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We’re Home Care Pulse, a leading provider of experience management & surveys, caregiver/CNA training, and online reputation management.

Demand for caregivers is greater than ever and with the current job market, you’re competing for caregivers not only with other agencies but with retail giants like Amazon and Walmart, fast food chains like McDonalds, and gig platforms like Uber and TaskRabbit. Here are 101 ways that you can use to recruit more caregivers and ensure that you’re properly staffed.

While you’re almost definitely using some of these sources, there’s probably not an agency in the country that’s using all of them. All of these are ideas that home care agencies listed in the 2018 Home Care Benchmarking Study as being ways that they found and hired caregivers, or ways that we’ve seen other home care agencies or similar small businesses use to recruit.

Keep These 3 Things in Mind

It’s important to remember that not all caregiver recruiting channels are created equal; we strongly encourage you to track the cost-per-hire, number of applicants, and caregiver turnover rate of each channel so that you can continually refine your process.

We also recognize that the circumstances of every agency are different; some of these ideas may be extremely useful in helping one agency hire more caregivers and bring little or no benefit to another agency. We’ve included as many ideas as possible in this list so that you can make your own decision about which caregiver recruitment channels are best for your agency.

Finally, remember that the channels you’re comfortable with using may not be the channels that your target demographics use most often. For instance, caregivers are generally younger than agency management and much more likely to be active on social media platforms like Instagram and Twitter. In fact, overall today’s job seekers are much more likely to connect with employers via internet sources vs. traditional marketing sources than they were even a few years ago. It’s very important that your strategy is tailored around the channels that your target audience prefers—not the ones you feel most comfortable with.

Recommended Top Sources

While your circumstances may dictate other sources, these are widely-used sources that we advise you to look into as cornerstones of your recruiting strategy.

  1. Employee Referral Programs
  2.  Social media, both nonpaid and paid (specifically Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter)
  3.  Google Ads/pay-per-click
  4.  Open house recruiting events
  5.  CNA schools
  6.  Job websites, specifically myCNAjobs, Indeed.com, and ZipRecruiter
  7.  Recruitment CRMs like Hireology
  8.  Networking by a full or part-time dedicated recruiter (if the circumstances of your agency allow)

Online Sources

While most agencies are already using Indeed, Craigslist, and a few other websites, there are a host of other sites used by job seekers, not to mention social media and other online advertising platforms at your disposal to attract new caregivers. In addition to throwing a wide net, you should take time to ensure that your job postings are engaging, easy to read, and stand out.

  1. Facebook ads
  2. Instagram ads
  3. Twitter
  4. LinkedIn
  5. Snapchat
  6. Local Facebook groups
  7. Paid ads on Pinterest
  8. Asking employees to share on social media
  9. Yahoo Jobs
  10. Care.com
  11. Glassdoor
  12. Career Builder
  13. CaregiverHR.com
  14. Caregiverlist.com
  15. Monster.com
  16. Jobing.com
  17. Jobs.com
  18. CareerJet.com
  19. Adzuna.com
  20. Juju.com
  21. Workable.com
  22. US.jobs
  23. Jobsintheus.com
  24. Jobs-to-careers.com
  25. Mightyrecruiter.com
  26. JobAccept.com
  27. SimplyHired.com
  28. Local university job websites
  29. Snagajob.com
  30. Your company website
  31. LDS Employment Services
  32. Craigslist
  33. GenerationsUnite.com
  34. Local career websites
  35. Bing ads
  36. Ads on podcasts (ideal for national franchises)
  37. Pandora ads
  38. Spotify ads

Traditional Advertising

  1. Church or faith-based newspaper
  2. Daily newspaper classified ads
  3. Direct mail flyers
  4. Direct mail postcards
  5. Billboards
  6. Other outdoor advertising (benches, signs, etc.)
  7. Sponsored signs or advertising at local businesses
  8. Penny Saver/Thrifty Nickel or other free local paper
  9. Radio Christian or faith-based station
  10. Radio stations (both music and talk radio)
  11. Regional newspapers
  12. Senior directory ads
  13. Signs or banners on your building
  14. Television ads
  15. Weekly newspaper classified ads
  16. Yellow pages (online or print)
Caregiver Appreciation Ideas

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Postings/Boards

As you throw your caregiver recruiting net wide, consider which local job boards you might benefit from. One benefit of job boards in caregiver recruiting is that they’re usually free and extremely low-maintenance.

