Rural Youth Counselor Recruitment Campaign Attracts Hard-to-Find Role Models
“What satisfies you is that you can change lives. And that’s the most rewarding part of this.”
A residential treatment program for youth, located in northeast Wisconsin, was having trouble finding viable applicants for open positions – leaving the program understaffed and unable to accept more children into their program. An award-winning recruitment campaign for youth counselors in rural Wisconsin generated big results – delivering ROI in less than three months.
Homme Youth & Family programs is a residential treatment program offered through Lutheran Social Services of Wisconsin and Upper Michigan (LSS). The program welcomes and serves male youth who may face a troubled past, may be emotionally scared and are in danger of developing more serious issues. Homme needs around the clock support and staff to make the program function to its highest ability. Unfortunately, Homme was having a hard time reaching viable applicants for the job, leaving the program understaffed. The total census allowed at any given time within the program was directly tied to number of staff. When recruitment complications left a gap in staffing, the result was less children able to be accepted into the program and ultimately, less youth served. LSS was looking for 25 qualified applications for a Youth Counselor position and five qualified applications for Supervisor roles to then extend offers to fill five Youth Counselor position and one Supervisor position. People in the Wittenburg and surrounding area, were unaware of the great work being done, so LSS needed a campaign that would not only recruit for the open positions, but educate and elevate the work of current staff in the community.
SOLUTION
In order to reach a targeted and engaged audience, Kane first conducted interviews with existing staff in the two open roles. Through this research, the team created audience personas to truly understand the ideal candidate. This process led to more intentional and effective messaging as well as the approach to the campaign.
Kane decided to run a three month targeted Facebook campaign using the LSS Careers page that would contain digital display ads, boosted posts and target specific demographics. To create an easy process for applicants and track engagement, a landing page on LSS Careers website, focused on Homme Youth & Family programs was created. In an effort to bring the expertise and passion at Homme to life, Kane developed videos to share the impact of the work being done through interviews with Homme staff.
RESULTS
Click-through rates of display ads performed higher than the national average.
Highest traffic to the landing page was routed through the Facebook posts.
Facebook posts about Homme Careers were the highest organic reach posts in 2018 for the Careers page.
A total of 81 applications were received during the three-month campaign.