Forget James Taylor – I love traffic jam.

Don’t care what highway or parkway, and I’ll tell you why….

As a kid with a parent in the recruitment business, I learned at a young age that there were many non-conventional ways to get a feel for which way a job market, or economy for that matter is heading. Some people look at how full Trucks or Trains are, how many cardboard packing boxes are being sold, etc. We used to walk through Macy’s in New York, (the Flagship store on 6th & 7th avenues ) on the way to see the NY Rangers games. Ground floor at Macy’s – between Thanksgiving and Christmas was about as good an indicator of the economy, as you could get. If I wasn’t getting knocked to the ground by pint-sized New Yorker Grannies ready to commit misdemeanor crimes for the next bargain – then things were bad. This coming from someone who lived to experience New York’s bankruptcy first hand. Let me tell you – you could toss a football across the cosmetics department and not hit a soul in those days.

Anyhow, when things hit the fan a couple of years ago, a buddy of mine employed at a high level for a major automotive manufacturer give me the 1st anecdotal evidence on what was to become the most massive job carnage in our times.

“Hey Matt, have you noticed you little traffic there is on the commute home lately?” I hadn’t then – but started to. As the weeks turned into months, months to years, I actually began to miss my lunatic roadmates. Granted, they ALL drive too fast or too damn slow and at many times,  I HAD wished that they all go away. But when it actually happened…I wondered…was I responsible for their disappearance? Where was Rod Serling and the crazy spinning pyscho-hypnosis wheel?  (original Twilight Zone – look it up).

As luck would have it, maybe it’s the affordable price of gas – or at least in my neck of the woods, we seem to have a glimmer of light on the horizon – cause I can tell you first hand – TRAFFIC STINKS AGAIN.

Every one of my lost friends it seems has returned, back to cut me off,  jam the brakes in front of me, while simultaneously applying make-up at 75 (years or miles per hour….take your pick) and generally remind me that without jobs there’s no traffic, and without traffic there are no jobs.

So don’t be a hater, LOVE your traffic jams – because there are GDP points in every breaklight, every exhaust fume and every gesture casually exchanged between us as we journey to and from.

Today, all we need is a click of a button to reach and connect to the rest of the world. This online global village has given rise to the popularity of social media networks where a virtual platform is constructed to interact with likeminded individuals. The effectiveness of existing social media networks have given HR industry a perfect tool to recruit and reach a mass number of desirable candidates. The HR professionals can make use of social media to work in recruitment, employee engagement, increasing retention and more.

If you are a HR professional, you must have already utilized and experienced various social media networks especially in the year 2008, where the whole concept of using social media as HR tool gathered momentum. Phrases like ‘tweet’, ‘community’, etc have become acceptable part of our daily vocabulary. The sharing of job opportunities, new openings or even a new Public relation tactics has become instant, convenient and most importantly official through these social networking sites.

About a decade ago, if HR managers wanted to share or communicate any information regarding job assignments, recruitment, increasing retention or even to induce employer brand, they are expected to engage in month long planning activities and executing the information through various traditional mediums. It was a long process that consumed time, labor and money.

However, now, many HR departments of various corporate are getting free advertising, revolutionizing their marketing and PR strategies and investing a considerable amount of time and money to make their presence felt in facebook, linkedin or twitter accounts, something that would have sound absurd a few years ago. Many are embracing social recruiting.
So for those amateurs who are still unsure of how to make use of social media as a HR tool, here are few tips that I can think of:

1) Go where people “like you” might hangout virtually
Gather people who are like minded and face similar challenges like you. Choose any of the networking sites such as LinkedIn and consequently engage in live chats, discussions and Blog posts to create a group of professionals facing common challenges and vision.

2) Get familiar with twitter
Twitter can prove to be an excellent recruiter tool, coach and talent hunter at the same time. If you think Twitter cannot actually reach the niche group or target group you are aiming at, I am afraid I must warn you that it is a misconception. Twitter has become the ‘choice’ for almost all professionals and senior level executives as a medium to stay in connect with their concerned clients and followers.

3) Tap the power of facebook for recruiting
Facebook has definitely proved to be an important tool for HR professionals in the kitty offered by social media network. Many companies are already using facebook features to connect with and recruit young professionals. It has the right platform to engage in process of employment branding and social recruiting.

Social network indeed has taken the form of revolution as far as HR area is concerned. It has set its own game rules but has definitely left space for the HR team to make the most of social media. However remember even cyber space require certain amount of professionalism. Are you still thinking How HR Can Make The Most of Social Media? It is time to explore this.

