We're delighted to have hit 100,000 followers on LinkedIn! So to celebrate, we wanted to share some of the ways our recruiters use the platform to attract & secure talent.

With over ten years of recruitment experience we have constantly been evolving the way we target and attract the best talent online. Growing our candidate networks on LinkedIn is a great tool in our recruiters' strategies to attract the best talent within their niche. 

We think that’s part of the reason we hit the sizeable milestone of 100,000 followers on LinkedIn this week, and why we wanted to share with you some of our tricks for picking up amazing talent. 

With 756 million users, it's obvious that LinkedIn plays a crucial role for candidates when finding and applying for new jobs. It also makes it great for employers to showcase their brand and attract the best talent. But getting the most from the platform is far from simply adding people and engaging with posts.

It’s through years of tailored training, evolving sourcing strategies, and utilizing the platform for sales, that we can add significant value during the recruitment process. This means we have developed extensive networks and strategies for talent pooling and pipelining that will make a difference for your business or career. 

Aligned with our recruiter’s excellent local knowledge, LinkedIn helps us target the most relevant potential candidates, maintain relationships, and grow our network to ensure we are always keeping up with new talent. 

We discussed this with Jevon Barnes, our Client Partner, who specialises in FinTech growth and expansion with Hamlyn Williams, to share how he utilises LinkedIn to source the best talent.

Accessing candidates in new markets 

Jevon: My focus in the last few years at Hamlyn Williams has been working with FinTech companies helping them staff up for the development of new products, expansion of their services into new territories, scale up of existing teams, and hire strategically to deliver against their respective business objectives.  

That often means expanding where they hire, or the broadening the kind of skills they need to make new products work. In short, they come to us when they’re unsure where to look for great talent, or how to get the local knowledge we have that makes job searches even more likely to succeed. Whether we are looking at executive hires or partnering with businesses to feed market insights into their recruitment planning, the skills and experiences we are searching for are niche, and identifying the right people goes beyond merely the roles someone has worked in before. 

When it comes to using LinkedIn, it’s not just about spending time browsing and poring over multiple skill or job searches. Unfortunately, there isn’t a magical cookie-cutter that is going to pluck out the ideal candidate but investing time in understanding the markets, as all our recruiters do, helps guide how we find and locate brilliantly skilled local (or remote!) talent. 

For example, a decade ago, the desired background for credit risk teams within banking would’ve required a lot of manual experience with underwriting processes and credit beurres. This has dramatically shifted with new FinTech’s moving towards data utilisation and AI to fuel automated credit decision processes – where we have seen a clear progression where now lending clients look to harness a far more analytical approach.  

This has changed the desired candidate profile for many FinTech originators who are taking the technology enhanced approach to some traditional financial services. This has shifted candidate requirements to focus on transferable academic backgrounds, technical programme language knowledge, and hands-on technology experience with modelling, decision-making engines, and even the data visualisation of reports for example.  

That deeper approach is something all recruiters take at Hamlyn Williams by working in a geographical and vertical skillset niche, matching technical skillset, academic & qualifications, tech stack, languages, industry experience, and much more – so LinkedIn is a great resource can dive into all of these areas. 

Have meaningful conversations & grow your network 

Jevon: When opening the LinkedIn app, I see approximately 11,000 connections I have made during my time at Hamlyn Williams. But that’s not thousands of random leads. That’s thousands of conversations shared with candidates and clients – all of them contributing towards the resource of market intelligence, lead generation, referral contacts, and even some passive candidates who are on the lookout for a good opportunity. LinkedIn is an amazing place to open those conversations and start to get an insight into the market of talent.

Using InMails to get in touch with anyone on LinkedIn is essential for us. Just as important though, is the ability to offer something candidates want in a genuine, consultive way, whether that’s market insight, opportunities they don’t know about. 

Hamlyn Williams sees it as a recruiter's job to become an expert – we’re specialists rather than salesmen is how I see it. That means every connection I make and client or candidate I learn about through LinkedIn all grows our market knowledge and builds a bespoke network of candidates to draw from.

We have the time to get to know the needs and plans of hiring authorities within companies to get a deep understanding of businesses. From learning about market expectations, technologies that are being introduced, or innovation in industries– that is all information that gives me a broad knowledge of the FinTech market that helps inform where think candidates would be well suited to, or how we help other clients.

Research & Thought Leadership 

Jevon: All those thousands of niche connections mean my LinkedIn is filled with so much knowledge every day that a simple search couldn’t find. Adding to your network and spending time finding thought-leaders who share insights and reach in their community is a fantastic way to keep your finger on the pulse of your industry. 

Whether it’s revealing new products, important hires, or market changes, using LinkedIn communities and groups can help add depth to increase your understanding of candidate's trends and skillsets.  

It’s a great place to find brilliant content or podcasts and market intelligence. For example, many of our recruiters publish thought-leadership that extends to a wider audience through LinkedIn’s algorithms. Only 0.4% of users post more than one time a week – and without that, you’re missing the chance to be a regular fixture in the candidate's timeline, as well as feeding the algorithm. Post quality content three or so times a week, and you’ll see your posts reach increase. 

Just last month, our own Will Brown was featured in the Wall Street Journal and has contributed to books on the Compliance space – content which was seen many times on our LinkedIn alone. Creating content that people find hugely useful is a great way of getting your name out there and finding your relevant audience!  

Can’t find the talent you need? Get in touch to see how we help hire in your specialism.