There was a time when recruiters found great candidates through word of mouth or postings on job boards, but these days the best applicants are literally in the palm of your hand. SMS is revolutionizing every aspect of business, and if that seems like an overstatement, it isn’t. More than 75 percent of the mobile phones currently in use are now SMS enabled, and mobile marketing automation is expanding that already promising accessibility to exponentially exciting new levels.

The Initial Job Opening
A lot of in-house recruiting departments as well as employment placement agencies utilize online job boards and encourage jobseekers to register for an account in order to save job listings, upload an application, and so on. By building SMS permissions into that registration process, subscribers can now be notified of new openings as they become available.

Taking Applications
Once you’ve notified eager job seekers that there’s now an opening, you have to somehow manage the incoming flood. There are applications to send, documents you’ll need to request, and personal details required every step of the way. You could call and ask for these things, but an automated text with an embedded link that, when clicked, delivers recipients straight to the upload page just makes more sense – and, because the process is automated, the computer is responsible for nudging tardy applicants so you can concentrate on more important things.

Holding Interviews
Depending on the job opening and industry, the first round of interviews for a position may include dozens or even hundreds of people. Coordinating all those interview times is a logistical nightmare – or at least it used to be. Opt for SMS software that includes a calendar function and those scheduling texts will go out all on their own (once you’ve set the parameters, of course). This works for last-minute changes in the time or location of the interview, too.

Onboarding Your New Employee
Once you’ve checked all the references and analyzed all the interviews, you’re going to have to actually pick someone. If you’re lucky, your number one choice will accept the offer, and it’s time to onboard your newest employee. Once again, there’s an opportunity to streamline the process by sending everything from the actual job offer to orientation paperwork via automated text. Nervous about asking employees to send personal data over a mobile connection? Relax. If financial institutions are finding ways to accept credit card applications via SMS, you can find similar solutions for social security numbers and other information necessary for employee files or background checks.

Ongoing Company-Wide Communication
So now your formerly nameless, faceless applicant is a part of your corporate family. The power of automated SMS has just begun! In fact, efficiently dispersing routine information and helping to streamline the day-to-day functions of your human resource department is really what automated SMS does best. Once you’ve set up targeted recipient lists and designated certain actions as triggers, you can use your software to:

• Inform employees of an unexpected office closing due to weather or maintenance concerns
• Invite everyone to the annual employee picnic or a mandatory company-wide meeting
• Let everyone know about the upcoming blood drive and even schedule donation times using short codes
• Request updated contact information once a year and include a link to the corresponding form

Being a recruitment manager is a seriously hard job. Thankfully, automated SMS is here to not only make our jobs easier but, even more important, to help us do them better. With 47 percent of millennials now using mobile devices during their job search (a number that promises to grow as increasingly digitally dependent generations come of age), it’s a technological upgrade we should be fired for not considering.

What’s Next?
What do you think of what I’ve covered so far? Will you adopt mobile as your tool for communication?  I would love to read your comments below.

Author Biography

Sophorn Chhay

Sophorn is the marketing guy at  Trumpia, the most complete SMS software with mass text messaging, smart targeting and automation.

Follow Sophorn on Twitter (@Trumpia), LinkedIn, Facebook and Google+

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