Getting the Most out of Your Potential Matches

Here are a few of our top tips for using potential matches.

Potential matches allow the system to take on some of the hard work in sourcing candidates by intelligently matching candidates already on your database to your jobs based on preferences, keywords and salary info.

So if your client is looking for a specific combination i.e. a marketing executive, in Brighton who has experience of X, Y and Z software’s, popping these keywords into the job potential matches allow the system to generate a list of candidates before you’ve even put an advert out .

Super users can choose exactly how the potential matches are filtered to make them as robust or weak as is required in your business. 

How many candidates should you aim to have?

This will ultimately depend on your market and how particular your clients are. But as a general rule of thumb, you should aim to have between 20-40 candidates in your potential matches.

If you have more candidates, why not try adding some extra keywords or even narrowing your postcode radius search to try to reduce the number of candidates in your list – as no one wants to have to read thousands of CVs for 1 position!

And if you don’t have many candidates? Try removing some of the trickier keywords / expand the radius to identify if there’s a candidate shortage in that particular area or skill set. Failing that, it’s time to advertise to attract new talent.

Top things to look out for

Preferences and ranking will be a key deciding factor, but there are a few other points to consider when reviewing your matches:

• Engagement – check the coloured squares, if a candidate is already out at final stage interview or under offer, it may not be wise to start the process for a new role without checking with your colleague managing the other role.

• Last Updated – how long has it been since the candidate’s record was last updated? If it’s been years you might want to check their LinkedIn profile to check they are still in that type role/industry – you don’t want the embarrassment of contacting a now senior candidate about a junior role.

• Star rating – you might not want to send a 1- or 2-star candidate to a key account

• Post code radius – this one is really handy if you have a client site in a tricky location with odd working hours or lack of public transport.

• Placed Indicator – this will show on any candidates you have previously placed. That can only be a good thing as you know they must be a decent candidate right? But what if that candidate was placed within the last 6 months and has updated their status to be actively looking. We’d recommend finding out more about the situation – especially if a candidate is in a rebate period!

• When a candidate is placed their status updates to happy in current position/currently in contract and they do not appear in potential match lists until that status is updated by a recruiter or the candidate via their portal.

Super users can create up to 10 engagement indicators in the settings, see here for how to.

Identifying who’s interested

Once you’ve whittled down your list to remove the candidates that definitely aren’t suitable, you could start calling through the candidates. But if you still have a list of 30-40 candidates and juggling a few other tasks you might not have time to call every candidate right away.

Why not use the advert mailshot to send a personalised email to your list?

You’ll find instruction on doing this here, just make sure you select ‘potential match’ in the ‘from your job’ section.

This will allow you to easily identify the best candidates to call first – those who have viewed the advert/email over the ones who haven’t opened your email. Just check back on the marketing column of your potential match for the coloured fish updates.

We recommend calling the green and orange fish candidates first.