How to Write
a Sizzling Recruitment Ad (Part 2)
Dr. Dave
Barnett
Ads Communicate Your Uniqueness
In addition to
targeting your recruitment ad to the values and needs of your prime
candidates, you should also come up with one or two things unique to
you, your company, product, or work environment. These singularities
help differentiate you from your competition. You will be further
ahead in the long-term stating one or two unique key benefits about
your work (flexible hours, casual dress code, location of your
company) than to publicize a laundry list of trumped-up hyperbole
("unlimited income", "chance of a lifetime", "easiest job you'll ever
have").
Publish the income
range of the position as well as the pay program (commission, salary
plus bonus, etc.).
- "Commission
only; average first year income $38-42K."
- "Starting
monthly draw during three months of training $1200 K; full
commission thereafter."
The more realistic
your income estimates, the more likely you will attract genuinely
qualified candidates. You may attract some gullible folks by using
overstated claims, and you may even "sell" some of them on signing
up. But you're further ahead financially to telling the truth
up-front rather than incurring the high costs of job turnover from
the disillusioned and disaffected.
Action
Line
Perhaps the most
important part of your recruitment ad is your call to action. What is
it you want prospective candidates to do? This should be spelled out
clearly.
You have several
basic action choices. What your ad asks candidates to do will have a
lot to do with what kind of response you get. Your action line can
work for you or against you.
If you want to
maximize responses, publish a fax number or an e-mail address and ask
for resumes, these calls to action require little initiative or
commitment. Asking candidates to mail resumes ups the ante a little.
Now the job seeker has to invest a postage stamp and a trip to the
mailbox. Do not ask candidates to call unless you have voice mail.
Not only is this a huge time and energy trap, but it could cost you
in other ways if a good candidate reaches a busy signal while you're
explaining your opportunity for the umpteenth time.
However, using the
phone can be a highly effective way to secure candidates. One top
recruiter in the mortgage loan business ends his recruiting ads for
telesales candidates with an action line to call and leave a
five-minute voicemail message.
"I introduce the
company, describe the position and what we're looking for, and then
ask them to tell me about themselves and why we might want to
interview them," he explains. "Since the core competency of the job
is using the phone, I learn a lot more from their voice mail messages
than I do from a resume. Besides, the people who aren't comfortable
on the phone never even bother to call. That saves me a lot of time
and wasted effort."
Here's an
important to principle to remember: your call to action should be
directly related to the skills and initiative required by the job.
The more commitment required to respond to your ad will likely lower
the number of responses you get, but the candidates who do respond
will be of better quality.
The action line
requiring the highest level of commitment is requiring job candidates
to show up in person. Not only does this effectively weed out those
with little initiative, it also says right up front that initiating
contact is the most important skill required for success in this
position.
While everybody
wants to see a good response from his or her advertising investment,
I don't consider this blizzard of creative writing the best measure
of an ad's success. In fact, the less your job requires writing and
organizational skills, the less you should rely on the written
resume.
Asking sales
candidates to send resumes is a low energy, low commitment response.
It invites many of the merely curious to distract you from finding
qualified candidates with more drive and initiative. You're not
hiring a librarian. Use the hiring process to filter out the
unmotivated and non-serious candidates.
Conclusion
The well-written
recruitment ad communicates not only the nature of the job, but also
tells candidates about your values. Recruitment ads should be
designed and written to target the needs of complementary selling
styles. Honest ads can help minimize costly turnover. Your ad's
action line can and should filter out the unmotivated by requiring a
response critical to job performance.
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