Passive candidates are the biggest group of available talent out there. As a recruiter, you can focus on recruiting by a ‘post and pray’ approach where you advertise your job ads and wait for active candidates to come in. Or… you can spearfish the highest quality candidates in the market; passive candidates.

Why is that a good idea?

Because 70% of the entire available global talent pool are passive candidates. Just 30% are active candidates who are actively looking for a job on job boards.

85% of all candidates are open to new job opportunities.

When you rethink your approach to passive candidates an entire pool of candidates opens up. In addition, passive candidates on average are of a better quality than active candidates.

Where most recruiters focus on inbound candidates who have applied to job posts, there are recruiters that choose to focus on passive candidate sourcing.

This is why passive candidates are increasingly interesting for recruiters:

• Passive candidates make up the biggest talent pool: 70% of the workforce is passive talent
• Matches are more accurate: with active candidate recruitment you will on average invite just 2% of candidates that applied for an interview, with passive candidate sourcing you can spearfish for the exact talent you think would be best
• Quality of passive candidates is higher: 73% of recruiters find higher quality candidates when focusing on passive candidates.
• There is less competition for passive candidates: because the majority of recruiters still rely on active candidate recruitment the competition for passive candidates is less.

The proven approach to reach passive candidates is not job boards, but rather proactive outreach (outbound recruiting).

But once you find passive candidates, how do you engage them in your employer brand and open jobs?

Enough reason to write this guide on how to engage passive candidates.

These are the topics we’ll discuss in this blog:

1. Why engagement is important for passive candidates
2. How to engage passive candidates
3. Tools to use for passive candidate engagement

1. Why engagement is important for passive candidates

Because passive candidates are not actively searching for a job yet, engaging them (proactively) is even more important than with active candidates.

Passive candidates are not invested in your employer brand yet, they’re probably not even aware of the existence of your company let alone your job positions.

Aso, candidates have more opportunities and higher expectations than ever before so it’s harder to get them to consider your employer brand.

You have to engage them over a series of interactions, or touch points, to get them caring about your company as a potential employer.

Imagine being approached on the street by an absolute stranger. Shortly after introducing themselves they ask you to come with them to have a look at something they’re offering. Would you go with them? Probably not, but this is what most recruiters do in approaching candidates: one shot direct messages that focus on the need of the company, instead of focussing on the candidate’s need for the longer term.

To get passive candidates acquainted, comfortable and excited about your employer brand and job offering you need several touch points over time where you provide the right information at the right time and be available to the candidate.

That’s what engagement is all about.