Table of Contents

• What is university recruiting?
• University recruiting for Gen Z
• Components of a university recruiting strategy
• How to conduct campus recruiting events in-person
• How to conduct campus recruiting events online
• University recruiting for diverse talent
• Social media and mobile recruiting for university talent attraction
• University recruiting best practices checklist

What is university recruiting?

University recruiting is the process by which a company sources, makes contact with, and hires college/university students and recent graduates for internships and entry-level positions. Certain sectors depend greatly on university recruiting: technology, engineering, finance, and consulting. Frequently used approaches to campus recruiting include attending career fairs to connect directly with students, collaborating with campus career centers, and social media marketing.

University recruiting for Gen Z

To effectively recruit Gen Z job applicants on university campuses, focus on their skills, outlook/mindset, and values. Gen Z is:

• Tech-savvy: Gen Z is more tech-savvy than any other generation; social media platforms are integral to their personal and professional lives. For Gen Z, the Internet is a tool for work, research, and connecting with people.

• Risk-averse: Studies show that Gen Z is more risk-averse than previous generations, as they grew up during an economic crisis and political uncertainty. For many, stability and security are more desirable than risk-taking. 

• Looking for companies with a strong moral compass: Gen Z is open-minded and expects a similar attitude from an employer. They look for purpose-driven companies, from both a consumer and employee brand standpoint. Gen Z is focused on authenticity and cares about ethical consumption.

• Value diversity & inclusion: Gen Z is the most racially and ethnically diverse generation to date; almost half are non-white. They care about working for diverse companies that provide fair and equal pay and promotion and want to feel seen and appreciated at work.

• Cares most about salary and work/life balance: They seek freedom and flexibility in a role.

Your recruiting strategy for Gen Z should include:

• Campus recruitment: Forming and maintaining solid relationships with colleges/universities is critical to connecting with Gen Z.

• A compelling career site: A company’s career page is the cornerstone of its recruitment marketing strategy, especially for tech-savvy Gen Z applicants. The most important information should be easy to find, and the company website should be current.

• A personalized communication strategy: Ask university students to join your talent community before applying, and share content based on their interests. During the interview process, send updates to let candidates know their status. 

• Appealing job descriptions: Write job descriptions that appeal to Gen Z’s priorities.

• An employee influencer network: As Gen Z relies on referrals when looking for a new role, utilize current employees and alumni networks to attract talent on campus.

How to conduct campus recruiting events in-person

For in-person campus recruiting events, such as career fairs, assemble a team of well-informed, personable, and enthusiastic employees who can answer questions. This group of employees should include both recent graduates and older individuals. While having students talk with young professionals who recently graduated from the university can be a productive approach, seasoned, higher-level employees have vital information to share with college students who want to learn about a potentially long-lasting career at a company.

How to conduct campus recruiting events online

Online (virtual) recruiting reaches more candidates, particularly for smaller companies without a sizable recruiting staff devoted to sourcing prospective talent. In addition, online job fairs or open houses require less time and fewer resources than in-person events.

To create an online recruiting event, follow these steps:

• Select the right platform: Choose software that will provide the most functionality and a great candidate experience.

• Promote the event across digital platforms: Advertise the online event on your careers website and social media pages to optimize candidate engagement.

• Follow-up with participants: Reach out to all the attendees via email or direct message to thank them for attending the event and let them know how to contact you with any questions they may have.

• Use metrics to track success: Track the number of registrants and attendees and calculate conversion and offer acceptance rates of the attendees.

University recruiting for diverse talent

A well-designed recruitment strategy will help you effectively market to, connect with, and recruit minority students and graduates. Incorporate these elements in university recruiting:

• Establish your diversity brand: Showcase the company’s efforts to promote diversity and inclusion. Display relevant employee resource group activities on your company’s career page. Host the CEO’s diversity statement on both the career page and various social media platforms. 

• Develop strategic relationships with HBCUs: Strategic partnerships at historically Black colleges and universities will attract diverse talent and lead to future opportunities to reach highly educated talent. 

• Work with student groups: You can build your employer brand in diverse communities through strategic sponsorship, thought leadership, and events aimed at diverse student organizations. 

• Frequent virtual career fairs for targeted student groups: Look for virtual events that reach diverse groups such as women, veterans, and people with disabilities.

