Did you know Hispanics make up 17% of the total population in the U.S. and by 2050 they are projected to make up 30% of the U.S. labor force – that will be 80% of the total growth in the workforce (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics).

We’ve been asked by several companies how to recruit bilingual (Spanish / English) candidates – here are a couple of suggestions. If you’d like to learn more, check out some additional articles on our site.

Photo Credit: latinobrandingpower.com

Internal Recommendations

Below is just a sample of initiatives that you can implement leveraging your website and your workforce.

Creating Spanish Specific Landing Pages

You should treat both languages as separate user experiences. Since candidates may search for a bilingual role in Spanish, it’s important to create a Spanish specific landing page so that your job openings appear in all search results.

Employee Referral Program (ERP)

Hispanics are 50% more like to use contacts, friends, and family to find a job (Society of Human Resource Management). Creating a specific referral program is an ideal way to generate diverse candidates.

External Recommendations

We can hundreds of pages listing all the possibilities to reach Hispanic and Latino candidates.

Advertising

Social Media Ads

• Target users who have listed certain skills on their profile (Spanish language on LinkedIn, for example.)
• Test ad copy to find the best variation, (i.e. an English headline and Spanish body copy).

Pandora Ads

• Advertising to users who listen to Spanish stations. You can always reach a certain location, age, or demographic.

Hispanic Job Boards

• Leverage external organizations that focus on Hispanic diversity like National Society of Hispanic MBA (NSHMBA) or the Society of Professional Hispanic Engineers (SPHE).

It’s important to strategically think about your recruiting plan, especially targeting diverse candidates, and how to best leverage the resources available to provide the best ROI. A customized diversity plan is essential since there are variations when it comes to industry, roles and geography.