7 Crucial Time-saving Recruiting Technologies You’ll Want in 2017

Tools are great to have, and if you’re in the hiring space, they’re in no short supply. In fact, there are literally hundreds of HR tech and business tools available on the market – and even more Google Chrome extensions.

However, having too many tools in your toolbox can actually waste more time than save it. Not to mention, there’s a lot of junk out there, and it can be difficult to pick out the trash from the treasure.

So, in the holiday spirit of sharing, here’s the dish on the tried-and-tested tools that will save you time in 2017. And for more of where that came from, don’t miss my webinar, New Year & New Employee Branding: How To Market Your Company To Passive Candidates, on Monday, December 19.

1. MightyRecruiter: Clearly there’s a reason this post is appearing on the MightyRecruiter blog! I’ve been a user since the product launched in April 2016 and can confidently say that this hiring solution has a lot of features that save time. The job posting feature is automated and gives you the ability to manage all of your job postings in one location. This feature is extremely handy because you don’t have to spend time bouncing from one job board to another. I also currently use MightyRecruiter as my ATS. Aside from all the basic candidate management functions that you’d expect from that kind of software, it has an employee referral feature that helps you track employee referrals and a widget that makes it quick and easy to add a career page to your own website. All of these features save time and help with your budget as well. There are a variety of different packages to pick from; costs start at $189 (there’s also a 7-day free trial you can take advantage of).

2. ai: x.ai is a personal assistant service that schedules meetings for you, which can be hugely valuable when you’re trying to coordinate countless phone screens or in-person interviews. The service is unique in the sense that it uses artificial intelligence. In order to use the service, you would link your calendars to the service and set up rules. Then you would CC Amy who is your virtual assistant. There are a lot of scheduling programs in the market, but this one is special because there is very little error or back and forth. There is a free version that schedules up to 5 meetings a month and a paid version that starts at $39.

3. Connectifier Social Links: This Chrome Extension provides instant access to a candidate’s social media footprint. You will be able to view all of a candidate’s available social media profiles, which will help you personalize messages and gain insight into their work experience and how they’ll fit in culturally. It also provides you with a link to their Indeed resume if it is available. There is no cost to use this extension.

4. Adblock: Ads are extremely distracting and time consuming. Adblock helps you save time by eliminating distracting advertisements on webpages and popups. This extension works in both Chrome and Safari. This is one of the most popular extensions available with over 40 million downloads, and it’s free.

5. SalesHandy: This email tracking and email analytics tool is an alternative to Yesware, and it offers so much more – including data on email efficiency. This software comes in handy if you want to know if your emails are being read by candidates and what your response rate is. It has a Chrome Extension, and it works with both Outlook and Gmail. The email tracking is included with the free version. The premium version, which starts at $7 per month, offers enhanced features such as email campaigns, contact & communication history, document tracking, document management, and integrations with other platforms such as Salesforce and Slack.

6. Buffer: Social media accounts can be a lot to manage, and at a time when employer brand and the way you use social to build yours is becoming increasingly important, you need to make sure you’re posting effectively and efficiently. Buffer helps you manage all of your social media accounts in one place. It helps save time by allowing you to schedule your social media posts in advance, and you can post to as many networks as you would like. It has a Chrome Extension and is available in mobile. Buffer has both paid and free accounts.

7. Web Scraper: This tool is a Chrome Extension built for data extraction from web pages. It’s particularly useful for sourcers looking to build email lists based on candidate contact information scraped from various sites. Using this extension, you can easily import this information into Excel and then perform a mail merge to your ATS/CRM or recruitment automation solution. This saves you a lot of time because you don’t have to cut and paste or type data into spreadsheets. The cost is free.

It is important to review all of your tools periodically to see what is relevant for you and your team. The technology is constantly changing, and it can sometimes feel overwhelming. It is best to stick to a few tools and not hundreds in order to stay productive.