How Virgin Media lost £4.4m due to bad candidate experiences
Virgin Media is the latest company to come forward and speak about their bad experiences with recruitment. In a recent interview, the company admitted that they lost £4.4 million last year as a direct result of poor candidate experiences. This number is only going to continue to grow if something isn't done soon.
Virgin Media isn't the only company to suffer from bad candidate experiences. In fact, it's a problem that is plaguing the entire industry. Recruiters are so focused on filling open positions that they often forget about the people they're supposed to be helping. As a result, candidates are left feeling frustrated and angry.
Virgin Media customers were responsible for 22.5% of all rejected applicants for jobs in the business, and they were all recorded as ‘detractors,' implying that these consumers would ultimately depart with the impression that they would never suggest Virgin to others.
They discovered that 6% of rejected applicants who stated they would move to a different firm actually did so within a month.
The company's data revealed that out of 123,000 applicants rejected each year, 6% were actively cancelling their subscriptions (which amounts to about 7500 consumers).
£1.8 million per year is the cost of calling consumers who have cancelled their accounts to let them know about new services. This is a calculation based on the overall cost for each client lead, which totals £4.4 million in yearly revenue lost through terminated subscriptions.
So what does this teach us?
Employee brand damage can result from any of these occurrences. For example, an HR department wanting to fire a bad employee might be applying the wrong standards or using the wrong measures to determine whether performance has improved. Bad hiring procedures, as well as poor candidate experiences, may lead to more than just brand critics.
You may find yourself in a lot of trouble if you don't handle things correctly. You could lose a great deal of money and effectively scare away future jobseekers from ever coming within arm's reach of your company again.
We should always respond to those who inquire about our company. They are people at the end of the day, and it feels better than no response at all to be rejected.
We should be courteous. Consider other people's feelings - after all, an interview to you is one hour of your time, but it may be a candidate's future career move for them.
Conclusion
The development of modern-day technology and platforms has made it simple to create and implement basic standards, which are not difficult to do. With the improvement of technology and platforms, many issues can now be readily addressed.
This is one of the reasons why we established OCTA: to assist modern recruiters (agency or in-house) in keeping prospects up to date throughout the whole hiring process, as well as preserving brand reputation without spending a lot of money on their end.
We don't like the thought of candidates being overlooked and tossed to the side, regardless of how well they'd fit the position for which they've expressed interest. There are methods that may be utilised to minimise the number of irrelevant applications, which is a separate topic but no less crucial.
If you'd want to know how to use OCTA in your business process to keep jobseekers informed, we're always just a few clicks away.