What is Erecruiting?

Erecruiting is the use of internet for attracting, recruiting, and retaining job seekers and employees.  Also known as to as Internet recruiting, virtual recruiting, online recruitment, and erecruitment.

The concept of erecruiting encompasses many different recruiting, tools, technologies, and platforms including:

• Career Websites. As the number of people searching online for jobs increases, companies are taking advantage of eRecruiting software to manage the entire recruitment process and reduce recruiting-related costs.  According to the 2011 Career Crossroads Study, its takes 846 visitors to your career site to result in one hire.

• Job Boards. These can be used to source candidates through resume mining or by posting open position on the job board.  The erecruiting industry includes both large job boards like Monster and CareerBuilder as well as smaller niche job boards and job board aggregator sites.

• Social Media. As the sub-industry of erecruiting, social recruiting continues to grow, so does the use of social media to engage candidates and candidate prospects using social media.  Nearly 39% of firms manage candidates with social media tools in 2010.  In general social media lends to two different kinds of ecruitment strategies like most of the bulleted items.  It serves as a sourcing mechanism for just in time recruitment or a community and candidate courting tool.  Candidate courting relies on engagement, interaction, and relationships.

• Use of Search Engine. ERecruitment utilizes the power of search engine optimization (SEO) and online resume search technologies to search and source databases including resumes, online communities, and social networks. The use of SEO by recruiters and companies is important just as is the reality that candidates are using online search engines to search for jobs, company information, and insights at an even faster rate.  One million eight hundred thirty thousand (1,830,000) searches were made in March 2011 that contain “jobs” in the search field.

When developing your erecruitment strategy it’s important to consider all the above factors and channels to reach potential candidates.  Educate yourself about the tools, strategies, and your competition.  Plan your strategy and go forth with the notion that your strategy and end game is always subject to change.

Jessica Miller-Merrell, SPHR is a HR consultant, new media strategist, and author who writes at Blogging4Jobs. Jessica is the host of Job Search Secrets, an internet television show for job seekers.