Recruitment works the same way as marketing. The only major difference is that marketers target profitable customers while recruiters are on the hunt for quality hires. As a recruiter, you should realize that email marketing automation can help you meet competitive candidates in the most cost-effective ways. In fact, 74% of online adults (who are most likely professionals) prefer email as their communication channel for business.

Using email marketing for recruitment and hiring allows you target potential candidates that are qualified for your job openings. Whether they are active or passive job seekers, you can attract, nurture and convert them into applicants with the right email.

Meet your next hire through email marketing automation by following these tips.

Choose a platform that can serve your goals

While there are a lot of email marketing automation platforms on the market, it is best to choose the right technology. Not all platforms offer the most appropriate features to meet your recruitment goals at a reasonable price.

Some common email marketing features for recruitment and hiring include segmentation, personalization, landing page creator, social media integration, A/B testing, and data analytics for performance measurement, which you can find in ActiveTrail, one of the world’s leading email marketing platforms with advanced automation features that help businesses across various industries meet their goals.

Segment your list

Not all job seekers are actively looking for new opportunities. In the same way, not all of them would be good candidates for the same position. Simply put, it’s not wise to email a job vacancy for a Digital Marketing Director to a list containing engineers, architects, accounts and fresh graduates.

By segmenting your contact list, you are sending targeted emails to job seekers, which means delivering appropriate job openings that match their professional background and skill set.

You can perform segmentation in many levels here. First, you can create separate lists for active and passive job seekers based on their online behavior and email engagement. Further segment your list based on industry, years of experience and skills. Your segmentation options are limitless. It’s just a matter of knowing how to target the right email recipients.

Personalize

Across industries, personalized emails have 29% higher unique open rate and 41% unique click rates than non-personalized emails. Recruiters can follow this strategy to enjoy its benefits.

Since you’re done segmenting your email list, you can proceed to personalizing your content for higher chances of engagement and conversion. Do this by sending job seekers with a series of job postings relevant to their professional background, skill set, and industry. For non-active job seekers, you could send them blog posts about career development, job interview tips and other content related to their field.

Of course, don’t forget the basics such as using the first name to refer to recipients both in the subject line and email content.

Highlight the benefits

As a recruiter, it’s your job to make job posts attractive to potential hires. Again, you are not merely looking for employees to fill vacancies. You are selling career opportunities, which means that they will find the job role more interesting if you emphasize what’s in it for them.

Aside from the job role, responsibilities and qualifications, emphasize the competitiveness of your employment packages such as salary, medical benefits, insurance, and more. You can also highlight incentives and perks such as travel opportunities, flexible office hours, and free training. Others find office location as a selling point, especially when it’s close to their residential address.

Use a visible CTA to encourage application

In the end, your email should serve its purpose, and that is to lure job seekers to your desired action. Clearly, communicate what you need them to do with a call-to-action that is easily noticeable.

Be direct and use an active voice for your copy to prompt action. In most cases, the goal of a recruiter is to encourage job seekers to send an application. So, the most common CTA copy here is “Apply Now.” Combine it with great design and a contrasting color to make it pop out. Placement is also important because a powerful CTA button is nothing when unseen.

You may be a recruiter or an email marketer, but you were once a job seeker too. With the right email technology at your disposal, it should be easy for you to attract, nurture and convert job seekers into competitive hires.

Read more:

Email Marketing Metrics 101: What You Should Be Monitoring

Email Marketing Best Practices to Adopt in 2018 and Beyond

5 Incredible Ways to Build a Highly Engaged Email List