What would it be worth to you if 3000 canvassing prospects showed up at your door in just minutes? What if you could find them for free… now what’s it worth to you?
In previous issues I’ve talked about methods you can employ to attract recruits, methods that required an investment of money and time. There’s another resource you can tap into to attract qualified people and the only investment is your time. It’s called MySpace.
You can access over 106 million people on MySpace. With a few keystrokes on your computer, you can be in contact with 3000 of them within 5 miles of your office. And if you don’t find what you’re looking for you can get another 3000 with another click. You can have access to an innumerable amount of canvassing prospect, all based on the criteria you define.
Desktop Recruiting
MySpace, and other social networking sites, like FaceBook and Linkedin are a recruiter’s playground, if you’re willing to invest a little time in front of the computer. I guarantee you it’s an investment upon which you can reap loads of potential canvass prospects.
In previous newsletters I’ve talked about identifying your ideal canvasser. High school and college students have proven to be the choice candidate for canvassing. Anyone under 25 practically lives on MySpace.com. It has grown to be the most popular web site in the history of the Internet, especially amongst young people. MySpace added its 100 millionth member in August 2006 and a new user is added every 2 seconds. These numbers are based world-wide, but what makes MySpace so appealing for you as a canvassing recruiter is the site’s ‘targeting’ ability. It’s a tremendous human resource tool for attracting potential recruits based on geographic and demographic criteria quickly, efficiently, and best of all, for free.
MySpace let’s you target a wide range of criteria, including age, zip code and proximity. These sites are a virtual gold mine of human resources, if you’re willing to put in the time it takes to collect them.
In addition to the recruiting opportunities, social network sites are a great way to learn more about your prospective canvasser.
Social sites can be beneficial even for candidates you obtain through traditional recruiting methods. During an ‘in-person’ interview applicants can paint a wonderful picture of themselves and previously you only had the references they provided to verify their personality and work habits. Now you can check them out online quickly. Their true personality will be revealed on their MySpace page. You can easily determine if the person sitting across your desk during an interview is descriptive of the same person they’re representing on their MySpace page.
Check it out, go to MySpace and plug in some basic criteria and do a search. You’ll immediately have 3000 prospective recruits to choose from. You can then send your ad to those prospects, and for some you’ll have a response back within minutes.
Social sites have boomed. Just as with attracting prospective recruits through traditional advertising, there are nuances and techniques to capitalizing on the opportunities available to you on social networking sites. Canvass King Insider Circle members benefit from premade ads and scripts developed for effectively contacting, communicating and converting potential recruits. In October, I’ll touch on the basic X’s and O’s of working with social sites.