Job Fairs or Career Fairs present an opportunity for in-person networking, marketing your organization, and collecting resumes. A traditional career fair hosted by a business organization, college, or chamber of commerce attracts all kinds of people seeking employment. The drawback to the traditional job fair is that you as an employer are in competition with every other organization in attendance. Costs can also be a factor, considering you have to order your booth marketing materials, and the cost of the event itself can range into the thousands.

A Virtual Career Fair allows you to target specific demographics for your recruitment marketing. The benefits of hosting your own virtual career fair include cost savings over attending a traditional career fair, and the ability to promote your company and employment branding more effectively, and on a more personal level without having to compete with 100 other businesses at the same time.

Here’s a sample plan showing how you can get started with hosting your own Virtual Career Fairs.

1. (6-8 Weeks Ahead) Set the Date:
   First, set up your virtual meeting, date, time, and agenda outline (we’ll come back to this). We recommend hosting your career fair after normal business hours. Wednesdays and Thursdays, in the early evening is recommended.
2. (6-8 Weeks Ahead) Start Promoting Your Event
   Ideally you already have a mailing list that is already segmented into your target audience. If not, fear not, there are still plenty of places you can promote your career fair. Company newsletter, or blog. LinkedIn, promote to any groups, or pages you belong to. Twitter, Facebook, Google+, share with friends, family and your company pages and encourage all to register for your event. Promote your event weekly until the event date.
3. (4 Weeks Ahead) Create the Agenda:
   Book your speakers. CEO to talk about what a great company it is to work for, your Recruiter to speak about specific positions that you are hiring for, and what kind of skills you seek, HR to explain all the great benefits of working for your company, a fellow happy and engaged employee to speak about company culture.
4. (2 Weeks Ahead) Finalize the Agenda and Do a Walk Through:
   You have booked and confirmed your speakers, invited hundreds of attendees, now it’s time to practice. Set up a time, either individually, with each speaker, or as a group meeting. Walk though your agenda, PowerPoint etc. This is so you will be comfortable when it comes to the big day.
5. (1 Week, 3 Days, 1 Day Ahead and Morning of) Send Meeting Reminders!
   Send out your meeting reminders and login instructions one week before, three days before, one day before your event, and then again on the morning of the event. Encourage attendees to log in 5-10 minutes before your event begins so you can get started on time.
6. Host The Meeting!
   Ask someone else to introduce you as the Host, it always sounds more impressive. Use as few PowerPoint slides as possible. Thank your audience for attending, and set out the expectations and agenda for the meeting. If you can, use video or web cams during the session. Engage the audience throughout by using any meeting tools you have, such as polls. Engage on Twitter by using hashtags. Leave time at the end for audience Q&A. Keep things light. Demonstrate how to apply.
7. After the meeting, Send Thank You Emails to all the Attendees!
   Thank the attendees for spending their time with you, and encourage them to visit your website to apply for any available positions. Tell them how to follow up.

Secondary Marketing Opportunities
If you recorded the meeting, send it out to anyone who registered, but did not attend. Post to YouTube, your company blog, employment newsletter, and social media.

A virtual job fair is an excellent way to communicate with potential employees. This will help build your Talent Network and help attract great employees at a fraction of the price of a traditional job fair.

About Me

Since 2005 I have been helping small and medium sized business in all industries improve their recruitment processes, increase their candidate reach, build employment brand, and make attractive, magnetic career centers. Let me help you build your talent network, increase your reach, and find your best candidates using proven recruitment marketing techniques.

If you have questions about hosting a virtual career fair, please call (860) 478-2760 or click today. Happy to chat if you have a question.