It’s a sellers’ market for fresh technology talent. There was a time that the lowest of lowest entry-level positions was all that would be offered. That’s changed. Now being aware that their skills are in high demand, and knowing they can connect with people in many ways beyond just phone and email, today’s crew of young tech workers are more empowered than previous generations.

These Millennials (a.k.a. Generation Y), defined as people born anywhere from 1980 to 1999, have access to technology, communications, and publishing that simply wasn’t available decades ago. As a result, they have demands for career and lifestyle that are often different than older generations.

“Employers that better understand what motivates and retains Millennials will be able to secure the top talent, keep them happy and productive and also make sure they are not snatched up by competitors,” said Razor Suleman, founder and chairman of Achievers, in a report by Forbes.

While salary is important to Millennials, it’s often not the primary motivation (source: “Class of 2012” study by Achievers and Experience, Inc).

“Once a salary meets their basic needs, Millennials still desire progression and growth, along with challenging and interesting work that piques their interest,” said Suleman.

To find out what it takes to draw in this highly sought-after community, we asked recruiters and anyone hiring young talent what they believe are the “must-adopt” recruiting techniques for hiring Millennials. Here are our favorite responses:

 
TIP #1: Engage in social media.

“Engage with Millennials on the platform they use the most: social networks. By creating and maintaining Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ company profiles, you open the door to new potential employees by giving them an opportunity to easily get to know your company, its products, and services. Also, it provides them a way to interact and network with your company’s employees,” said Kat Krull (@Resunate), Associate Marketing Manager at Resunate.

Richard Dedor (@RichardDedor), Community Manager at VaynerMedia, said that they connect with candidates through “off-the-cuff conversations,” said Dedor. “You have to be there [in social media], and be responsive and engaging.”

TIP #2: Put a real name and face behind the corporate social media accounts

Tip #1 is a requirement for Millennial engagement. And with that requirement comes the need to engage with real people, not corporate identities, said Paul McDonald (@BuildASignHires), Talent Acquisition Manager for BuildASign.com. “[For example,] if you have a corporate Twitter account for hiring, call out explicitly who those followers are interacting with. It makes for a more personal connection, which Millennials appreciate.”

McDonald probably knows what he’s talking about. In the two years he’s been with his firm, he says he’s hired more than 250 employees, most of them Millennials.

TIP #3: Have a “why”

This catch-all envelops an entire corporate brand, philosophy, and attitude toward staff and others that extends well beyond a paycheck. Ultimately, a Millennial wants to know why they should take this job. How will it help them with their overall goals?

“Millennials need a challenge, a sense of purpose, and also a dash of vanity,” said Justin Sherratt (@justinsherratt), CEO of Gawoop Inc., makers of Sortbox.

“We found one of our best while he was still in university. Part of our offer to him was that we would help him network and move on if/when he outgrew us (advancement). We made it clear that our company helps people get jobs (social good). And we also made sure that we were working with cutting edge systems and software (training). These three combined far outweighed salary and perks at that time,” Sherratt said.

TIP #4: Make sure your website and social identities are up to date

One of the old maxims of job searching is “make sure your resume is up to date.” The same holds true for organizations looking to attract talent at any and all times. If your company plans to have a blog and be on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, then you need to keep them and your corporate website up to date.

“You don’t, as the employer, need to be everywhere they might expect, but at least show that you’re up to date and connected in their stream,” said Ian McAllister (@ianrmcallister), founder and professional CV writer at CV4.biz.

Nothing screams “we don’t care about our company” than a blog that hasn’t been updated in a year or a Twitter stream that doesn’t even have a personalized Twitter avatar. If you can’t demonstrate that you care, how can you expect a potential new employee to care?

