What is a recruitment funnel?
The term “recruitment funnel” describes how applicants move through your organization’s recruiting process. Think of a funnel you might use for cooking or oil changes; the top is wide, and the funnel gradually narrows to a slim bottom opening.
Your recruitment process is similar. When you’re recruiting, you start with a large number of applicants, but as you move through each phase of your hiring process, the candidate pool narrows.
Why your recruitment marketing funnel matters
Your new hires naturally go through a funnel-like process, whether you focus on it or not. Taking charge of the funnel concept can help you improve your hiring process. Here’s why your funnel matters:
- Strategic approach: When you look at your recruiting efforts like a funnel, you can be more strategic about it. The model breaks down the process into smaller phases so you can improve each part individually.
- Gathering metrics: An organized approach simplifies the analytics for your recruiting efforts. You can look at the numbers for different parts of the process to see where you’re excelling or need improvement.
- Improved candidate experience : Putting more effort into each step can deliver a positive experience for the applicants.
- Better hires: The goal of an effective recruitment funnel is to target candidates best suited for open positions. You can tailor the steps to find people who are a solid match.
7 stages in the recruitment funnel
A recruitment funnel breaks down the process into distinct steps. The following steps represent the general phases of the funnel, starting with top-of-funnel recruiting and working down to the final candidate.
1. Generating brand awareness
At the top of the funnel, you’re trying to get your name out there so people are aware of your company’s available job openings. You’re casting a wide net to attract a large number of applicants. Brand awareness is something you can generate all the time, even if you’re not actively hiring. It can help you create a pipeline of talent so you have interested job seekers when you’re ready to hire.
Solidifying your branding to express your company’s personality and values makes this stage easier. You can create awareness by strengthening your online presence through social media posts or blog posts. Updating your website, including your career page, with brand-focused content can also help.
2. Attracting candidates
When you have a specific job opening, you want to attract candidates who are best suited for that position. This is where your funnel starts to narrow. You might have a large number of people who know about your company, but only some of them will meet your requirements for the job. Those are the people you want to apply for the opening.
In this stage, you can use a variety ofcandidate sourcing methods to attract job seekers. Writing targeted job descriptions and posting them where those types of candidates look for positions helps at this point. You might use paid advertising to serve your organization’s job postings to people who meet your criteria for the job.
3.Application process
Next comes all of the applications you’ll get from job seekers. Candidates typically have a better experience with your company when you offer a streamlined application process without a lot of extra, unnecessary steps. Consider keeping candidates updated on the process with automated messages. This helps keep them engaged throughout the process so they don’t lose interest.
4. Screeningthe applications
The funnel keeps shrinking as you move into candidate screening. From the applications you receive, you look for candidates to interview. You can use several screening methods, such as phone screens, skills tests and video interviews. Initially, you might use applicant tracking software to automate resume screening and seek out applicants who meet specific requirements. You can do additional screening processes after the interviews if you want to look at additional details.
5. Conducting interviews
The interview process falls near the narrow end of the funnel. You can do a traditional in-person interview or a video interview. This stage helps you narrow down your selected interviewees based on their qualifications and answers to your interview questions.
6.Performing additional screening
You might do a more detailed screening process on final candidates to help make a decision. A common option is checking the references provided by each interviewee. You might also have the candidates take assessments to measure certain skills. Other checks you might run include:
- Background checks
- Educational verification (for positions where this is a strict requirement)
- Credential verification
- Employment verification
Some jobs might require additional screening. For instance, if the job involves driving, you might check the finalcandidates’ motor vehicle records.
7. Choosingthe final candidate
Using what you learn during interviews and other screening processes, you may be ready to choose a final candidate and make a job offer. This stage might include salary negotiations with the individual. If your first choice doesn’t accept your offer, you might choose to select a second choice from the interviewees. In situations where none of the other interviewees are a good fit, you might start the process over.
How to create your recruitment funnel
You likely already go through the general phases of a recruitment funnel. Focusing on the funnel concept and clarifying each stage can improve your hiring outcomes. Follow these steps to refine your funnel for recruitment:
- Evaluate your current process. You likely already follow the general steps in the recruitment funnel, but taking a closer look at your current process can help you see where you are now and how you can improve.
- Determine your goals. The ultimate goal of the recruitment process is to hire people with the right qualifications, but you might have other objectives too, such as increasing diversity or ensuring candidates are a positive culture add. Keep these goals in mind as you develop your funnel.
- Identify the stages in your funnel. Most companies use the same steps, but you might have different processes or additional checks that you need to do.
- Break down the steps in each stage. Having a strategy that fits your needs makes your recruitment funnel more effective. You might promote your openings on an industry-specific forum, for instance. Write specific procedures for each of the phases to create consistency in your hiring practices.
- Train your team. Anyone who’s involved in hiring, including your human resources team and your hiring managers, should understand how recruitment funnels work and why they’re important. They can also benefit from training on how to handle each stage of the recruitment process.
- Measure your outcomes. Looking at metrics like time to hire, cost per hire, quality of hire, source of hire and diversity of hire can help you monitor the success of your funnel. You can also get feedback from the candidates who go through the funnel to gauge overall candidate experience .
FAQs about recruitment funnels
What factors can affect your recruitment funnel?
Your recruitment funnel is as effective as your planning. Being intentional with each step helps you improve the quality of your results. Each step has different influences that can impact the outcome. For instance, when you’re attracting applicants, where you post job ads and the quality of the ads could affect what type of applications you receive.
What is recruitment funnel effectiveness?
Recruitment funnel effectiveness refers to how well your funnel works. Collecting metrics and evaluating each stage can help you measure the effectiveness of your processes. Paying attention to recruitment funnel effectiveness helps you decide if what you’re doing works or if you need to improve your methods.
What is top-of-funnel recruiting?
Top-of-funnel recruiting is the first stage of the recruitment funnel. It’s the beginning stages of your recruiting efforts when you’re spreading awareness and attracting a pool of applicants who are interested in your organization’s available openings. Nailing this stage helps you find job seekers who meet your criteria and are a positive culture add.
