Handshake’s Guide to Virtual Ambassadors

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Handshake Ambassadors is a great way to create authentic experiences for candidates by connecting them with like-minded peers outside of your recruiting team.

Ambassadors are designed as a digital way to replicate sending employees from the business to on-campus career fairs and events.

Create an authentic sourcing experience with Ambassadors 

You can seamlessly add non recruiters to your Handshake page, attach them to relevant events, and even attach their profile to outbound messaging campaigns. Pairing peers from your business or former interns with prospective candidates is a great way to personalize your candidate experience and stand out from the crowd.

Prospective candidates want to hear from someone who looks and sounds like them with a similar background. Utilizing ambassadors or non-recruiters who have expressed interest in helping recruiting, is a great way to build personal connections. 

Launching an Ambassador program

Define your goals 

Identify what goals you are looking to achieve with the Ambassador program. Are you looking to increase brand awareness at a specific school? Or a specific internship program or role? Once the goals are defined, you can better target the type of employees within your organization to be Ambassadors

Types of Ambassadors

• Alumni 

• Former Interns 

General tips and best practices

• Choosing the right Ambassadors
  • Ambassadors will serve as an extension of your company and recruiting team. Selecting individuals that are outgoing, personable and are genuinely enthusiastic about your company is key. 
• Setting clear expectations
  • Once you’ve found the right people, making sure that they are clear on how and when to engage with prospects will ensure connections are being made and followed up on. It may be helpful to provide general talking points and facts about your company that they can share with candidates.

Leveraging Ambassadors in Handshake

Step 1: Add your Ambassadors to Handshake  

If you’d like to add employees outside of your recruiting team to Handshake, first use your company-specific invite link to invite them to create a profile. Ambassadors can be alumni from a specific college, recent grads, etc. 

Once they create a profile, you’ll be able to grant them the Ambassador role from the Employee Directory page.  Once they have an Ambassador role, they’ll be able to view Event RSVPs, Launch a Check in Kiosk, and with an additional setting, you can allow them to source on Handshake as well! 

Make sure you advise them to fill out their profile (Photo, Bio, and Title), as students will be looking to them for guidance.

Step 2. Tag Ambassadors when you create your Campaigns

When creating a Campaign, you’ll see a “Related Ambassador” field:

We recommend adding an Ambassador that’s related to the campaign message to make the candidate experience personalized.  For example, you could add an Alumni of Amaranta University if you’re messaging potential candidates at that university. Or you could add in a recent grad who works in your Sales department if you’re messaging potential Sales candidates.  

You’ll see the Ambassador show up in your Campaign Preview, along with your message.  We recommend you craft your campaign message to share more about the person you’ve included.

Step 3. Students will receive the Campaign and be able to click through to your Ambassador’s profile

Students are able to review the Ambassador’s profile to learn more about their experience.  This is a great way to show real examples of potential career paths to students. Students can also proactively send the Ambassador a message if they have a question about their experience at your company.  

Step 4. Mobilize your Ambassadors as extensions of your recruiting team.  

Ambassadors will get notified via email about student messages.  They can log in to message the student back, creating an authentic 1:1 connection. This is a great way to scale your recruiting team’s efforts.  Not only does Handshake allow for candidates to engage digitally with recruiters, it also allows them to engage with other employees at your company via messaging!

Host an Event with Ambassadors

Adding Ambassadors to events is another great way to create more authentic experiences for candidates by connecting them with like-minded peers outside of your recruiting team.  Use this guide in conjunction with Handshake’s Virtual Event guide if you’re looking to host your first virtual event. 

Step 1: Add your Ambassadors to Handshake  

If you’d like to add employees outside of your recruiting team to Handshake, first use your company-specific invite link to invite them to create a profile.  Then, grant them the Ambassador role from the Employee Directory page. Once they have an Ambassador role, they’ll be able to view Event RSVPs, launch a check in kiosk, and with an additional setting, you can allow them to source on Handshake as well! 

Make sure you advise them to fill out their profile (photo, bio, title), as students will be looking at them!

Step 2. Tag Ambassadors as a Host or Speaker at the event

When creating an event, you’ll have the opportunity to add Ambassadors as Speakers on that event.  When an Ambassador is added, they’ll be able to see and interact with RSVPS. RSVPs will be able to click on and message the Ambassador from the event page as well.  

Step 3. Launch the check in kiosk

Whether in person or virtual, Ambassadors will be able to launch Handshake’s check in kiosk to track attendees.  

Step 4. Follow up from the Event

To keep potential candidates engaged.  Ambassadors are able to send follow up notes from Handshake’s Event RSVP page.

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We hope you found this best practice guide useful. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to your Account Team with any additional questions or suggestions on how we can help.