TIP #5: Keep selling your company and follow up

“The old mantra that the company holds all the cards in the employment landscape is rapidly deteriorating,” said Samuel Barnes (@Samuel_Barnes), Director of Talent Acquisition for ZanderMax Technologies. “We now have a candidate-centric market on our hands, which means that companies must: sell Millennials on why they should join, what their career progression will be, and most importantly, translate how they’ll make an impact on not just the company, but the world.”

All of this company selling has to be done with rapid-fire communications. “Millennials have rarely faced delays in communication or the acquisition of information,” said Stacia Argoudelis (@staciargoudelis), Area Director of Academic Coaching Institute.

Adapt their communication style and respond quickly, or as Barnes warned, even an excellent employment opportunity can “slip through the cracks.”

TIP #6: Be respectful of all recruits, including the ones that didn’t make the cut

“It’s particularly important that you maintain good relationships with Millennial recruits – regardless of whether they get the job or not – as they’ll be the first to tell their friends and family about their experience. Make it a good one, and you can turn recruits into recruiters,” said McDonald of BuildASign.

In an experiment, Gerry Crispin (@gerrycrispin), Co-founder of CareerXroads Colloquium, applied for jobs at the 100 of the best companies to work for.  Only 32 percent of the companies alerted him when the position was filled. That means 68 percent did nothing. “That’s a bad candidate experience,” said Crispin.

TIP #7: Recruiters should expect and prepare for repeat business from Millennials

Millennials are more project-oriented than they are company-loyal. If they lose interest on their current assignment, they’ll move on to something else. The frequency that Millennials change jobs is both a challenge and an opportunity for recruiters, explained Charles Caro, Executive Director at Rebounders United.

“Recruiters must use more inbound marketing techniques to build long-term relationships and relationship opportunities instead of more traditional outbound marketing techniques,” said Caro.

TIP #8: Build relationships with Millennials before they enter the market

“Identify the good technical students in their freshman and sophomore years and provide them with summer internships until they graduate,” advised Sandi St. John (@SandiStJohn), Director of Recruiting of Asynchrony Solutions, a division of Schafer. “You may have some additional training or ramp-up time but they will more than likely prefer to take a permanent job at a place they already know. Creating this up-front relationship will ‘secure’ a future hire.”

TIP #9: Live the company brand and culture

Culture, which could be discussed in a book of its own, is critical for Millennials. If your corporate culture is suffering, unfortunately one simple tip in an article isn’t going to change anything.

Regardless, whatever your company brand or culture is, you must “be honest and genuine about the employer brand that you present to them,” said Gaurav Shah (@gauravshah), Group MD & CEO of the DeGroup and CMD and CIO of IndiaSocial Fund. “If the employer doesn’t live up to those presented brand values, they just simply quit. Loyalty comes only with living by those brand promises.”

TIP #10: Show what it’s like to work in your office

One way to promote your company brand and culture is to simply show what it’s like to work in your office. You can do that one of two ways:

Invite potential hires to spend time in your office: At Asynchrony, they invite potential candidates to spend anywhere from an hour to half a day just to sit with their developers. It gives them a good idea what the working environment is like, and gets them excited about working there, explained Asynchrony’s St. John.

Shoot a “day in the life” video of your office: Create something very professional like what Rackspace does or hand out Flip cams to hiring managers and ask them to shoot short videos of people doing their job.

A video acts as a first level filter, allowing candidates to pre-interview their potential employer, and that will either repel or attract potential hires to actually apply, said Will Staney (@willstaney), Director of Talent Acquisition for SuccessFactors.

The other bonus of shooting “day in the life” videos is that candidates who watch these videos are far more knowledgeable when they come in for an interview, Staney said. If you ask them what influenced them to apply for the job they often refer to the culture picture that was created by the videos.

TIP #11: Accept failure

Millennials are attracted to entrepreneurial environments that have a culture that accepts failure as part of the learning and innovation process.

Self-identified Millennial Richard Dedor of VaynerMedia said that it’s important to have “a culture where you absolutely believe and buy into the attitude that failure is okay, and we are going to try and try and try. It’s entrepreneurship and control of the future that my generation wants. Give it to them.”

