WeChat Social Recruitment by Fortune 500 companies in 2014
As WeChat surpasses the 400 million users mark, companies are starting to leverage this platform for employer branding and recruitment purposes.
How many recruitment accounts are out there already and how do they leverage this mobile native platform? Maximum looked at Fortune 500 companies and their social recruitment efforts on WeChat so far.
Mobile recruitment is on the rise; a recent survey from Jobvite showed that 27% of job seekers expect to be able to apply for a position via mobile devices. Aside from developing mobile friendly careers websites, Tencent’s mobile native platform WeChat seems to offer solutions for this growing demand.
A group of Fortune 500 companies have already jumped onto the bandwagon and started exploring the possibilities of using WeChat for employer branding and social recruitment. Aside from sharing recruitment information some have taken their official career accounts to the next level by sharing employee stories, career videos, company culture and launched engagement campaigns.
We foresee many new career accounts appearing on WeChat in the year to come forcing employers to truly address social recruitment and mobile experience.
In August 2014, Maximum Employment Marketing Group conducted a research on the status of WeChat recruitment account of Fortune 500 in the first two quarters. The outcomes of this survey are gathered in the infographic below and provide a general benchmark for employer’s currently activities on WeChat and gives useful insights to employers who are or planning on using WeChat for employer branding and recruitment.
Key insights:
• While already 80% of Fortune 500 companies operate in China, only 7% of them have set up specific career accounts on WeChat. It seems to be a trending topic that is still in the early adoption phase.
• Among these early adopters the FMCG, IT and Manufacturing industries are the most represented.
• As official accounts are divided in 2 types, the subscription account seems to be the most popular among Fortune 500 companies. Posting frequency seems to be chosen over channel visibility (subscription are all grouped in one folder and allow for 1 post per day versus service accounts are listed separately but are restricted to four posts per month).
• Surprisingly, half of the WeChat accounts that share links to their career website, have career websites that are not mobile optimized.
• 19% of the accounts support direct application through WeChat.
• Almost half of the WeChat career accounts customized their menu bar to organize recruitment information and provide better user experience.
As Sina Weibo (China’s version of Twitter) is losing audience enthusiasm together with monthly active users, WeChat is definitely the go-to platform in the Chinese social media landscape.
In the meantime Tencent is working on exciting updates that will broaden the possibilities of WeChat official accounts. As for HR professionals who are ready to take it to the next level, there are already solutions on the market that can seamlessly integrate WeChat accounts with HR software. Setting KPI’s, measuring and reporting are easier than ever before.
Stay tuned for more data on WeChat recruitment by local Chinese companies. If you have any questions or need help with your social recruitment strategy don’t hesitate to drop us a line on enquiries@maximum.com
