In today’s competitive job market, you need to adapt quickly to find and retain top talent. Businesses often resort to sinking a significant investment into external recruiting sources and job boards to attract top talent. These can be great tools for reeling in candidates, but many organizations completely ignore the untapped potential of the existing talent databases they’ve already built over the years.
Applicant Tracking Systems (ATSs) were initially introduced as a way for employers to build and maintain a comprehensive database of candidates which they could leverage for future job openings. Unfortunately, however, as the datasets in these systems grew and grew to an overwhelming degree, the focus shifted towards using ATSs as mere workflow management systems, resulting in the loss of the potential these databases offer.
Let’s take a look at how you can harness the power of your existing talent database to maximize recruitment marketing ROI and seize opportunities that might otherwise go unnoticed.
The Problem: Abandoning ATS Candidates
Source: Rally Recruitment Marketing
According to a study by Rally, with large companies having an average budget of $341,700 for recruitment marketing, finding qualified candidates is not cheap. Since a significant chunk of that budget (about half, in fact, per Jobvite) is spent on external recruiting efforts, this means that much of those funds will see no return on investment as the external search is typically repeated for new job openings while the silver medalists gathered from past job openings are ignored.
External tools are great at casting a wide net, but the real value lies in maximizing the potential of the catch by taking advantage of the talent database you’ve spent all those resources building.
In the pursuit of fresh candidates, companies often overlook the wealth of talent already present in their ATS. By continuously relying on external recruiting tools, organizations miss out on the chance to tap into a pool of pre-qualified candidates who have already expressed interest in their company.
The Hidden Gold Mine Within an ATS
By leveraging existing talent databases, companies can realize numerous benefits. Firstly, tapping into the ATS allows for expedited hiring processes, saving valuable time and resources. While the average time to fill a position is 42 days, the best candidates are off the market in just 10 days, further emphasizing the need to move fast. Those gold medalists could already be in your database, waiting for you to reach out.
However, as most recruiters can attest to, even a dedicated ATS can be cumbersome for talent acquisition. With unintuitive workflows and limited recruiting functionality, these systems often make it very difficult to reach the treasure trove of talent hiding behind their clunky interfaces. With MojoHire, you can rediscover those A-team players instantly and start the interview process in a fraction of the time!
Strategies for Leveraging Your Talent Database
Rather than allocating a disproportionate amount of the recruitment marketing budget to external tools, companies can strategically allocate resources towards the following:
- Data Management: Regularly updating and maintaining candidate information within the ATS to ensure accuracy and relevance is the first step in creating a clean, and therefore more useful, database. This includes keeping track of candidates’ skills, experience, certifications, and any changes in their contact details to facilitate accurate job matching and personalized engagement.
- Advanced Search and Matching: Utilize the search and matching capabilities of modern tools to automatically identify highly qualified candidates based on specific criteria, such as skills, experience, location, cultural fit, and work ethic. By implementing a targeted, holistic approach, organizations can reduce time-to-hire and improve the quality of new hires.
- Proactive Communication: Establish proactive communication channels to engage with past applicants on a regular basis. This can include personalized emails, newsletters, or invitations to company events. By nurturing relationships with candidates and keeping them informed about job opportunities, you can stay top-of-mind when they’re thinking about new roles.
Technology Solutions for Getting the Most Out of an ATS
Today’s technology can offer a plethora of capabilities that make the lives of recruiters easier and optimize candidate engagement. By leveraging the power of AI-driven integrators, such as MojoHire, you can unlock the full potential of your ATS and maximize the value of your existing talent pool.
These solutions utilize the magic of intelligent algorithms to automate holistic candidate matching and recommend suitable opportunities on the fly, allowing you to sift through all your candidate data painlessly. With pre-qualified candidates served up to recruiters the second a job requisition is opened, your TA team can leverage the talent pool you’ve already invested in before spending even more on external sourcing.
Conclusion
By shifting the focus from external recruiting tools to optimizing and leveraging the talent databases your company has already spent years building, you can unlock the full potential of that investment. Embracing existing candidate pools not only enhances hiring efficiency and saves your company money, but it can also present a major competitive advantage that you didn’t even know you had!
Don’t let valuable candidates go untapped. Start by revisiting your recruitment strategies and allocating resources to effectively engage with and leverage your existing talent pool. By enabling your TA team to embrace the power of your ATS instead of dreading using it, you can streamline your hiring process, reduce time-to-fill, and increase employee retention.
Contact MojoHire for a quick demo and see how the success of your organization might lie within the talent you already have.