• Use employee resource groups (ERGs) to increase recruiting efforts: Members of your employee resource groups can act as representatives for university recruiting and outreach efforts to campus organizations. 

• Elevate your company’s employee referral program: Include an intentional message about the company’s need for a diverse workforce in your referral program. Highlight the importance of diverse referrals to your company, and explain how you address inclusivity at your company.

Social media and mobile recruiting for university talent attraction

For tech-savvy college students who live on their phones, your social media and mobile strategies help build your company’s employer brand and allow you to identify and target candidates. 

• Mobile-friendly job application process: A simple application process that can be completed on a mobile phone eliminates the barrier to application for candidates, wherever they are.

• Use QR codes in signage for job postings: College students are particularly mobile phone dependent; QR codes should be embedded in all aspects of college recruiting. QR code readers come pre-installed on most smartphone devices and there are many free apps for users with a device not pre-installed with one. 
  • A QR code for job recruitment at a retail site or a campus event represents an opportunity. By clicking the link, potential candidates will be immediately sent to careers page or a job application form. 

• Post jobs on social media: With a mobile-friendly landing page and application process, you can link to jobs in Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, Google, and Twitter ads. Adding social media to your recruitment strategy can attract active and passive candidates, target your ideal talent pool, boost your employer brand and company culture, and save on recruiting costs.
  • According to GlobalWebIndex, the average internet user has over five social media accounts. As of this year, Instagram has over 1 billion users, and Twitter has over 300 million — and those numbers will only continue to grow.

University recruiting best practices checklist

These are steps that all university recruiting efforts should include to attract and engage the student community:

• Curate a list of primary & secondary school choices: Start by creating a primary campus list and a secondary campus list. The primary schools are where your company will focus most of its efforts. This list is often based on universities with programs that match a company’s required hiring qualifications. It may also include schools from which the company’s outstanding employees graduated. The secondary list should include other schools that are a good source for high-quality applicants. While these schools may have great talent, the number of potential candidates might be lower for various reasons.

• Engage in early recruitment: The best employers start reaching out to students in their first year at university. Some companies are now targeting high schoolers for the early promotion of their employer brand. 

• Build inspiring relationships: It’s not enough to be active on campus. Your company should build inspiring, ongoing relationships with university career centers. Clubs, associations, athletic teams, and faculty members can help promote your company and reach top talent.
  • Find a professor who will invite a company representative into their class or a lecture series in which the company gives a presentation about a topic relevant to the class. This can help raise awareness of the company and generate interest in the profession/field.
  • Identify a recent intern to serve as a campus ambassador who can be a conduit between the company and the school. Students and recent grads know their campuses well and can help spread the word about opportunities at the company.

• Connect with students on and off-campus: University recruitment strategies can include a mix of on-campus and off-campus initiatives and tactics to appeal to your student target audience.

• On-campus: In addition to recruiting students for positions, career centers help facilitate introductions of students to employers. They coordinate career and job fairs, student job programs, graduate school expos, information sessions, table displays, and networking events — all opportunities to meet future talent. Further, schools have departments and/or students who manage online and offline advertising located in academic and high-traffic campus areas — communication channels that should be leveraged.

• Off-campus: Include a clearly defined content strategy on social media and mobile devices. Consider hosting an open house at the company or a career fair. Invite current employees to participate in the fair and share their experience working at the company. Current students can meet potential future colleagues and get a glimpse of what a career at your company might look like. 

• Show new applicants you understand them: Gen Z isn’t interested in micromanaging or monotonous work. They want money, job security, and rewarding experiences. They want to be mentored in an environment where they can advance quickly. An employer who understands what is important to their target student audience and communicates it effectively will be regarded as an employer of choice.

• Use storytelling to attract and engage talent online: Give the company a human face. Develop an online personality via sharing employee testimonials and case studies of prior hired students who have grown and thrived at the company. Consider showcasing photos of corporate and social events. 

• Offer internship opportunities: Create attractive summer, co-op, and intern programs that will allow the company to hire the best talent. Expose students to the company’s brand long before other employers and long before students seek their first full-time career opportunity. 

