The Ins and Outs of Marketing to HR Professionals

From traditional resume searching to comprehensive HR technologies, human resource professionals are looking for effective, turnkey, self-service solutions to improve their overall recruitment programs. In today‘s tight labor market, the need to be proactive versus reactive in recruitment efforts is paramount and more and more employers are becoming more vocal in reference to their wants and needs to achieve hiring success.

“I want who I want.” Many employers conduct resume searching to obtain immediate results by searching a database of qualified candidate resumes. They proceed by quickly calling interested candidates on-thespot to secure an interview.
“I want candidates to come to me.” Job posting is one of the most popular forms of recruitment advertising because HR professionals know they will only receive resumes from candidates with a preexisting interest in their available positions or company.
“I want an easier process.” Applicant Tracking Software (ATS) enables HR professionals to track, report and manage all recruitment activity across the organization. Additionally, web-based ATS solutions allow companies to store all candidate and requisition data in one centralized location. While ATS solutions are typically a premium service, a select few job boards, including Beyond.com, offers a comprehensive and complimentary ATS to all network members.

Challenges in Reaching and Engaging HR Professionals

There are specific challenges in marketing to HR professionals including reaching the decision-maker withpurchasing power, as well as the executive who oversees HR initiatives for the company. In order to fully-engage both parties and clearly communicate the value of available services, HR service providers must demonstrate unique selling points tailored to each party, including:

“Save me money"- Executives with purchasing power are typically eager to hear more about how recruitment products and services can save the company money, decrease cost and time per hire, and generate a higher ROI. These are key elements to any recruitment program that should always be part of the “pitch.”
“Save me time.” While cost and savings are important to HR managers, the key selling point for this audience is the ease and effectiveness with which new products or services will allow them to target, hire and retain qualified candidates. “Having a unique business model that allows companies to cross-post jobs to our network with a single click has been vital to our success in marketing to HR professionals,” says Rich Milgram, CEO of Beyond.com, Inc. a full-service provider of more than 15,000 niche web communities Beyond.com. “It allows HR professionals to target highly-qualified and passive job candidates through established online communities such as ITWorld.com where professional‘s source information on a daily basis to gather information for their job or learn about the latest advancements in their field.”

How to Capitalize on the Business and Environmental Factors Affecting Employers Today

In today's competitive talent recruitment market, employers are seeking ways to continuously reach qualified candidates by building a strong employment brand while maintaining a positive return oninvestment. It is important to "get inside the heads of key decision-makers and HR leaders" and “know their hot buttons“ that encourages them to react.

HR is marketing. Online recruitment has evolved into recruitment advertising and employment branding. Job postings are no longer used solely to recruit candidates. These ads are used as a way to build and grow a company‘s employment brand. Larger companies will even launch integrated marketing campaigns including email marketing and featured listings on a variety of employment and other Internet sites to ensure a continuous pipeline of qualified candidates and strengthen their corporate brand within the marketplace.
ROI is everything. With the advent of online recruiting, HR professionals are increasingly responsible for demonstrating a positive ROI. HR decision-makers typically look for very specific, quantified information in evaluating and selecting new recruitment vendors. The more specific information or data that you can provide with regard to industry, experience level, and other factors, the better. This information allows decision-makers to easily compare product and service offerings in the marketplace, calculate prospective ROI, and make prompt, informative and measurable decisions.

Tips for Marketing to Human Resources Professionals

As demonstrated, employers often times know their wants, needs and understand the challenges that they are facing to ensure that they are making informative recruitment decisions that will save them time, money and demonstrate a positive ROI while positively impacting branding their company. For HR service providers, these factors no longer have to be a challenge.

Be unique. Since talent recruitment has become increasingly competitive, scores of companies have entered the marketplace with relatively new product and service offerings targeting HR professionals. Though this has led to a growing influx of marketing messages, many HR professionals still reserve time to review offers that are truly compelling.
Any time you can pitch a compelling offer to HR professionals or demonstrate how you can solve a problem or fulfill a need, you will have a powerful statement that allows you to stand out from the crowd. The key, however, is gauging which goals your prospective client is pursuing and marketing to them with the right message.
Give them something they can‘t say no to. Don‘t be shy about allowing HR professionals to test the waters by providing them with complimentary access to your products or services or consider extending services to them on a trial basis. Milgram adds, “One way Beyond.com has been successful in demonstrating the effectiveness of our services is to provide HR professionals with a complimentary ATS system with a corporate career site as well as free unlimited blinded resume access. This strategy allows prospective clients to develop their own user experiences and become familiar with our services before spending a dime. Secondly, it acts as a means of qualified lead generation and allows us to collect more specific information from our users so we can continue to improve and grow our service offerings.”

Beyond.com Engages HR Professionals by Differentiating Themselves from the Competition

The Beyond.com Network of niche websites is a key component to our success. Not only is the network one of our most powerful points of differentiation amongst competitors, but it is also a valuable tool for business development and a strategic link to a diverse community of consumers.

Cater to their needs. Our network of more than 15,000 web communities caters to the recruitment needs of HR professionals across more than 25 industries. We continuously form strategic relationships with well respected and highly-trafficked industry publishers to further build out our online presence. Employers and recruiters find our career centers in much the same manner as do job candidates - searching the web for information about their specific industry of interest.
Simple and direct marketing. We are able to save a significant amount of time and money on marketing and advertising. We pass this savings directly on to our clients in the form of highly competitive pricing - our recruitment products and services cost less than most of our competition without diluting any of the value of our services.
Emphasis on customer service. Finally, never underestimate the importance of active follow-up and a strong customer service program. At Beyond.com, our customer service is first rate - we were the first job board to offer live chat online and we have published many instances of proven client success. The combination of proven value and great service helps keep clients engaged and increases the lifetime value of our relationship.

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