Facebook ads also provide a rare opportunity to reach passive candidates where they spend most of their downtime. In other words: get the attention of drivers that aren’t actively browsing through jobs on job boards. This is a big deal and I’ll get into why in a little bit.
When pulled off properly, (and depending on the quality of your job), Facebook can yield a consistently lower cost per lead / hire than any other advertising platform.
The problem with Facebook advertising is that it’s notoriously hard to get into. There are a lot of boxes to be ticked before you can set up your ad, let alone one that actually works. Companies don’t want to go through that hassle, and most can’t afford hiring a team of Facebook experts just to try out a solution that they have no faith in.
Pictured: A team of expensive Facebook experts you probably don't want to pay the salaries of.
Because of how hard it is to get into Facebook advertising, many companies end up dismissing it altogether. But dismissing Facebook is a bad idea.
Before we get into the other benefits of job advertising on everyone’s favorite social media, let me explain what passive candidates are and why reaching them is such a big deal.
To understand the value of passive candidates, you need to understand the shortcomings of the “usual methods”.
The first problem with job boards
As you’re aware, most carriers (small - mid size) rely on free traffic from job boards. The problem is that the drivers sourced through job boards are actively looking for work. They’re on the job boards because they’re ready to make the switch, and they’re applying to several positions at a time. Since these drivers need work ASAP, they click on as many jobs as they can, and let the smoothest talking recruiter handle the rest.
At best, you’ll manage to reach one of these drivers and convince them that your job is the best. At worst, you’ll spend hours following up with drivers that don’t care.
The second problem with job boards
On job boards, you don’t just compete for driver interest and attention. You compete for attention in general. You’re on a platform with hundreds of other carriers with very little power of how to stand out.
Just one day's worth of job ads in one city on Craigslist.
On many job boards, you have no way of making your brand and your offer stand out without it turning into a shouting contest. This desperation for attention causes many carriers to resort to using flashy titles and massive claims that they can’t possibly live up to.
Why Facebook candidates are different
With Facebook ads, you avoid competing for the driver’s attention. When your targeted ad reaches a driver, it isn't surrounded by hundreds of other flashy ads. That way, when a driver expresses an interest in your job, they'll expect a call from you and you alone. Interacting with an ad in this environment gives drivers more space to appreciate your job offer on its own.
The other thing that separates Facebook candidates from the ones you reach on job boards is that many of them are not actively looking for work. This may not seem like a great thing at first, but it is.
Most truck drivers are constantly on the look out for better opportunities. The ones that aren't are usually happy to consider their options, especially if you have a decent job offer.
Facebook ads consistently outperform other ad channels
At YouCruit, we've run hundreds of Facebook campaigns and sourced thousands of driver applications for our carrier partners. In the early stages of figuring out what worked and what didn't, we realized that Facebook was outperforming everything else by a lot.
Driver applications were coming in cheaper and more consistently than on any other platform we experimented with. Part of this is due to the sheer amount of drivers checking Facebook on a daily basis, and much of it is due to our target audience becoming more and more refined and effective.
How we made Facebook advertising simple
We've been running Facebook ads for a while now. We understand exactly what goes into crafting an effective trucking job ad. We've put in the hard work, and now we want to share the fruits of our labor with you.
During our time advertising trucking jobs on Facebook, we've learned how to target drivers in a way that yields cheap applications, and consequently cheap hires for the companies we work with.
By providing you with a solution that lets you tap into our target audiences and have us advertise the jobs on your behalf, you'll get a far better return than if you were to get into Facebook by yourself.
Setting up
Once you've set up your trucking job in YouCruit, you can begin to advertise. In the 'Advertise' tab on YouCruit, you'll find the job advertising options available to you.
Text reads: Facebook job advertising made easy - We'll run the campaign for you, allowing you to leverage our highly targeted driver audience to tap into the power, reach, and accessibility of the world's most popular social media platform.
By selecting 'Read more', you'll enter the campaign set up page.
Here, you'll get some more information about how we set up your Facebook ad. We take your detailed and specific job description and hiring area to target a custom driver audience for you. Each ad is manually reviewed by our team to ensure it is a success and brings the desired results you need.
Setting up your budget is up to you, and we estimate the number of hires you'll get based on your choice. We arrived at the estimated figures based on the results from the hundreds of campaigns we've run for our existing partners.
What you get with YouCruit’s Facebook advertising campaigns
- A custom campaign based on your unique hiring area, job description, and hiring needs.
- Our proven driver audience based on the behavior of 300,000+ drivers
- At a minimum, each incoming lead will feature: name, phone number, email and zip code.
- All leads will be urged to complete screening in Lanefinder as a complimentary service.
- A dedicated personal account manager.
- Detailed report outlining the results of your campaign including number of applicants, impressions, CPA, etc (applies to campaigns with a budget of over $1,000)
Bonus screening
YouCruit's Facebook campaigns deliver the information you need to get in touch with the driver. We deliver ZIP codes, emails, phone numbers, and names by default. As a complimentary service, however, we also utilize Lanefinder to attempt to receive additional screening information from each driver.
Lanefinder sends each applying driver a link to complete a full screening and sends daily reminders for drivers to complete their applications.
With this complimentary service, a portion of your drivers will be pre-screened before you even reach out to them. This'll make the job of your recruiters a lot easier, by letting them know who is worth reaching out to and who isn't.
Summary
Here are a few bullet points to sum up this blog post:
- 63% of truck drivers use Facebook daily as their primary social media.
- Setting up on Facebook on your own is hard and expensive.
- Many drivers are not actively looking for work on job boards and can easily be targeted on Facebook.
- Facebook applications are cheap and high quality.
- YouCruit delivered thousands of driver applications to our carrier partners using targeted Facebook campaigns.
- By tapping into our proven driver audiences, you can get started with Facebook without the busywork.
- Each applicant is prompted fill out screening in Lanefinder.
Make the most of your Facebook campaign results
Your Facebook campaign will bring in the leads, but what you do with them is up to you! We always recommend that you take these necessary steps to hire successfully:
- Be clear about your job offer - Nail your communication and be honest about your expectations.
- Feature your brand - Drivers are more likely to go for a company with a solid brand (website, online presence, message, etc.)
- Remember that time is of the essence - Getting in touch with your leads ASAP should be your top priority. That's how the mega-carriers do it, and they're highly successful at converting leads into hires. Get your driver leads on the phone and make it clear that you want them in orientation as soon as possible. If you're serious about filling those trucks, make sure you're fast.
These are just a few quick tips to keep in mind when reaching out to your Facebook leads. Treat those leads well and you'll hire great drivers in no time.
If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out! We're always happy to hop on a discovery call and help great drivers find their way home to your company. If you're an existing customer, just shoot your friendly YouCruit representative an email, otherwise reach us at sales@youcruit.com any time.