Companies are hungry for better information that helps them find the candidates they want as well as retain the employees they need.

Employers interested in social recruiting have a new platform available to them with the recent launch of Glassdoor’s Employer Center.

The Yelp of the business world, Glassdoor—which currently serves as a place for employees to rate their employers in areas such as salaries and overall job satisfaction—will now offer organizations a chance to get in the game. With the new feature, employers can track job seeker behavior as well as benchmark their brand and reputation against those of other companies.

“Companies are hungry for better information that helps them find the candidates they want as well as retain the employees they need,” said Steve Roop, Glassdoor vice president of marketing, in a statement. “We’re excited to give employers more resources to help them get started on Glassdoor so they can better engage with top talent and manage their employment brand.”

The free Employer Center allows organizations to create profiles with company descriptions and mission statements and post awards and photos. Companies can also respond to reviews posted by current or former employees and flag potentially inappropriate reviews.

But while consumers have become accustomed to using social media to review products and services, social reviews in the employment realm haven’t yet achieved the same reach. In an a poll of more than 1,000 employees and businesses, online survey platform Tellwut found that only 30 percent of participants knew employer review sites, such as Glassdoor, existed, and only about 30 percent of total respondents said they used such sites.

Social recruitment and online job communities may be the wave of the job-hunting future and may follow the model of social media platforms like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook, which have worked their way into the job application process.

“Whether you believe in [social media] or not, you have to be there, and you have to be consistently there,” said Jim Zaniello, president of Vetted Solutions, during a panel discussion on employer branding last year. “Candidates have a choice as to where they go to work. They are looking at all types of social media.”

Do you think your association could benefit from a presence on employer review sites? How might you use them? Share your thoughts in the comments.

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