Admittedly, they're not brilliant for finding people outside the creative sphere with a wealth of experience – you're probably best off using a professional jobs site like Reed for that – but social networking enables you to connect with millions of people who are at the early stages of their career and thinking about their next opportunity."

Creating a Buzz on Facebook

It must be said that not all small businesses can benefit substantially from social media. If you run a hardware store, for instance, it's unlikely that you'll be able to whip up the necessary buzz about your company to make people want to work for you. If you're going to have any success at all, then you'll need to make clear what you can offer people other than just being merely a hardware store. For instance, are you particularly focused on employee welfare, and are there any perks for working at your company? You might well be surprised to find that the winner of the Times Best 100 Companies to Work For was Heat - a Belfast-based central heating installer. It's this kind of accolade that helps a recruitment drive – so make a company group profile and outline both what you do and what benefits you can offer employees.

Once you have a group made, encourage current employees who are on Facebook to join it. From then you'll have a free and easily maintained forum for people to express their views about work. You'll find a lot of similar groups out there where the message board hasn't been used for ages, but you need to take a proactive approach for it to be of any worth to your employees. Encouraging question and answer sessions and getting people to post pictures of company social events is normally a good way to start.

Students and Creatives

One of the best ways to use Facebook for recruitment is if you want students to work for you. If you're a pub or a local shop, then there's probably a role that a student could fill. Just create a group, search for students at the nearest University, and then message a few about the role that is open and point them to the group where more information is stored. If you message 10 people, then you'll probably get at least one reply from someone wanting to know more.

Another way to tap into student skills is if you need a creative job doing for your business. For instance, you want someone to DJ at an event or party or you want to build a website but you don't have the technical ability. If you head straight for the professionals then you may well be intimidated by the pricing. Outsourcing a professional website build could cost you thousands of pounds, but you're likely to find a much cheaper alternative if you message a few computer science or web design students first. Students need money; when they get the chance to do something they enjoy and get paid for it then they'll often jump at the opportunity.

Finally, if you're a web-based business, then having a social networking presence should really be thought of as a necessity. There are plenty of groups dedicated to online marketing professionals, web designers and other internet-based vocations. Just sifting through a few of these could lead you to a number of potential applicants. Take a proactive approach and message them first, then see what they have to say.