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By: Helios on October 8th, 2015

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How Much the Best Recruiting Resources Cost for Small Businesses

Employee Relations | Talent Acquisition

As a small business, you probably don’t have the time, money or staff to be able to utilize expensive and robust offerings in recruiting resources.  You have no need for an Applicant Tracking System, LinkedIn Recruiter or large contracts with CareerBuilderMonster or the like.  However, there are three recruiting sources that you can utilize that may get you the applicant flow you are looking for and yield the results to hire an impactful, talented employee.

Top 3 Low-Cost Recruiting Resources for Small Businesses

Two Words:  Free Advertising

There are lots of tools online that you can use to post your job advertisement and/or description that passive and active job seekers will notice and respond to.  Two of the best free resources are LinkedIn and Indeed.  That’s right, FREE!!!  Any company can post a job on Indeed for no cost and have the applicant flow come directly to your email or company website.  If you don’t have a career page on your company website, then select the option for candidates to email their resumes and applications to a company email address.  You can also search resumes on Indeed.  Indeed has one of the largest footprints out of all of the job boards currently on the market and their free option is the way to go.  Because they see so much traffic (140 million visitors), you can guarantee that your position marketing will be seen.  Another free option is your own or your company’s LinkedIn page.  You don’t need to upgrade to LinkedIn Recruiter (costs money) to advertise your open position.  You can publish the job description on your home page, post it in groups that attract the backgrounds/industry experience that you need and send it out through your network.  This is all free of charge.  You can also join groups on LinkedIn that attract the type of individual (background, expertise, industry experience) you are looking for and ask the members of those groups for referrals.

Low-Cost Advertising

Now I am not suggesting you have to spend hundreds on one job posting, but for a small fee, there are a number of other options. You can post your job advertisement on Craigslist for $25.  If you want to go this route, you must be willing and able to have the time to review a lot of resumes because you will see a lot of response and not all of it will be what you are looking for.  For a slightly larger one-time fee, you can post your position on Zip Recruiter.  This will run you about $149 and they have options to push this out (for no additional fee) to all of your social media:  Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.  If you need a highly specialized background, look into very specific posting boards that cater only to those individuals with that background.

Cost of the Best Recruiting Resources for Small BusinessNetworking Events

There are a plethora of networking events that are tailored not only to industries but to individual’s expertise within their career.  Do research (if you don’t already attend networking events) and attend the ones that will most likely attract the individuals you are looking to hire.  Most events will allow you to stand up and make an announcement and this is a perfect time not only to talk about what you are hiring for but to advertise your company.  If you need an HR Generalist, attend the local SHRM meetings.  If you need someone with Government Contracting in their background, seek out events that cater to those in that world.  If you need an IT expert, check out Women in Technology, NOVA Tech Council or even Eventbrite for listings of your local events.  This will give you a forum to meet people face to face and that may lead into your next hire.

To be successful in recruiting for your small business, you don’t need a robust recruiting department.  Take advantage of what social media, the Internet, and your local area have to offer.  Once you utilize these offerings and find the right candidates, make sure you are responsive, concise, and timely.  The number one best recruiting resource is a positive candidate experience which leads to great reviews for your company and the attraction of top talent. If you find that you need additional help, consider partnering with a local firm that provides recruiting process outsourcing (such as ours) so that you can stay focused on growing your business.