With the unemployment rate continuing to linger near 50-year lows, recruiters who want to stand out in a sea of open positions have to think outside the box to capture candidates’ attention. Supplement your traditional job board posts with these creative ways to advertise job openings.
Why Creative Job Advertising Can Be Beneficial
Broaden your talent pool
If traditional job advertising methods are bringing you a great pool of candidates, by all means, continue using those methods. But if you’re like most recruiters, you’re bogged down by applicants who lack the necessary skills or experience to be a strong fit. Creative advertising tactics can help you reach a wider audience, which is more likely to include someone with the correct qualifications for your role.
Differentiate your company
When you rely on job boards alone, the only thing you have to differentiate yourself from other employers is your job description. This is important, to be sure, but creative advertising mediums open up a new range of opportunities to set yourself apart using images, sound, video, real-world testimonials, and more.
Communicate company culture
Think of your recruitment advertising like a puzzle piece. The right candidate is the matching second piece that fits perfectly into the first one. Crafting creative messaging helps you communicate your company culture in a way that encourages strong-fitting candidates to apply.
See how our recruiting process delivers the perfect candidate for your team.
Creative Ways to Advertise Job Openings That Will Attract Top Talent
1. Go big on billboards
Traditionally reserved for sales messaging, billboards are a great way to gain visibility among a huge volume of people quickly. Because their audience is limited to a single location, billboards are ideal for targeting candidates in a narrow geographic area. You could also use a billboard placed on a busy roadway to entice frustrated commuters to apply for an intriguing work-from-home role.
A short copy and a quick, simple call to action are absolute musts to make billboard recruiting successful.
2. Get personal with text messaging
Text recruiting, also known as SMS recruiting, allows you to communicate with candidates about job openings on a medium where your message is all but guaranteed to be viewed. Texting is highly personal, which is perfect for reaching out to a select group of prospects who would be a great fit for a job.
Because of the highly personal nature of texting, you should use it only to send highly tailored messages relevant to the recipient, like sending an urgent opening to a handful of top candidates already on your shortlist.
3. Include it in your packaging
It’s hard to think of a more engaged audience than a customer opening a much-anticipated package. Capitalize on their excitement by including a postcard or other bite-sized piece of recruitment marketing that highlights your employer value proposition and promotes your website’s careers page.
4. Use QR codes
QR codes made a big comeback during the pandemic, and consumers have gotten used to scanning them for more information on everything from ticket sales to restaurant menus. You can leverage them to share the details of your job openings and drive to your recruitment materials.
The beauty of QR codes is that they can be placed anywhere–on your product packaging, fliers, other marketing collateral, or even on the side of your building.
5. Paper the neighborhood
You can’t go wrong with a good old-fashioned ‘Help Wanted’ sign. Use paper fliers to advertise job openings in your front window and anywhere else; advertising can be placed in your immediate vicinity: table tents in the cafeteria, on the desk in the lobby, and on the wall in the elevator to give you a few ideas.
6. Create a social media campaign
Anyone can copy and paste a job description to the company page on Facebook (and you should!). But you’ll have better results if you take your social media efforts a step further and create a comprehensive campaign that consists of multiple pieces of content designed to engage users on different channels.
For example, you might share an employee testimonial on TikTok, create a ‘day in the life’ reel on Instagram, highlight your generous benefits on Facebook, and share job posts with relevant hashtags on Twitter/X.
Related: We Are Hiring Social Media Captions
7. Leverage live streaming
In addition to helping you increase your social media reach, live streaming is a great way to spotlight your employer brand. You can engage viewers with interactive components like polls or do a live Q&A to address questions from prospective candidates.
8. Capture eyes with a pop-up
Website popups have an average conversion rate ranging from 3 to 10%, which tends to be even higher on mobile devices. If you use your website popups to advertise job openings, you could receive several qualified applicants for every 100 website visitors.
This tactic works even better when you use software that can show popups strategically to specific groups of users, like visitors who have already viewed your careers page or people who have engaged with your recruitment marketing on social media.
9. Host a virtual event
Virtual events appeal to candidates and employers alike due to their flexible nature and low barrier to entry. A hiring event like a virtual job fair allows you to interface with job prospects nationwide. In contrast, informational events like webinars can increase your exposure and build awareness among new talent pools.
Related: Tips and Best Practices for Hosting a Virtual Hiring Event
10. Take advantage of free advertising
Don’t discount the power of cost-free advertising methods, like community bulletin boards. These can be found in coffee shops, gyms, laundromats, churches, grocery stores, parks, and other communal locations and offer an easy way to get your openings in front of hyper-local candidates.
Colleges and other community organizations like professional networks may also offer free or low-cost opportunities to advertise your job openings.
11. Take it on the move
If your city has a widely used public transit network, publicize recruitment messages on buses, trains, and cabs. Not only does in-transit advertising connect you with a captive audience, but it also allows you to tailor your message for people within specific neighborhoods or candidates who are already comfortable commuting for work.
12. Advertise in newsletters
E-newsletters are all the rage right now. Reach niche groups by partnering with publications your ideal candidate is likely to be reading, whether it’s a parenting blog to reach moms reentering the workforce or an investing newsletter to reach people with a knack for accounting and finance.
13. Amplify openings with podcasts
Podcasts are another great platform for reaching targeted audience groups. You can run traditional ads, played before, within, or after the regular podcast content, or native ads, where the host incorporates your message naturally into their script.
Another appealing thing about podcasts is that hundreds of thousands are out there. This means you’re certain to find a range of options that fit your budget and audience profile.
14. Rely on word of mouth
At the end of the day, referrals remain the strongest and most reliable source for high-quality hires. Spread the word about your openings to everyone within your network, ask your friends to tell their friends, and make it easy for employees to share your openings.
Additional Tips to Help Your Job Openings Get Noticed
Use strong imagery
Creative advertising gives you the advantage of using rich media like photos and videos to support your message. Make it count! Rather than using generic stock images, use real photos and videos of actual employees whenever possible. Images of people–specifically faces–are much more engaging than any other type of visual. Short video clips perform incredibly well, too.
Write captivating headlines
You only have a few seconds–or, in this case, a few words–to capture a candidate’s attention. Every word must carefully convey why a candidate should apply for your work. AI tools like Chat GPT can help you develop clever, engaging, and concise headlines for your recruitment ads.
Customize, customize, customize
We’ve already said it several times throughout this article, but the most effective job advertisements speak to a specific audience and its desires. Use candidate personas to help you narrow your focus on the type of person you’re looking for each job opening and create recruitment messaging that will attract them.
By using one or more of these creative ways to advertise job openings, you can enhance your employer brand while increasing the effectiveness of your recruiting strategy. Do you have another great idea for reaching candidates in a competitive market? Connect with us on LinkedIn and share your thoughts!
