5 things to consider before creating a recruitment chatbot

Author: Grace Porter

Published: February 2023

Chatbots are becoming more and more popular with recruiters, and it’s important to make sure yours is a valuable member of your talent acquisition team. To help you get started, we’ve put together a list of things to consider before building your chatbot solution.

Do you really need a chatbot?

Will the inclusion of a chatbot help your team achieve their goals? More importantly, is a chatbot going to be useful for job seekers that are landing on your website? 

It could be worth surveying recent applicants to ask them about their experience, conducting interviews or using an insights tool like FullStory for research, behaviors, and analytics to discover if a chatbot is the right fit for your business. The last thing you want to do is add an additional hurdle for applicants to jump over, so it’s good to understand what will help them during the process and in-turn help your team find the best candidates.

At what stage in your hiring process does it belong?

Take a look at your hiring funnel, is there a particular area that would benefit from a chatbot? 

Do you find candidates drop off at a particular point during the process and could a chatbot help prevent that? It can be hard to identify why a candidate drop offs at the top of the funnel. Research shows that having a strong brand identity and readily available information about the role and company can help reduce this drop off rate, so having a chatbot answering frequently asked questions could be an asset to your website. 

Alternatively, it could be that you need help with screening candidates to free up some time for your team members. If that’s something you’re considering, VideoAsk can be a great tool for asking qualifying questions and conducting asynchronous interviews to save time.

Tips on creating pre-recorded interviews and questions to ask

What are the most common questions being asked by your applicants?

Before you start building your solution, go through your frequently asked questions to make sure your chatbot is able to answer as many of them as possible. Chatbots allow you to answer these questions at scale and can direct people to the right answers and resources. 

You can even turn yourself into a Human chatbot with VideoAsk’s voice answer type. Applicants will be able to ask their questions and see your pre-recorded answers thanks to some GPT-3 AI magic. You can learn more about how to create a Human chatbot here.

Using a chatbot can also help save time in the hiring process by asking qualifying questions (like how many years experience do you have and what’s your degree level). In fact, some studies have shown when recruiters use chatbots 95% of applicants become leads and 40% complete a job application.

A chatbot can act as a 24/7 team member, on hand to answer questions around the clock, but don’t forget to add a way for an applicant to reach out and talk to a real person.

If you create an FAQ videoask you can include a step which allows applicants the chance to ask questions that can be responded to by the recruiter.

What do you want your chatbot to say about your brand?

Using a chatbot can be a great way to highlight who you are as a company, what the company culture is, and what an applicant can expect if they are successful in the recruitment process. 

Using video is a great way to show a glimpse of what or who is on the other side of the job posting, and a tool like VideoAsk can really help you get creative with your chatbot. 

The branding features will help you personalize the experience to match your website so applicants will already feel like they know who you are and what to expect before they arrive at a live interview.

If you’re looking for inspiration, be sure to check out the VideoAsk template gallery in your account where you’ll find a range of videoasks designed to assist you in your recruitment process.

What tool do you need to create an effective chatbot?

Picking the right tool to suit your business is important. Your chatbot needs to be able to deliver the right information to applicants while showcasing the best of your business. 

Here are some common uses for chatbots:

  • Application - For collecting essential candidate information including experience and qualifications.

  • FAQ - Answering frequently asked questions around the company, role, salary expectations, and benefits.

  • Scheduling - Asking for additional information and scheduling interview times

  • Skill test/Personality test - Testing position-specific skills or could include role play scenarios.

While there are many chatbot products on the market, a tool like VideoAsk can help you showcase your brand and company culture while providing important information to the applicant. And if you’re using an ATS (applicant tracking system) like Greenhouse or Lever you can even connect your VideoAsk chatbot to a job posting to help keep applicants organized.