  1. Regional job boards
  2. College job boards
  3. Community Center boards
  4. Grocery store job boards
  5. Library job boards
  6. Workforce services job board

Referral sources

Sometimes your referral sources can do double-duty–we’ve had home care agencies report that establishing strong relationships with professional referral partners has sometimes yielded not only client referrals but only referrals as well. Some of these are client referral sources; others are purely employment referral sources. It’s worth your time to evaluate which ones you can strengthen your home care agency’s relationship with to hire more caregivers.

  1. AARP
  2. American Red Cross
  3. Assisted living facilities
  4. Chamber of Commerce
  5. Church clergy
  6. CNA or home health aide schools/programs
  7. Current/past clients and their families
  8. Employment agencies
  9. Hairdressers and beauty salons
  10. Home health agencies (Medicare certified)
  11. Hospice agencies
  12. Hospitals
  13. Independent Living Facilities
  14. Junior or Community Colleges
  15. Nursing Schools
  16. Senior Centers
  17. Skilled Nursing Facilities
  18. State home care associations
  19. Trade or technical schools
  20. Workforces Services local office
  21. Working with local universities to offer accredited internships

Community Events

Whatever other sources you’re using, it’s important to have some involvement in your community—not only for the sake of recruiting caregivers, but also to extend your reach with potential clients and establish your home care agency in people’s minds. We particularly recommend having a presence at job fairs, care-related community events, and charities like Alzheimer’s Walks.

  1. Community caregiver training
  2. Health fairs
  3. Job Fairs
  4. Town parades
  5. Booths at wellness events
  6. Speaking engagements
  7. Sponsorships (Alzheimer’s walk, etc.)
  8. Cultural celebrations and festivals
  9. State and county fairs

Other Sources

  1. Word of mouth (reputation)
  2. Reactivation of former employees
  3. Other home care agencies (We don’t recommend actively targeting the employees of other agencies as this contributes to caregiver turnover and increases the burden on clients, but it can be useful to create inroads with other agencies so that if they are unable to work with a caregiver’s specific schedule they can pass along the referral and vice versa.)

Retention Starts at Recruitment

For most agencies, caregiver turnover is nearly as difficult a challenge as caregiver recruitment. To counter this, you need to have a mindset of recruiting for retention. Track the turnover rates of caregivers who are recruited through each source and over time you can pinpoint the sources that will yield the most dedicated caregivers.

Which methods surprised you most? Let us know in the comments below!

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3 Comments

  1. barbara andrews September 30, 2021 at 8:30 am - Reply

    I have found it very difficult to find a reliable Home Health caregiver. The majority of people that I have tried out have been unreliable untrustworthy storage units in garages today as selfish self-serving with little to no integrity. The caregivers that I have tried will drop you in one minute flat leave you completely stranded with no way to have access to medication doctors appointments and overall living needs. I have been astonished at the lack of integrity and care that these people possessed.

    • Jennifer Lagemann October 1, 2021 at 1:35 pm - Reply

      Hi Barbara!

      I certainly understand your frustrations with recruitment, with caregiver shortages it is hard to find good people. If you have the opportunity to be more selective with your hiring process, or ask certain questions, we have an article that lists 65 questions that you should ask during caregiver interviews. These will help you gauge the experience and qualities that a caregiver has to make sure that you have all the material you need to make a sound hiring decision. Here’s a link to the article: https://www.homecarepulse.com/articles/65-caregiver-interview-questions-to-help-you-hire-the-right-caregivers/

  2. Jessie Holloway July 29, 2022 at 10:56 am - Reply

    I really like how you talk about how not all caregiver agencies are the same and have different hiring and payment situations. my grandmother can’t keep up with house cleaning anymore so we’ve been thinking about hiring a caregiver so she can live in her home a bit longer. Making sure we look at many agencies and choose the right one is a super important step to giving my grandmother the care she needs.

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