If you currently possess a talent community (kudos!) then I wager you’re overlooking at least one suggestion below on how to enhance yours.
If you lack a talent community, then these 5 simple concepts will ideally illustrate how straightforward talent communities are to expand.
What constitutes a talent community?
A talent community (also referred to as a ‘talent network’) is a strategy for gathering names and email addresses (as well as other optional fields) of candidates to remain connected with them via updated job openings or news regarding employment with you.
It’s one of numerous recruitment marketing tactics to apply on your corporate career site.
“Recruit while you rest”
Since talent community software (more on that below) can automate much of the creation and communication with candidates, a talent community can genuinely be a “recruit while you rest” solution.
Talent communities have existed for some time but continue to be a trending topic in recruitment: over 1,000 of you searched for terms related to ‘talent communities’ and ‘talent networks’ last month, as per SEOBook:
| Search Term Name | # of Google Monthly Searches |
| Talent Network | 708 |
| Talent Community | 168 |
| Talent Communities | 48 |
| Talent Networks | 48 |
| Talent Community Software | 24 |
5 Suggestions to Enhance Your Talent Community
1. Incorporate talent community capture fields on every job posting
For most employers, only about 11% of candidates will apply for your positions. What about the remaining 89% — don’t you wish to capture them for future job opportunities?
You might discover that for every job vacancy, you could yield an extra 2-3+ individuals joining your talent community. 2-3 new members might not seem significant, but envision if you have 100 job openings currently (and let’s assume you fill those positions in 60 days) — that translates to 1,200 jobs posted over the next 12 months. If 3 individuals join your talent community for each of those, that means you’ll have 3,600 people in your talent community a year from now.
2. Utilize a “Flex-fields” strategy to enhance talent community conversion
Some of you request extensive information in your talent communities — including fields such as phone number, address, and even uploading a resume. That is acceptable to ask for, but be aware that the percentage of individuals who complete those fields will, of course, decrease as the number of required fields increases.
To increase your talent community conversion, simply request name and email — you may see a doubling or tripling of your talent community members.
3. Incorporate a ‘Can’t find the appropriate opportunity?’ into your job search results
Numerous candidates search on your corporate career site and discover nothing — there are no available options for them. Consider what Du Pont does and include a link at the bottom of the search results encouraging them to click to your talent community if they “can’t find the right opportunity” via their search.
4. Position your career page talent community link ‘above the fold’
Take a cue from Nike and ensure to place your link to the talent community ‘above the fold,’ as they say in marketing (i.e. at the top of your page, so candidates don’t need to scroll!). Many candidates arrive at your career site and don’t scroll down — so capture them before they exit!
5. Microsite pages should also capture talent community interest!
If you possess microsite landing pages (also known as job family pages) tailored to your departments and locations or diversity or military, etc. — and you should — then incorporate a talent community call-to-action there.
Consider SSM Health; they feature a prominent “Join Our Talent Network” in the upper-right corner of every microsite landing page.
Talent Community Software
If you haven’t yet adopted a talent community software solution, numerous options exist, including Ongig, CareerBuilder, and Avature. If you already utilize a talent community solution, the Ongig Cloud allows you to place your existing talent community capture on any job description, microsite, or job search results page (and monitor it).