Job recruiters increasingly using Facebook to find candidates

More companies are looking eagerly at Facebook's more than 750 million users in hopes of finding new employees. Facebook's use as a job-recruitment tool is small but may be growing, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Some recruiters say they have all but eliminated their spending on job boards, which often charge per job posting. Others have found that although LinkedIn is more comprehensive as a résumé database, candidates tend to value referrals from Facebook connections much more, and are also easier to reach on Facebook since they spend much more time there than on LinkedIn.

The result is that traditional job boards and LinkedIn may suffer as Facebook continues to become more and more ubiquitous, although it's too early to tell how much of an impact the social networking giant could have. Some job boards are already learning to leverage Facebook rather than compete with it. Meanwhile, LinkedIn insists that its users are telling the company they want to keep their personal and professional networks separate.

It's important to remember that Facebook is not actively pursuing this market. This is just one of the benefits of being the world's largest social network: it's hard to ignore you.

See also:

• 82% of colleges use Facebook to recruit students
• Geohot reportedly now works for Facebook (update: Facebook confirms)
• Employer demands Facebook login credentials during interview
• 47% of Facebook Walls contain profanity