Your Team is Your Business: Our Proven Formula to Find and Hire Great People

“If each of us hires people who are smaller than we are, we shall become a company of dwarfs. But if each of us hires people who are bigger than we are, we shall become a company of giants.”

— David Ogilvy, British Advertising Tycoon - the “Father of Advertising,” Founder Ogilvy&Mathers

As your company grows, your team expands. Just how that team expands, though, can make a major difference between sustainable success and failure.

Fortunately, you can do something about it. The right hiring strategy can propel your team and company forward, allowing you to find the best possible candidates for your required skill set and culture. In this post, we'll walk you through the formula on how to find and hire great people.

Attitude Shift: Recruitment as a Marketing Strategy

Especially when looking to fill key positions, it's about more than just posting the description on a few job boards and hoping for the best. Our strategy treats the process like a marketing campaign, designed to attract, sift, and filter through the applicants to find the best fit in the end.

That approach requires a bit of an attitude shift. It means setting up a strategic process, complete focused tactics designed to lead to measurable outcomes. Once you think of recruitment as a marketing initiative, though, the process begins to fall into place.

Our 6-Step Formula to Hire Great People

The nuances may differ depending on industry, positions you're hiring for, and more. But our six-step formula, outlined below, has been born out of recruiting talent for our marketing agency (and other businesses), and helping clients strengthen their own marketing team within the Concierge program. Within this formula, your applicant pool widens, and sorts itself so that your finalists will be A-level candidates who are likely to succeed in your business. Let's get started.

1. Start With the Position Description

In many ways, your position description is the foundation of success. Done right, it accomplishes a few things:

• It accurately outlines the requirements and responsibilities of the position.

• It reflects the brand personality of your company to give applicants a sense of what awaits them.

• It's just as clear about who the job is for as it is about who the job ISN'T for.

• It stands out from other job descriptions for similar position by being more interesting and entertaining than expected.

2. Create Some Relevant Obstacles

Don't just require a resume and cover letter. Instead, make your applicants jump through some initial hoops to increase the chances of qualification and make sure they're paying attention.

That might, for instance, take the form of asking your applicants to answer two questions in their cover letter. These questions should be relevant to their positions, but this step also allows you to weed out applicants who don't follow directions well or aren't paying attention.

3. Build Your Advertising Campaign

With your job description and initial obstacle in place, it's time to get the word out. Advertise the position as you would your product or service, building a comprehensive, multi-channel campaign. That might include:

• Regular posts on social media, on the channels your potential applicants are most likely to frequent.

• Job postings on LinkedIn, potentially with some money to boost it if you want to maximize your applicant pool.

• Emails to your in-house email list, as long the overlap between recipients and potential applicants is significant enough.

• Potential targeted paid campaigns on social media to optimize your reach.

4. Sort Your Applications Into Piles

If you get the third step right, the applications begin to pile in. The next step is simple: sort them into two piles. Pile A is for applicants who have followed your directions from step 1, while B is for everyone who cannot. Delete the applications in that pile; you'll be shocked just how few of your applicants pass that first test.

5. Create Another Relevant Obstacle

Your A pile consists of your finalists. It's time for another obstacle to find the right candidate. Contact them, and ask them to answer another question for the interview. Make the question as relevant as possible to the job they will perform—something that shows they're willing, ready, and able to show initiative in their new job. Then, schedule the interview. 

6. Plan Your Interview

The focus of interviews with your finalists should be that obstacle, the relevant question to be answered. Still, it helps to follow a few other best practices to make sure you make the right choice:

• Schedule a two-stage interview process. The initial interview might be broader and over the phone, while the second is in-person or via video conference for more depth.

• Avoid your biases. Sometimes, the best candidate comes from an unusual background. Try to focus only on their expertise, and its relevance to your position description and needs.

• Build a script of questions. The more similar the interview with each candidate is, the easier it will be to find the best option for your company.

Now, all you have to do is pay attention. The best-interviewing candidate deserves your selection.

Leveraging Marketing Strategies for Recruitment Efforts

Hiring can be complex, but it deserves focus and attention to help you build the best possible team around your growing business. Part of that means treating it like a marketing strategy, and that's where we can help.

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