A famous bank robber was asked why he robbed banks. His answer was “That’s where the money is”. Using that same brilliant logic, tech recruiters should be going to where tech talent flock to. According to the 2019 Stack Overflow survey, Reddit is the most popular social media site for developers. Compared to LinkedIn, Reddit has more developers utilizing the site, in fact, more than 5 times the amount. While the idea of Reddit may be one that is viewed as just another social media site, it has many dimensions that may be the next big move in your tech recruiting search. Reddit consists of various types of posts that are made by users to different communities within Reddit called “subreddits”. Just like LinkedIn and Facebook, users can post pictures, videos, text, and links to outside sources. These posts can be filtered from most popular (Top) to chronological order, with other filters existing to help users navigate subreddits. The key difference here is that Reddit utilizes an upvote/downvote button that users can “vote” on the quality and relevance of the post within the subreddit.

The amount of upvotes that you receive on a post is known as “karma” and will push your post to the top of the subreddit or the landing page known as “The Frontpage” of Reddit. Karma also adds merit and credibility to users that continually post well-crafted content.

There are many different subreddits that could absolutely benefit tech recruiters attempting to use Reddit. Here are a few we think tech recruiters should start with:

You will most likely find many developers/users with skill sets that could fit the profile of your “perfect candidate” through the few subreddits alone. Creating organic engaging posts within these subreddits can evoke many users to participate in the conversation and help you locate the talent you’ve been searching for. Creating posts isn’t the only way you can engage with users.

Looking through the various subreddits and finding developer’s accounts can give you insight into where they frequent or comment. Whether you’re looking to find insight on recruiter and developer relationship issues or just looking through other’s posts to see what conversations are happening, there is much more to Reddit than just another social media site. What Else Is There? Another great resource for sourcing tech talent is GitHub. GitHub is how their peers see them and how they really act. The raw data available from the GitHub profile pages alone is worth the price of admission (it’s free!) but dig a little deeper and there are even more recruiting gems to unearth. This free eBook will help you get the most mileage out of your GitHub recruiting.