Running recruiting events are a great way to increase your talent pipeline or connect students with career opportunities. But there are different type of virtual, in-person or hybrid recruiting events and finding the right event can be challenging. In this article, we have summarized everything you need to know about the top event types for recruiting in this article for you. 

As you may have well guessed, it is largely dependent on what your goals are and where you want to focus on in the recruitment funnel. Are you looking to warming up cold leads in your existing talent pool for future recruits? Or are you looking to fill lots of positions in a short time frame (aren’t we all?) 

So before you think about event formats, make sure you and your team are aligned on your objective. Define which stage you want to focus on in the recruitment funnel and if you want to attract, engage with or hire new talents. Once you have defined your event goal, it will help you identify the right recruiting event type.

Now let's dive into the most commonly hosted event types in recruiting and how you can find the right recruiting event type for you: 

If your main goal is... TALENT ATTRACTION, ENGAGEMENT, AND HIRING (whole funnel)

👉 Career Fairs

Career fair is a large scale event type, and often hosted by universities involving several companies or company departments. Career fairs usually capture the most audience due to their marketing power and rich content and can be either virtual, hybrid or in-person events. Organizers can host hybrid career fairs to combine the 'best of both worlds' and benefit from better insights & reporting and a larger audience due to flexible participation. A typical career fair may involve a kick-off presentation followed by dedicated sessions for candidates to get to know specific companies or departments. For more personal interactions, 1-1 chats can be added to the program. Companies may also hold booths for participants to drop in for a chat. Career Fairs are perfect events for employers, that want to connect with a large number of talents for one or more departments or universities to offer their students different job opportunities and connect them with a multitude of companies. 

• Preparation time: ⌛⌛⌛⌛
• Suitable for: Employer branding, large scale recruiting of talents and students
• Type: Virtual, physical or hybrid
• Helpful features: Group video calls (with large capacities), presentation/screen/video sharing, polling and Q/A features, 1-1 chat scheduling, drop-in group chats, text chat/messenger, agenda, email and calendar reminders, accessible participant profiles & resumes and company pages via QR codes, job posting

👉 Webinars

Webinars are a great way to market the workplace culture and personality. Webinars can include a simple information session, feature talks from industry experts from companies, or even a virtual office tour. The content possibilities are endless. Additionally, webinars can be recorded and run on-demand. A benefit of webinars is that the short preparation time, making it very efficient for smaller audiences. Universities can use webinars to inform a specific student group, while employers can leverage webinars for employer branding and engaging with particular talent pools with longer recruiting cycles. 

• Prep time:⌛⌛ (shorter if you play recordings)
• Suitable for: Informative career or recruiting events 
• Type: Virtual
• Helpful features: Group video calls, polling and Q/A features, recording function, text chat, presentation/screen/video sharing, company pages, talent profiles

If your main goal is... TALENT ENGAGEMENT (mid-funnel)

👉 1-1 Chat events 

1-1 Chat events are the best formats to facilitate deep connections between employees and candidates, which lead to direct hires depending on the fit of the candidate. A great virtual recruiting event platform will enable a personal hiring experience between recruiters and talents, independent if the 1-1 Chats are scheduled virtually, hybrid or in-person. 1-1 Chats are the most personal form of recruiting event types and are suited to engage with job applicants or finding the right candidates for vacancies during a hiring day. 1-1 Chats take the least time to organize when you have a recruiting event platform that can handle all the scheduling automatically for you, such as Talentspace.

• Prep time: ⌛
• Suitable for: personal conversations, great to combine with big recruiting events such as career fairs and hiring events
• Type: Virtual, hybrid
• Helpful features: 1-1 chat scheduling, text chat/messenger, participant profiles & resumes, email and calendar reminders, company pages, talent profiles

👉 Workshops 

Workshops are the perfect event type for career centers that want to host career workshops for a dedicated student group, or companies to host internal HR workshops or external application workshops. Many companies hold application and interview workshops to provide information on the recruitment process and empower candidates to be better in control of their application, thereby increasing hiring motivation and success. If your goal is to increase talent or student engagement on a larger scale, hosting workshops can be the right event format for you.

• Prep time:⌛⌛
• Suitable for: Career center workshops, companies with specific application processes  
• Type: Virtual, physical or hybrid
• Helpful features: Group video calls, presentation/screen/video sharing, polling and Q/A features, breakout rooms, company pages, job posting, talent profiles

If your main goal is... ASSESSMENT & HIRING (bottom of funnel)

👉 Hiring events 

Hiring events are typically closer to the bottom of the recruiting funnel, where the aim is to interview, assess and hire from a selected pool of talent, as opposed to the more open and informational nature of career fairs. If companies want to attract new talents and fill many roles as efficient as possible, this can boost HR efforts. Hiring events can be organized virtually, hybrid or in-person, while the benefit of a virtual or hybrid format might prevail. With some roles that are hard to fill, virtual events will allow you to invite a larger pool of talents, independent of their location. With hybrid events, companies can combine the best of both worlds and invite a larger talent pool, collect event insights and boost their employer branding through inviting talents to their office. Maximize the event output through combining virtual and in-person formats such as speeches, workshops and 1-1 Chats. 

• Prep time:⌛⌛⌛
• Suitable for: large scale hiring, pre-selected candidate pools or candidates with shorter recruiting cycles 
• Type: Virtual, physical or hybrid
• Helpful features: Group video calls, presentation/screen/video sharing, 1-1 chat scheduling, agenda, email and calendar reminders, accessible participant profiles & resumes and company pages via QR codes, job posting

Before getting started, it is crucial to find an event platform that offers maximum flexibility for hosting virtual, hybrid or in-person events without long onboarding time or additional resources required.

Universities and Career Centers that want to offer their students an amazing career support, can also combine different event types depending on their objectives. The right career event platform should enable you to flexibly combine different event types with no additional resources and host them in virtual, hybrid or in-person format. 

Though we generally recommend organizers to try to plan different event formats throughout the year to cover their hiring needs, there is no need to host all of these events to be a good recruiter. Some events make more sense for certain universities, companies and industries than others. 

As a rule of thumb, the larger the company size, the more events should be running across different stages of the recruitment funnel to keep up with a higher hiring volume. 

Organizations that are looking to hire employees with longer recruiting cycles or higher education or experience levels, a mix of different event types will help you succeed. Virtual career fairs, webinars and 1-1 chat events are part of long term hiring strategies needed to boost employer branding and recruit top candidates. And for companies looking to hire in large volumes to cover seasonal needs, virtual hiring events are a great way to quickly assess candidates and hire them for the job. 

If you would like to know more how you can leverage the Talentspace platform for your future career evnts, feel free to reach out to us. We are happy to help you identify what types of events serve your hiring strategy best by booking a free demo below.