“Mobile, before Mobile”
Healthcare and physician recruiting is an expensive “business” and hospitals are becoming attracted to technologies that make them more efficient and effective as organizations are tightening their belts. Studies clearly show financial benefits of getting physician starting sooner and corporations are now focusing on “efficiency” practices to streamline their operations, and that needs to happen in recruiting.
And with the continued documented shortages in a variety of areas, recruiting today can no longer be viewed as an administrative function but a very competitive one.
The advantage will be with the employers who take prudent and common sense steps that run against the old, “standard industry operating recruiting process” and use better recruiting strategy, material and technology that attract and compel, outsell, and recruit more efficiently, while hiring the better practitioners than their competition.
Got Apps? Applications developed for the iPhone were the door openers to a huge focus on mobile; the smart phone has driven the computer to our hands – that affects recruiting
The first generation iPhone was released in June 2007 – this is Jackie holding our mobile Online Job Tour prototype in 2005; having the technology knowledge plus seeing how mobile changes impact consumers, is important in developing the right approach to mobile with Online Job Tour and for client recruiting
We are not only an industry pioneer in applying content creation and web technology to recruiting, but we were the first to the career search market on smart phones. Coming from his background in tech sales and consulting, Founder Carl Brickman was familiar with the company Palm, and its handheld units that were used for calendars and appointment setting. Technology always seems to drive things to being smaller, and the advent of the smart phone could easily be forecast into eventually being a huge market force, and ultimately mobile computing and mobile internet – so we produced a prototype mobile Online Job Tour in 2005.
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Today’s web content is moving to “Mobile:” Driving web content design is the smart phone along with the proliferation of video content and broadband speed, and their accessibility, which continue to enamor consumers. With Apple achieving record earnings of iPhone sales with each new model release since their inception and with its market lead in mobile device software, web design (as seen in the growth of apps and apps for the most popular social media tools) is now very heavy for mobile devices. The reality is that the iPhone has driven the computer device to our hands – in a manner of speaking.
The mobile web is also heavy on video: If you are a lead executive, informed, and you can afford it, you own the iPhone. And you are buying the next one. And you must be tech savvy if you lead recruiting, so you are at least remotely engaged in social media which is dominated by video (Instagram, Snapchat, Vine, etc., and the leader, Facebook, can’t get out of the way of continuous streams of video on your feed).
Mobile content is made for “quick checks” to keep users moving through advertising
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Mobile content is “built” for “quick checks;” that is, quickly checking your messages in whatever form you receive them from work, home, and friends, and from breaking sports scores and news sources.
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Commercial organizations are finding it challenging to generate revenue on mobile, prompting design agencies need to create content that can cram commercials and ads into the structure of the content.
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Our attention spans are being designed to be shorter online, especially on mobile because companies need to keep users moving through advertising.
The latest mobile content design trends aren’t conducive to permanent placement recruiting: All sales professionals understand no matter what product or service you are selling, including recruiting, prospects must feel comfortable that they have the information that they need in order to make a decision. Especially with jobseekers that are nervous and face life-changing choices, using the Internet to get information about their careers is very different than scanning through sports scores. A substantial review and comparison process for a jobseeker flies against the “mobile world” of web content.
The challenge to employers is to stay away from the “temptations” of sites that may offer pizzazz and hype but don’t provide deep, required information for analysis that plays an advocate’s role to support the jobseeker’s needs, in order to get educated on core subjects they require, and want, in their career search process.
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How can employers negotiate through the influence of mobile trends in web design and maintain optimized recruiting practices and tools for jobseekers?
First, when it comes to making decisions on web content for recruiting purposes, employers must understand the differences between their marketing and recruiting departments.
Recruiting, is in its essence “sales,” which includes qualifying prospects, competing, selling jobs, seeking referrals, hustling to meet start dates – even working to quicken start dates. This is entirely different than “marketing” a hospital’s services, branding, or promoting its local charity work – which is directed to its patient area and to drive business. The people, and mentalities, are also different, and the pay is different with recruiters/closers often being compensated based on performance bonuses and meeting placement deadlines, and other commission-oriented incentives.
