate
Between 50% - 80% of emails sent land directly in Spam files
On average SMS is responded to within 90 seconds vs email which has a response time of 90 minutes

Sending SMS vs. email or phone communication allows you to take action quickly, and at scale to ensure a major reduction in candidate drop-off. The best part, by using automation workflows, your recruiters save time while keeping every single candidate engaged and informed of their progress.

Final Thoughts

Candidate follow-up is a large part of creating a positive candidate experience. It can help you keep top candidates engaged, improve your employer brand and win over more top talent.

Sending a personalized SMS note to every candidate in your pipeline can feel like an impossible goal, but with the help of automation from Seiza, it doesn’t have to be. Our platform can help your organization to:

Engage candidates continuously using the most responsive source: SMS, Messenger, etc.
Automate 1:1 and 1-to-many messages to stay agile even with a large volume of candidates
Reach 90% of the candidates who enter your pipeline
Establish meaningful relationships with your candidates to drive preference for your company