Last week the ATS vendor Jibe published some interesting stats about which candidates convert better according to what channels they come from. Turns out that social media and organic search traffic deliver more applications versus paid and other channels.

“There’s one major difference in an inbound candidate versus an outbound one: intention. When someone organically comes to your site, they are showing intention to do something—learn about your employer brand or apply. We believe intention is a driver of higher conversions. -Jibe

Employers who are neglecting their social channels and SEO should take note. If you want to lower your costs on paid channels social and search offer ways to do just that. On social that means more that just publishing your jobs to twitter. It means crafting a message for why they should apply. Give candidates a compelling reason to hand over their resume.

You do that through effective recruitment marketing. Such as pictures of your office environment, letting employees voices be heard, authentic messaging that job seekers want to hear. Give them a real world picture of what it’s like to work there.

When it comes to search, make sure your ATS is SEO friendly, meaning it should be mobile optimized and conform to basic search engine friendly standards (on your job descriptions). Contact your local university career centers and see if they will link to your careers page. Building up inbound links to your own content is also an effective way to increase your organic ranking within Google and Bing.