Automated Job Outreach

Handshake can automatically invite qualified candidates to apply for your job, helping you expand your talent pool with minimal effort. 

You can enable automated outreach for new or existing jobs, customize your candidate message, and review your campaign’s performance.

This feature is available only to Essentials and Enterprise (formerly TES) customers. For more information, please check out this resource.

Topics: 

• Automate outreach
  • New job
  • Existing job
• Customize and send outreach
• Manage outreach settings
• Campaign status
• Viewing candidate replies 
• Campaign recurrence

Automate outreach 

New job

After posting an eligible job, a modal appears with the message: “Your job is now live. Now, get more applicants with automated outreach. We’ll automatically reach out to qualified candidates and invite them to apply. No extra effort from you required!”

Click Review automation to set up automated outreach for your newly created job.

Existing job 

1. Click Jobs from the left navigation bar, then select the job you want to automate outreach for.

2. From the job posting Overview tab, click Manage outreach in the information panel.

Note: If this option isn’t available, the job isn’t eligible for automated outreach.

Customize and send outreach 

1. On the Manage automated outreach page, ensure the toggle for Automatically invite qualified candidates to apply is switched on.

Note: Automated campaign messages don’t count toward your messaging limits.

2. In the Message to candidates section, write or edit your outreach message.

• To generate a draft using AI, click Write with AI (Beta) in the lower-left corner of the message box.

• You can regenerate the AI draft as many times as needed.

• Personalize the message to highlight what makes your role and employer unique.

3. Click Preview message to review how your outreach will appear to candidates.

4. Once automated outreach is turned on, Handshake identifies qualified candidates most likely to be interested in your role and automatically sends them your message at the next scheduled time.

Note: If a student receives your outreach but can’t view or apply for the job, their profile is likely set to private. Private profiles prevent students from viewing job details or receiving invitations to apply.

Manage outreach settings

1. From the job posting Overview tab, click Manage outreach in the information panel.
 

2. On the Manage automated outreach page, review and adjust your automation options:

• Automatically invite qualified candidates to apply

  • Get your job in front of more great candidates. Handshake will reach out to qualified matches and invite them to apply.

  • Note: If you disable this feature, Handshake will no longer reach out to qualified candidates to apply, and you will not be able to allow candidates to skip the application and book an interview.

• Automatically book interviews with top candidates

  • Allow candidates to skip the application and book an interview right away. Learn more about how to Automate Candidate Interviews.

3. Toggle the button to automate or disable an activity:

• To automate an activity: Toggle the button to the right.
• To disable an activity: Toggle the button to the left.

Note: Activities displayed in black are enabled, while those in gray are disabled.

4. Once your selections are complete, click Save changes in the lower-right corner of the page.

Campaign status

To check your campaign’s progress, click the Overview tab of the job posting page. 

The page displays varying messages depending on the status:

In progress

When in progress, the message "Your Handshake outreach is in progress. Next automated message: [Date, Time, Timezone]." is displayed.

No new candidates 

When there are no new candidates, the message "We've run out of new candidates. Expand your audience by posting your job to new schools. We will try to send again on [Date, Time, Timezone]" is displayed. 

•  
  • To expand your audience, click the button Post to more schools.

Outreach is off

When outreach is disabled, the message "Your Handshake outreach is off" is displayed.

•  
  • To enable automatic outreach, click the button Manage outreach.

Viewing candidate replies

Handshake does not provide a list of the individual recipients for your automated outreach messages. If a candidate replies, their response appears in your Handshake inbox along with the original outreach message. 

Need help navigating to your inbox? Refer to How Do I Access My Messages?.

Campaign recurrence

Handshake sends automated outreach in weekly batches while the job remains upgraded and there are still qualified candidates who haven’t been contacted.

Once all eligible candidates have been reached, you’ll receive an email notification. This message will suggest posting your job to recommended schools to reach a broader audience.

To post your job to schools that have been recommended, refer to Posting a Job to Recommended Schools.