Steve Sinclair is a writter on Social Recruiting and he advices companies on Social Media Recruiting strategies
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Steve_Sinclair

One of the most important aspects of your organization’s overall recruitment strategy is developing and managing your employment brand. Candidates rate an organization’s employment brand the 2nd most influential factor when considering employment opportunities. Google is the world’s most recognized employment brand. Google’s employment brand was built in a short period of time and exclusively through viral marketing. Google’s employment brand has been written about in every major business publication and as a result of its branding Google receives over 3,000 resumes per day. Other organizations such as Southwest Airlines, IBM, GE, Disney and HP have implemented similar employment branding techniques and are finding similar results.

While smaller organizations should not set out to compete with Google’s employment brand they can strive to become the number one brand in their vertical. A viral based approach to employment branding will result in the ability of the organization to attract top candidates. If you have to pay to get your message out it will not be credible. A successful employment branding strategy must be viral and must excite potential candidates to take action.

Successful employment branding emphasizes stories about an organization, an organization’s recruitment process and what it’s like to work in an organization which can easily be spread by employees and candidates. Employment branding has been called the #1 strategic way to increase application traffic yet on average companies spend less than 5% of their recruitment budget on employment branding.

The goal of any organization’s employment branding should be to build the organization’s reputation as a top place to work in order to attract top talent. Your employment brand should be credible, believable, and concentrate on the spreading of positive stories about the organization, being talked about in the media, and winning awards.

Some of the components of your employment branding
initiative should include:

· A well developed and implemented employee referral program.

· Development an execution of a “Recruitment Culture”

· Proper utilization of social networking
(LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace, Plaxo, Twitter, Ning, etc.).

· Viral Marketing

· Recruitment Video
· Career site SEO

· Award programs.

· Articles in targeted business publications

· Presentations at conferences

An organization’s employment branding should lead potential candidates to a strong career site. Candidates will visit the career site to confirm if what they’ve heard about the organization is true and read detailed information about the organization. The career site should clearly identify the organization’s culture, values, vision, current job openings and benefit programs. The site should reflect an organization’s brand and strengthen a candidate’s desire to consider employment with the organization. Included on the site should be testimonials from employees and video showing employees doing engaging work. Video should definitely be a part of employment branding as it can excite candidates and allow them to see feel and hear the passion and excitement of an organization’s employees. Google’s recruitment video “An inside look at Google” has been viewed over 500,000 times on the Internet.

Positive employment branding will result in a significant increase in the volume of unsolicited resumes, higher quality candidates, higher offer acceptance rates, an increased number of employee referrals, improved employee retention rates and an overall increase in the success rates of an organization’s recruitment programs. Remember that your employment branding is only as good as your candidate experience ratings.

Mike Astringer, Founder and CEO
Human Capital X701
mike.astringer@humancapitalconsultants.com

http://www.humancapitalconsultants.com
http://mikeastringer.blogspot.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Mike_Astringer

When it comes to interactive advertising, much of the terminology can be overwhelming and confusing, especially if you are new to the medium. You hear different metrics and words, such as hits, page views, page displays, ad impressions, ad views, clicks, rich media, buttons, banners, alt text, text links, and ad servers. But what do they really mean? And, how can understanding this terminology help you evaluate a site to determine where to place a media buy? Should you do a sponsorship with a fixed position in a contextual content area for branding or a rotation throughout the site for direct response, ROI and reach? Education is one of the most important things in planning and understanding new media (i.e., interactive advertising) and having a successful campaign. Whether you are a novice or an expert, knowing these terms may prove useful when discussing and purchasing online advertising. Below are some common interactive advertising terms and definitions from IAB’s Glossary of Interactive Advertising Terms – helpful for clients who have any questions on what these might mean in reporting or in any ad serving systems. The IAB’s full Glossary of Interactive Advertising Terms can be found at www.iab.net/resources/glossary_a.asp.

Ad banner – a graphic image or other media object used as an advertisement. See iab.net for voluntary guidelines for banner ads.

Ad click – a measurement of the user-initiated action of responding to (such as clicking on) an ad element causing a re-direct to another Web location or another frame or page within the advertisement.

There are three types of ad clicks:

1) click-throughs;

2) in-unit clicks; and

3) mouseovers.

Ad click-throughs should be tracked and reported as a 302 redirect at the ad server and should filter out robotic activity.