At the Interop conference last year, I spoke with Google’s Vinton Cerf about Google’s culture of accepting failure.

TIP #12: Offer flexible work options

“Millennials don’t want to fit their lives into an inflexible job,” said Sara Sutton (@flexjobs), CEO of FlexJobs, “They’d much rather have the ability to blend their work and personal lives together in a way that makes sense for them.”

That flexibility can take on many forms such as telecommuting from home, a flexible schedule with non-traditional hours, or a Results Only Work Environment (ROWE).

“Gen Y want to build parallel careers with flexibility to balance ‘the other things’ in their lives. In short, they want what their parents are just now achieving,” said Sahar Andrade (@SaharConsulting), Executive Director of Sahar Consulting.

TIP #13: Offer training in the “cool” offices

Since so much IT and development work is location agnostic (hence the popularity of telecommuting) it’s an attractive perk to send employees to the best company office locations for the first one to three months of the job.

“It’s like a ‘study abroad’ program for professionals,” explained Zachary Dearth (@BostonZachD), Recruiting Manager for Randstad Technologies who has found that pitching the ability to work from a client’s international location in Rome is helping to get some of the better talent on board.

TIP #14: Build a community

This last tip bookends the very first tip in this article – to actually engage on social channels like Facebook and Twitter. Once you’re comfortable with social engagement, the next big step is to create a community where those interested can have open and frank discussions in a comfortable online/offline space with hiring managers and employees.

“Participants can share applicable news, post openings, offer advice, make introductions, describe company culture, set expectations for the hiring process, and build credible relationships. Once these relationships are established, job seekers have the know-how to make better choices when applying – they have insight into the company and the role they’re applying for,” said Lauren Smith (@Ascendify), Director of Marketing for Ascendify.

CONCLUSION: Treat Millennials the same as any other generation

While we do talk about Millennials being different and demanding more, they truly want the same things as previous generations, said Steve Guine (@SGHRC), Project Staffing Manager at SGHRC.

“While this group grew up during a time of almost unprecedented technological achievement,” said Guine, “I think what makes this group more special is the fact that they have watched their parents and loved ones in their careers as they grew up and internalized some valuable lessons. This generation will not be married to the firm, as with the previous workforce, but rather spend more time with their family or in pursuits which bring them personal satisfaction. This, I feel, is the reason work-life balance takes center stage, as opposed to money.”

See all 41 tip photos on Flickr.

Research for this article conducted by Joy Powers.

Get Michael’s tips on creating a culture that attracts talent in this 5-minute video.

Long said it wasn’t about fun, but about traditions and what sets the company and people apart. Celebrations aren’t about parties. They’re about good deeds and living the values.

Culture is a part of your company, said Long. People equals product which equals profit. If you take care of the first part, celebrate successes and everything else, then profit is inevitable.

If you’re trying to imbue culture into your company, and you’re in an organization that’s toxic or conservative, look for the bright spots, Long advised. Who does well here? From the outside, what are the stories you can tell that are in line with the people inside?

There’s a lot of choice for tech people, said Long who believes our sector has the lowest unemployment given demand is so high. If the situation at your company is bad enough, leave and find a place that fits you better. But if there are redeeming qualities in your workplace and you could take some individual ownership of that, then take control and celebrate it.

At Talent42: Tech Recruiting Excellence Conference, spend June 13-14 in Seattle with colleagues, experts and industry leaders to drill down on specific tactics, tools and methods to attract, source and hire tech professionals in today’s competitive talent market.

What you’ll find at Talent 42:

• Phenomenal speakers and panelists from Groupon, Google, Facebook and more
• Engaging sessions that hit straight to the heart of your tech recruiting challenges
• Top-notch colleagues from Nike, Disney, Target and other companies of all sizes
• World-class conference center at Bell Harbor on Seattle’s waterfront

What you won’t find:

• Swag. Bouncy balls, flashy pens and bendy toys have been banned, because they probably won’t help you attract top tech talent.

