CLEARLINK is becoming a teenager this month (we’re hoping we don’t turn solemn and angst-ridden for the next seven years)!  To celebrate we’re hosting our annual company birthday party this Friday. Since we’re still hiring like crazy, we decided to tie our recruitment efforts to the party to see if we could get some extra reach online.

We’ve asked our employees to share our happy birthday message on their social networks to be automatically entered to win one of thirteen prizes at our bash tomorrow. We broke our Facebook shares record in the first hour we posted this message. So far, so good.

How does our birthday party tie into recruiting? Transparently displaying our culture has been at the core of our recruitment and social media strategies from the beginning.  And, motivating our employees to be at the center of the conversation has proven to be an authentic way to rapidly spread our job opportunities. Our CLEARLINKers (as we call our employees) really are an extension of our recruiting team. All we do is open the shades and let them stare and share. 78%[i] of consumers trust peer recommendations when making purchase decisions, and the same holds true for job recommendations.

We’ve also found that taking a multi-channel approach to promoting our contests and events is more effective than simply posting on our wall or Twitter profile. This time around we created a throw-back poster that’s being used around the office, on all the computer monitors, and as our Facebook profile picture this week.