5 Clever Ways to Create Buzz Around Your Virtual Recruiting Event

Ready to make some new hires? It wasn’t that long ago the traditional job fair was an easy way to make that happen. But in the middle of a global pandemic, the virtual recruiting event has taken its place.

By now, you’ve probably been on some virtual calls, maybe attended a webinar, or completed training online. The technology and software are there to make it happen. But how do you create buzz around your virtual recruiting event?

Let’s just say in a tech-driven world where a lot of job seekers are online and own a smartphone, the old-school ways of recruiting aren’t as effective anymore. 

You need to be a little more clever and use your creative promotional juice to get candidates to attend your virtual recruiting event. Here are some things you can do:

1. Deliver professional development

Job seekers are always looking for an advantage and an edge—something that will enhance their skills and support their efforts for getting hired.

If you can provide that as part of your virtual recruiting event, you can tap into this segment of candidates hungry for training and professional development.

Keep in mind, you’re not selling anything. You’re just providing free training to help job seekers level up their game.

Some virtual ideas for professional development include:

• How to improve your resume
• Time management tips
• How to negotiate salary and benefits
• X essential skills for [name of position]
• The career-success roadmap for your first 90 days

Offer a 1-2 hour training on a professional development topic to job seekers. Promote it on social media in the weeks and days leading up to your virtual recruiting event. You may even want to engage on social media to find out what kind of professional development your audience is interested in, then do that.

2. Organize a panel or presentation on diversity

It’s been an important topic for human resource professionals, recruiters, and employers for years, but diversity is once again front and center in a lot of areas.

How about addressing diversity and inclusion in a panel or presentation format at your virtual recruiting event?

• Invite your HR director and a few people that represent your diverse workforce to participate in a panel. 
• Come up with a list of questions or topics for them to discuss. 
• Invite job seekers or candidates to submit questions ahead of time before your virtual recruiting event.

It’s an opportunity for you to showcase your diversity policies and efforts to create a diverse workforce.

Once again, social media is your friend. Promote this on your social channels ahead of your virtual recruiting event to generate interest and find out what diversity topics people are interested in hearing.

3. Provide access to experts for an Ask-Me-Anything session

A lot of job seekers understand access to someone on the inside is a great way to get their foot in the door, ask questions, and potentially land an interview.

But on the outside, finding the right person to talk to can sometimes feel impossible. Make it easier for them by hosting an “Ask-Me-Anything” session with someone like your:

• HR director
• Department manager
• CEO
• Newest employee
• Support staff

Once you identify the person to host the “Ask-Me-Anything” session at your virtual recruiting event, share some info, fun facts, or bio about the person on social media. 

You could even invite your expert to take over your social media account for a day, ask questions, respond to comments, or post a short video to generate buzz for your virtual recruiting event.

Pick a person your ideal candidate would be interested in talking with to learn or about how to land a job with your organization.

4. Host a virtual info session

If you can remember back to the time before COVID-19 restrictions closed most large-group gatherings, old-school job fairs often promoted their events by hosting an in-person info session.

That may be off-limits for now, but you can recreate the experience and make it part of your virtual recruiting event. 

In the virtual info session, you can cover things job seekers want to know like:

• What positions are you hiring for?
• What’s a day in the life at your company look like?
• What’s the range of salary and benefits look like?
• What’s your company culture like?
• What’s the latest company news about your products or services?
• What’s the typical process look like for getting hired?

Get the word out by sharing this on social media and online where your ideal candidates go. You may even want to create a virtual registration process to help you collect candidate information and ask a few additional questions to learn more about what they want to know.

5. Offer an enticing giveaway for virtual attendance

Let’s face it—“Free” is a very good price. It gets people to notice and pay attention. Offering a free giveaway for attending your virtual recruiting event is another way to attract candidates and generate buzz.

There are paid options like a:

• Book on professional development
• Gift card
• Branded item (calendar, mug, planner, etc) with your logo, website, and phone number

And there are free options like a:

• Free trial of your product or service
• E-book you’ve already created on a niche topic related to your business or industry
• Professional development resource

Use social media to spread the word about your free offer for attending your virtual recruiting event and you’ll likely see a spike in engagement and interest.

Use social media to generate buzz for your virtual recruiting event

Like it or not, one of the best ways to generate buzz for your virtual recruiting event is social media. It’s where you’ll find many candidates will find you. And if you have an interesting hook to bring people in, the posts you make about your event get shared and reach more people, which means more potential candidates.