How to improve candidate experience (ATS tips and templates)
This tip will save you time and money while improving the candidate experience.
A welcome email is one of the first interactions a candidate has with your organization. It sets the tone for the rest of their experience and can help to ensure that they have a positive experience from start to finish.
Here’s how to make the most out of your first impression with candidates.
Welcome emails are an essential part of creating a positive candidate experience, so be sure to include one in your process.
Why this is important?
It helps to set the tone for the rest of the process. A warm and professional welcome email can help put candidates at ease and let them know that they are working with a professional organization.
A welcome email can help to provide clarity about what to expect from the process. This can help to reduce anxiety and prevent surprises later on.
It saves you time and money in your recruitment processes. This saves your team time and money by reducing inbound confusion from candidates chatting/emailing/calling customer support, emailing different stakeholders in the company, having the stakeholder reach out to recruiting, and then recruiting following up.
When drafting a thank you email to candidates, first, you’ll need to consider your strategy:
Will you send all candidates the same thank you email address?
Will each department have a unique thank you email with the process and department details?
Will each role have a unique thank you email describing the role, process, and next steps?
You should also consider the following items:
Who will the email be sent from?
Whose voice are you writing in?
Is there a brand guide you need to review?
What information is most important to our candidates?
Who should my ATS emails be sent from?
Depending on the company size, recruiting team bandwidth, and the amount of traffic your open roles receive, it may be helpful to send your confirmation emails from a no-reply email.
However, some companies choose to send mass decline emails to candidates from a reply email. This will depend on your company and your Head of Talent.
ATS email template subject line ideas for welcome emails
Here are some examples:
👍Confirmation: Your application has been received @ [company name]
[Job title] application received @ [company name] 🧳
🎉 [job title] application received
Your application is in our system! 👩💻
Our hiring managers are reviewing your resume @ [company name]
Job application confirmed @ [company name] 🤝
👍Thank you for applying: [company name]
Here’s your confirmation - [company name] 🙂
ATS email template to thank candidates for applying for a role
Hello [name],
Thank you for applying.
We received your application.
Our [team] reviews applications daily. You should receive an email back in X days. During a busy period, we can take up to X days.
Please keep in mind our team is off during Thanksgiving and the last two weeks of December.
Any applications received during 12/15 - 1/3 will be reviewed in the new year and responded to accordingly.
As a reminder, you can find a list of our open roles [website].
Each job description shares what to expect, how many people we’re hiring, why the role is open, who the role reports to, salary, benefits, and interview process.
In the meantime, if you have any other questions, please let us know.
Thanks,
[company name] Recruiting
What to do next
Login to your ATS. Grab a text editor and copy and paste your existing thank you email into the document. Grab a headline of your choice from above and the body of the template email above and paste it into your document. Make the edits you need to make the email sound like it’s written in the appropriate brand tone for your company. When necessary, refer back to marketing’s brand voice documentation for clarity. Set 30 minutes aside to complete this activity. Refresh your email templates on a quarterly, seasonal, or yearly bases as needed.
I hope you find this helpful in driving clarity, transparency, and insight into your interview process to improve the candidate experience.
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