While web designers hired by marketing departments can take the trending content design concepts and incorporate them because they think it will impress their client by looking like it fits into current commercial designs, recruiters who put their prospects’ needs first to sell them, and want a sales tool to accommodate those needs and would balk. The quick checks and quickie videos work in the branding and consumer markets. They don’t satisfy jobseekers and their needs, nor compete for them. So marketing and recruiting are entirely different.
Do these look like marketers? Recruiters are sales pros/closers – there’s a big difference
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A marketing director may find mobile design concepts compelling because they appeal to their instincts to attract and brand and create “buzz,” but these things that work in marketing a hospital’s services to patients contribute to the biggest complaint we have heard from jobseekers in the last decade since the Internet took over the marketplace: “there is not enough information.”
Can technology provide an optimal sales tool for employer recruiting? Absolutely, but content today that is being influenced by mobile trends need to be avoided. Web content that is ultimately an employer’s sales tool works when: jobseekers’ needs are met and they must also be emotionally compelled (these are core selling/recruiting tenets).
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A 100% digital career preview, these are Online Job Tours for St. Jude’s-affiliated Niswonger Children’s Hospital in Johnson City, TN, and CHS’s Seven Rivers Regional Medical Center, Crystal River, Florida
Special Note: Both Online Job Tours have a mobile version which are automatically activated when accessed with a smart phone.
Introducing Online Job Tour® and its accompanying mobile version:
More than a dozen physicians – among 50 community leaders, are featured in Online Job Tour productions – far more than candidates meet on the real interview (Pediatrician Jennifer Rose, MD, Kingsport, TN)
Expert Randy Ratliff takes job seekers fly fishing in one of our productions – what would take all day – including discussions of strategy and making a new friend, is more easier facilitated in Online Job Tour
After almost eight years researching our mobile version, it is an abbreviated version of our large productions that motivates jobseekers and their families to use the production on their full screen devices (tablets, laptops and desktops). The look and feel of our mobile versions are similar to many mobile sites and their content style, and the videos are optimized for the iPhone – principally because our target market (primarily physicians) have iPhones, but without clutter or designs inadvertently influenced by commercial needs to incorporate advertising and banners, video ads, etc. Our mobile version can be viewed on Android and Samsung mobile software-driven devices, among others.
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Because more and more prospects are first viewing Online Job Tour on their smart phones, our mobile pieces are elegant and proprietary, with nothing but content for jobseeker needs. Because they ultimately want to get details for their career search, the mobile versions help to transition them to the full site versions that they can enjoy on larger screen devices.
Online Job Tour is providing a compelling advantage as the sales tool for our clients’ recruiting, made in an era where web content is moving to mobile, but accommodates the true needs of jobseekers who must feel “fulfilled” in obtaining the information they need. Online Job Tour keeps everything manageable and comfortable for the user because it is designed as a “tour.”
Commercial groups influenced by mobile design trends that develop recruiting content to impress marketing folks can fall short in meeting needs for recruiting, when candidates complain the recruiting material “doesn’t have enough information” or is filled with clichés, which is never the case with our comprehensive productions
The Best Product: Through years of test marketing we have already negotiated the issues relating to user expectations of content, the tools they use to access the web (including mobile), and have a proven recruiting asset for our clients that significantly improves healthcare recruiting, empowers the in-house recruiters of our clients, and helps our clients stand apart from their competitors in a tough marketplace.
Regarding mobile technologies, we love it and embrace it.
We’re innovators! Our job and our commitment to current and future clients demand it. We didn’t sit back and wait for mobile technology and we don’t run in industry packs and follow – you’re too late when you do that. Instead, we anticipated the influence of mobile on the consumer market and on Online Job Tour and recruiting, and now mobile is a part of our work plan and production – and that gives you advantages.