Ad impression –

1) an ad which is served to a user’s browser. Ads can be requested by the user’s browser (referred to as pulled ads) or they can be pushed, such as e-mailed ads;

2) a measurement of responses from an ad delivery system to an ad request from the user’s browser, which is filtered from robotic activity and is recorded at a point as late as possible in the process of delivery of the creative material to the user’s browser – therefore closest to the actual opportunity to see by the user.

Two methods are used to deliver ad content to the user:

a) server-initiated and

b) client-initiated.

Server-initiated ad counting uses the publisher’s Web content server for making requests, formatting and re-directing content. Client-initiated ad counting relies on the user’s browser to perform these activities. For organizations that use a server-initiated ad counting method, counting should occur subsequent to the ad response at either the publisher’s ad server or the Web content server. For organizations using a client-initiated ad counting method, counting should occur at the publisher’s ad server or third-party ad server, subsequent to the ad request, or later, in the process. See www.iab.net for ad campaign measurement guidelines.

Ad materials – the creative artwork, copy, active URLs and active target sites, which are due to the seller prior to the initiation of the ad campaign. Ad serving – the delivery of ads by a server to an end user’s computer on which the ads are then displayed by a browser and/or cached. Ad serving is normally performed either by a Web publisher, or by a third-party ad server. Ads can be embedded in the page or served separately.

Ad space – the location on a page of a site in which an advertisement can be placed. Each space on a site is uniquely identified. Multiple ad spaces can exist on a single page.

Ad transfers – the successful display of an advertiser’s Web site after the user clicked on an ad. When a user clicks on an advertisement, a click-through is recorded and re-directs or “transfers” the user’s browser to an advertiser’s Web site. If the user successfully displays the advertiser’s Web site, an ad transfer is recorded.

Alternate text – a word or phrase that is displayed when a user has image loading disabled in their browser or when a user abandons a page by hitting “stop” in their browser prior to the transfer of all images. Also appears as “balloon text” when a user lets their mouse rest over an image. (also referred to as alt text)

Animated GIF – an animation created by combining multiple GIF images in one file. The result is multiple images, displayed one after another, that give the appearance of movement.

Banner – a graphic image displayed on an HTML page used as an ad. See www.iab.net for voluntary guidelines defining specifications of banner ads.

Bonus impressions – additional ad impressions above the commitments outlined in the approved insertion order.

Button –

1) clickable graphic that contains certain functionality, such as taking one someplace or executing a program;

2) buttons can also be ads. See iab.net for voluntary guidelines defining specifications of button ads.

Clicks –

1) metric that measures the reaction of a user to an Internet ad. There are three types of clicks: click-throughs; in-unit clicks; and mouseovers;

2) the opportunity for a user to download another file by clicking on an advertisement, as recorded by the server;

3) the result of a measurable interaction with an advertisement or key word that links to the advertiser’s intended Web site or another page or frame within the Web site;

4) metric which measures the reaction of a user to hot-linked editorial content. See www.iab.net for ad campaign measurement guidelines. See also ad click, click-through, in-unit clicks and mouseover.

Click-through – the action of following a hyperlink within an advertisement or editorial content to another Web site or another page or frame within the Web site. Ad click-throughs should be tracked and reported as a 302 redirect at the ad server and should filter out robotic activity.

Dynamic rotation – delivery of ads on a rotating, random basis so that users are exposed to different ads and ads are served in different pages of the site.

Flash™ – Macromedia’s vector-based graphics file format which is used to display interactive animations on a Web page. This form of rich media technology is available via a plug-in.

Frequency – the number of times an ad is delivered to the same browser in a single session or time period. A site can use cookies in order to manage ad frequency.

GIF (Graphic Interchange Format) – a graphic format which uses compression to store and display images.

Hit – when users access a Web site, their computer sends a request to the site’s server to begin downloading a page. Each element of a requested page (including graphics, text, interactive items) is recorded by the site’s Web server log file as a “hit.” If a page containing two graphics is accessed by a user, those hits will be recorded once for the page itself and once for each of the graphics. Webmasters use hits to measure their servers’ workload. Because page designs and visit patterns vary from site to site, the number of hits bears no relationship to the number of pages downloaded, and is therefore a poor guide for traffic measurement.

HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) – a set of codes called markup tags in a plain text (*.txt) file that determine what information is retrieved and how it is rendered by a browser. There are two kinds of markup tags: anchor and format. Anchor tags determine what is retrieved, and format tags determine how it is rendered.

