When setting up for high-volume hiring, it is equally important to make the jobs you are offering attractive and easy enough for people to apply.

For example, McDonald’s in the US once made headlines by inviting job seekers to apply using a 10-second “Snaplication”, an application submitted via McDonald’s Snapchat careers page.

This high-volume hiring led to finding 250,000 new employees for the summer. While it seems like a PR stunt, McDonald’s tapped a key insight: make it easy for people to apply for your open roles.

Here are some ways that you, as an employer, can achieve a similar effect.

Make the application process easy

A study by the careers site Indeed found that 42% of job seekers are frustrated by being asked to fill out lengthy applications and three in five do not finish applying due to complex questions, overly long forms or too many requirements.

To make it straightforward for someone to submit an application:

• Mobile-optimise the application form: 20% of job seekers will abandon an online application if they cannot complete it on their mobile device.
• Don’t ask too many questions: Keep questions to five or less. Use other steps in the hiring process to weed out unqualified candidates.
• Provide clear instructions: Tell applicants exactly what they need to do to submit. If you are using an online form, tell the applicant upfront the information they need to submit, how many questions there will be and roughly how long the process should take.
• Confirm successful submission: Whether it is an on-page pop-up or email confirmation, make sure to affirm that the application went through so a candidate knows they have not wasted their time.
• Make it easy to apply: Have a one-click application or an application that pulls information from LinkedIn or social media so a candidate does not have to manually fill in fields.

Improve candidate engagement

A poor candidate experience can be costly. Virgin Media found that inconsistent communication, outdated hiring methods and a glitchy careers page cost the company US$6 million in lost revenue.

The key to constant communication is having the right tool to automate messages from the recruitment team to candidates. This helps to keep each person informed as they move through the process.

AI recruiting can even automate candidate interviewing, progressing the best candidates through the hiring funnel faster than if a recruiter reviewed résumés manually.

Another useful tip is to use video interview software to make it easier for applications and save recruiters’ time.

Select the right talent

Out of the hundreds of CVs for dozens of positions, how to discern who is the best fit? Use a skills assessment that asks questions designed to mimic how a candidate will perform once they are hired.

A good skills test will include questions that can be answered by someone who is already doing the job. Skill assessments cover a range of task-related abilities as well as less tangible things like teamwork and leadership.

Many skill tests can be administered in bulk. Vervoe and other platforms make it straightforward to select a list of questions from a library of content or design questions based on the specific needs of the role.

AI scores the results from hundreds of completed tests using a multi-layered approach and Vervoe’s algorithm ranks candidates on how well they performed.

No one is filtered out for having missed a certain benchmark. Recruiters receive an ordered list of candidates that includes everyone, so no one misses out on being considered for the next round.

Track your time to hire

Time to hire is measured from when a candidate submits an application, either sourced or through a careers page, to when they accept a job offer. It is an overall indicator of efficiency.

Shorter time to hire is generally better unless the wrong candidates are being hired out of speed or desperation.

In high-volume hiring, it is worthwhile to unpack time-to-hire in-depth to see if this approach works for the company. Consider things like:

• Hiring velocity: how much time is spent on each step of the process? Are candidates getting stuck in a particular phase?
• By role, department, or team: are there areas where hiring is taking longer? Are certain managers bottlenecking the high-volume hiring process?
• Manual tasks: can parts of the hiring process be automated – communication, résumé reviews or interviewing – to move candidates more quickly through the funnel?

Learn more about implementing the right tools to make high-volume hiring work for you. Get in touch with the experts at Vervoe to see how AI can improve your hiring process.

This article first appeared in Vervoe.

At Vervoe, their mission is to fundamentally transform the hiring process from mediocracy to meritocracy.