Facebook to connect job seekers with local employers confirming years of speculations that the giant social network would harness its huge audience to take on LinkedIn and online job boards.
Facebook has created tools for businesses to post job openings and for job seekers to hunt for new gigs.
The new features are aimed at small and mid-sized businesses that typically struggle to find the right people to hire, particularly part-time and hourly workers, targeting a weak spot for LinkedIn, Facebook’s vice president of ads and business platform Andrew Bosworth has said.
Businesses were already trying to connect with prospective employees by placing job openings on their Facebook pages, Bosworth said. Facebook is just giving them an easier way to do it.
Starting this week, U.S. and Canada businesses will be able to post job listings, track applications and communicate with job applicants through their Facebook pages.
Job seekers can apply for open positions by clicking the “Apply Now” button, with Facebook auto-filling some of the public information from their Facebook profile such as name and location. Applicants can review and edit the information before submitting the application. Once submitted, the application creates a conversation between the business and the job candidate on Facebook Messenger. Facebook is also adding a new “Jobs” tab for job seekers.
Businesses can pay for ads that will boost the reach of their job listings. The job listings will also show up in News Feed for Facebook users who have liked that business’ page.
Facebook began testing the new job tools last spring in a couple of cities including Chicago, Bosworth said.
The challenge for Facebook: People are frequently reluctant to commingle their personal and professional lives — and with good reason. Though 84% of organizations are hunting for new employees on social media and 9% say they plan to do it, according to a 2015 survey from the Society for Human Resource Management.
The most popular social media service for recruiters is LinkedIn at 96%. But, the survey found, Facebook is gaining, with 66% of recruiters turning to it. More than half of recruiters also use Twitter to recruit, according to the survey.