HTTP (Hyper-Text Transfer Protocol) – the format most commonly used to transfer documents on the World Wide Web.

Hyperlink – HTML programming which redirects the user to a new URL when the individual clicks on hypertext. Hypertext – text or graphical elements on a page that activates a hyperlink when clicked.

Impression – a measurement of responses from a Web server to a page request from the user browser, which is filtered from robotic activity and error codes, and is recorded at a point as close as possible to opportunity to see the page by the user.

Inventory – the number of ads available for sale on a Web site.

JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) – a file format that uses a compression technique to reduce the size (number of bytes) of graphic files.

Mouseover – the process by which a user places his/her mouse over a media object, without clicking. The mouse may need to remain still for a specified amount of time to initiate some actions.

Page impression – a measurement of responses from a Web server to a page request from the user’s browser, which is filtered from robotic activity and error codes, and is recorded at a point as close as possible to the opportunity to see the page by the user. See www.iab.net for ad campaign measurement guidelines.

Pixel – a picture element (single illuminated dot) on a computer monitor. The metric used to indicate the size of Internet ads.

Reach –

1) unique users that visited the site over the course of the reporting period, expressed as a percent of the universe for the demographic category; also called unduplicated audience;

2) the total number of unique users who will be served a given ad.

ROS (Run-of-Site) – the scheduling of Internet advertising whereby ads run across an entire site, often at a lower cost to the advertiser than the purchase of specific site sub-sections.

Splash page – a preliminary page that precedes the user-requested page of a Web site that usually promotes a particular site feature or provides advertising. A splash page is timed to move on to the requested page after a short period of time or a click. Also known as an interstitial. Splash pages are not considered qualified page impressions under current industry guidelines, but they are considered qualified ad impressions.

Sponsorship – an association with a Web site in some way that gives an advertiser some particular visibility and advantage above that of run-of-site advertising. When associated with specific content, sponsorship can provide a more targeted audience than run-of-site ad buys.

Static ad placement/Static rotation –

1) ads that remain on a Web page for a specified period of time;

2) embedded ads. Third-party ad server – independent outsourced companies that specialize in managing, maintaining, serving, tracking, and analyzing the results of online ad campaigns. They deliver targeted advertising that can be tailored to consumers’ declared or predicted characteristics or preferences.

Total ad impressions – the total of all graphical and textual ad impressions delivered, regardless of the source. See ad impression. Yield – the percentage of clicks vs. impressions on an ad within a specific page. Also called ad click rate. Other Useful industry sites:

IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) www.iab.net AAAA (American Association of Advertising Agencies) www.aaaa.org ANA (Association of National Advertisers) www.ana.net ARF (Advertising Research Foundation) www.arfsite.org AAF (American Advertising Foundation) www.aaf.org CARU (Children’s Advertising Review Unit) www.caru.org Source: Interactive Advertising Bureau – www.iab.net

The birth of Hooklineandthinker.com has come from a group of recruitment professionals specializing in print advertising. Since the tides of recruitment advertising have shifted dramatically in the direction of web, social networking, and career boards, we’ve decided to dedicate our manpower towards following these exciting new trends, and provide up to date information on the latest and greatest technologies and applications. Through our resources and news sites, we do our best to provide great tips, tricks, news and information on topics such related to HR and the world wide web.

We’re all in this together, HR professionals, recruitment agencies, and job seekers alike, can all benefit from having information available to be well informed, and utilizing your HR budget in a most effective manner. For job seekers, it’s always best to know where to go, or where to be, to be discovered while searching for a new gig. The light at the end of this recession is closer than we know, and a boom in the recruitment economy is surely on it’s way. In the mean time, it is very beneficial to be prepared, with connections, profiles, networks and tweets, so when the job-rush finally hits, we will all be prepared to reap the spoils.

At HooklineandThinker, we want it to be about you. You, the HR professionals, You the Employers, You the jobseekers, to contribute to our effort, and become a part of the conversation. We are always looking for any contributing material to our blog, and will gladly publish any articles, white-papers, recruitment related stories, and opinions that you may have. We truly want HooklineandThinker to be a blog that is for the people, and by the people. There’s no better way to measure the success of a new-fangled idea,….than to hear from the people that actually apply them. And we mean everyone. You do NOT need to be an expert on Social Media, or even a high level HR professional. Just a person who has an opinion or a case study regarding the newest technologies applied to get people to work…and to get work!

So…Let’s get working!

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