Candidate emails, social media posts, the company blog and job listings are just a few of the points in your recruiting initiatives that should always, always, always include a call-to-action of some sort. Candidates, customers and clients need to know the next steps, what is expected of them and what they can expect from you.

Lucky for us, Dan Zarrella at HubSpot (@DanZarrella) has already done the research for us on the effectiveness of various forms of CTAs across different mediums, and presented the results in an infographic, “Social Calls-to-Action Work”.

Let’s Get More than Two Viewers on the Company Blog

A blog might not reach as wide an audience as any given social network might, but the company blog is your chance to get in-depth, establish credibility and build a strong brand. Out of over 50,000 blog posts analyzed, HubSpot’s research found that posts that included these three simple CTA words get more comments, views and links than those without.

• “Comment”
• “Link”
• “Share”

Including these words in your CTA is almost effortless. Make it a point to ensure that each and every blog post ends with at least one CTA. Your blog CTAs could be something as simple as:

“Did you find this information helpful? Comment below to let us know!”

Click here to help your followers out with their CTAs.

Super Charge your Facebook and Twitter

Social network image experts, Reppler, teamed up with Lab42 and conducted a study of over 300 individuals involved in the hiring process at their company. They found that 91% of them are using social media in their recruiting efforts. Everyone is using it, so it’s time to step up your game with effective CTAs.

Twitter

Zarrella used a database of over 1 million tweets to find the most effective CTA phrases out there.

• The phrase “Please ReTweet” got an astounding 50% more retweets
• “Please RT” got 40%
• Using neither phrase got just 10%

Is this useful to your followers?

Zarrella also shared some other CTAs that he found to be effective: “please help”, “spread” and “visit”. Obviously, we recommend going with “PleaseReTweet”, but getting too repetitive can hurt your results. Switch up your CTA phrases on Twitter regularly.

Facebook

Zarrella looked at the 10,000 most-liked Facebook pages to find out just how effective the CTAs they used were. He found that posts that included specific CTAs did indeed get more of the targeted action they requested. He looked for the following effective CTAs:

• “Like”
• “Comment”
• “Share”

Career Site and Aggregators

Your career page and listings should be chalked full of CTAs! Social share buttons should be on every page and on every listing. These should just be clickable icons that allow visitors to share any piece of information on your page.

Additionally, any videos should be accompanied by, “Click here to see…” Even though it is obvious that it is a video, and clicking on it will start the play, we have learned that simply adding a CTA will increase the likelihood of the requested action being taken.

For job listings on an aggregator like Simply Hired or Indeed, try getting more creative and specific. Instead of, “Apply Now”. How about, “Click here if this sounds like your next job” or “Want to know more? Click here to visit our company site and see more listings”.

Again, these CTAs that have proven effectiveness couldn’t be easier to implement in your recruiting process. These ultra-simple CTAs are how you expand your audience, get your job listings seen and build a strong brand. 

Visit our main blog here.

photo credit: FACEBOOK(LET) via photopin cc