This is the first tech recruiting conference of its kind, and Dice is proud to be a sponsor and save you some green.

Register now and save $100 with code “T42DICE”.

Watch the 3-minute video below to get Bill’s insights on the four keys to integrating social media into your existing recruiting strategy.

According to Boorman, social integrated recruiting boils down to the following issues:

• Getting apps in place that can work collaboratively.
• Building brand advocacy that’s authentic.
• Increasing the flow of the right candidates rather than just candidates.
• Social requires a shift from an “apply transactional” model to a “talk to relationship” model.
• Let the people who do the job tell the story rather than the marketing department.
• Create a company culture that allows for the use of social tools such as Facebook, Twitter, and blogging
• Give employees the permission to talk about themselves and the company.

People who want to work for your company are not interested in a job description or what your company’s product is like. What they’re interested in is what’s it like to work there from the people who are doing the job, said Boorman. The job is going to be where you’re going to spend most of your life. Do you really want to be a part of it?

Get insight from John in this 4-minute video below.

Hagel pointed to China and India having very robust talent development of not just their employers but also their partners. Hagel is also inspired by independent contractors who use the online space to learn from each other. For example, SAP has a software developer network where 2 million participants learn from each other. Similarly, contact center service LiveOps have provided their isolated “at home” workers with tools so that they can learn from each other.

The last time I ran into Chris Brogan (@chrisbrogan), President of Human Business Works, it was just a month prior at Ragan’s 5^th Annual Social Media for PR and Corporate Communications Conference in Las Vegas. At the time, we were talking about getting your readers in the habit of taking action so that you can increase the level of engagement.

One of the themes at that conference was making your customer a hero through the creation of branded content. At Talent Net Live at SXSW I caught up with Brogan again and this time I asked him how do you go about making your customer a hero.

In the video Brogan talks about the importance of using video to tell stories. His advice on getting good at video is: do it a lot, look at what you shot, and learn from your mistakes. You don’t need to be producing everything you shoot.

The next step to storytelling is to make sure you’re telling customer stories. Most companies do it wrong, said Brogan. They talk about their amazing product and how great they are. What you want to do is equip your buyer for success. Produce a story about how your product will make your customer successful.

Here’s their advice in a quick-hitting, two-minute video.

What happens when you send out 27 recruiters to do their own thing? Not a lot of efficiency as you can imagine.

Watch the 3-minute video above to learn more.

At Perficient, an IT consulting firm, they’re going to try to refocus recruiters’ time in a more economical way. That means segmenting recruiters more by region and business unit, but also having certain recruiters focus on sourcing and others connect with candidates directly, explained Trish McFarlane (@trishmcfarlane), Perficient’s Director of Human Resources.

It’s critical that they shift this way as many of their recruiters are doing their work virtually, and they simply have no metrics as to how well they’re doing. McFarlane said that by the end of the year she hopes to know which techniques work best so that she can better plan for 2013.

Today, if companies are losing tech talent quickly – it may be your managers, not the market.

Read more about tech managers and retention issues in the May Dice Report.

What’s the best way to get potential employees interested in a job? Show them what the job is going to be like. And the best way to show is through video.

That’s what Will Stanley (@willstaney), Director of Talent Acquisition for SuccessFactors discovered when he was working with VMware. While at the virtualization software company, Staney’s team used video for both employer branding and as a recruiting tactic. They simply just gave Flip cams to hiring managers and asked them to shoot short videos of those doing the job and what they were looking for.

Acting as a first level filter, the videos have allowed candidates to pre-interview their potential employer, and as a result either repel or attract potential hires to actually apply, Staney said.

Candidates that do watch the videos are far more knowledgeable when they come in for an interview. If you ask them what influenced them to apply for the job they often refer to the culture picture that was created by the videos, Staney said.