• Deliver an exceptional candidate experience: The candidate experience is crucial to how the student community regards a company’s brand. Gen Z applicants want to be acknowledged and respected while interacting with a potential employer. You can count on them to share their experience with peers and on social networks. Make sure your hiring processes and applicant tracking system facilitate experiences that leave candidates with a positive impression of your company.

• Measure your results: It’s not enough to put a campus recruitment strategy in place and hope for the best. You need to measure your results to know what worked and what failed. Set goals and KPIs, and assess your results. Over time, you’ll discover the best universities to source talent and most effective channels to communicate your brand. Metrics will also help you understand the types of content and initiatives that attract and engage top-tier talent.

Hiring talented interns that make an immediate impact on your company is a challenge when they lack experience, which is why these job boards are great resources for hiring top-quality students today.

It’s hard to argue against the economics of hiring interns. Employing free or very cheap labor is a low-risk solution for organizations that need workers, and internships offer recent grads or new professionals opportunities to gain valuable work experience.

Many companies historically hire interns on an unpaid basis in order to save costs on jobs that would otherwise go to entry-level employees, but unpaid internships have come under scrutiny as being ethically questionable. Few young professionals can afford to work for free, and arguments that unpaid internships exclude millions of low-income candidates from the workforce are gaining traction. With recent lawsuits escalating arguments on both sides of the issue, companies now shoulder the legal responsibility to know if and when an intern needs to be financially compensated according to the Federal Labor Standards Act (FSLA).

Tabling the legal and ethical debate of unpaid internships for the moment, hiring interns can have a positive impact on your organization, so you shouldn’t shy away from hiring young professionals who offer a fresh perspective, are eager to learn, and help cultivate mentorship and leadership skills among existing employees. To connect your company with fresh talent, check out these job boards and career resources for interns.

1. WayUp

The standout feature of WayUp is its appealing and user-friendly layout. Internship and entry-level job seekers can create personalized profiles that include their prior work experience and highlight extra criteria like volunteer experience, hobbies, and skills that demonstrate candidate value to employers.

With over 4.5 million candidates in their database from over 6500 different schools, there is no shortage of talent waiting to be discovered on WayUp. As an employer, you can create and post jobs via the company’s marketplace, and feel confident in WayUp’s representation of underserved minorities, who currently constitute over 35 percent of the total candidate database.

2. InternJobs.com

With its simple website design, InternJobs.com offers an affordable pricing plan that starts at $15 per posting for 30 days. What’s more, InternJobs.com has over two decades of experience connecting young professionals to employers. If you’re looking for a no-nonsense and regularly updated job board to post your open internships, then this is one resource you shouldn’t overlook.

3. Internships.com

Internships.com is the world’s largest student-focused internship marketplace, boasting its network size right on the site’s landing page: over 300k entry-level jobs and 5k internships from over 140k companies located in 10k cities across the US. The site offers free job posting for employers and a wide range of career resources for candidates, from how to write cover letters and resumes to interviewing advice.

Internships.com uses a powerful algorithm that allows students to search for opportunities based on major, industry, city, and company. The site even has an “Internship Predictor” that matches candidates with internships according to their personality and character references.

4. LinkedIn

You likely already use LinkedIn as a major sourcing tool for open positions at your organization, so why not leverage the world’s largest professional network for internships as well? Few other job boards can compete with the LinkedIn’s expansive network of members, companies, and educational institutions. With over 560 million active users on the platform, the likelihood of meeting a candidate through your existing network is high, making this a no-brainer for many companies.

5. Idealist

If your organization works in the non-profit sector, you may be in need of like-minded workers who share your passion for taking action and making an impact. With 1.4 million monthly visitors to the site’s English and Spanish sites, Idealist posts opportunities across the globe from nearly 130k organizations, and posting a new listing is as simple as logging in with a Facebook or Google account.

6. College Recruiter

College Recruiter was founded way back in 1991, and in over the last three decades it built a 7400-strong network of one-, two-, and four-year colleges across the country. Posting an open internship on the site starts at $75 per listing but can be tailored to target specific schools, majors, graduation years, GPAs, languages, or diversity requirements. College Recruiter also offers custom advertising solutions at various price points and hosts regular College Recruiting Bootcamps where HR professionals, hiring managers, and college relations professionals gather to network, brainstorm, and share ideas about how to attract the next generation of talent to your organization.