How to Use AI to Personalize Your Interview Scheduling Software

It's no secret that recruitment is a challenging process. Not only do you have to find the best candidates, but you also have to make sure the process is as smooth and stress-free as possible for them.

The mere act of booking a recruitment interview can be nerve-wracking for candidates, and using scheduling tools with impersonal boilerplate notifications will not make matters easier for them. 

The problem is that personalizing notifications is a time-consuming process, especially if you’re dealing with a large candidate pool applying for many different positions.

So, the temptation is to use templates to save time: basically, copying and pasting the name of the candidate plus the role in them and calling them “personalized.”

But then we’re back to the boilerplate approach.

Now, what if there was a way to generate truly personalized notifications tailored to each candidate at scale in very little time?

Sounds too good to be true? Enter the world of AI writing assistants.

In this article, you’ll learn how to use the power of AI to personalize your interview scheduling notifications in record time to create a more positive experience for every candidate.

What Is AI And How Does It Work

AI is a term that’s used to describe a wide range of technologies, but at its core, AI is all about machines that can learn to mimic the skills and the decision-making capabilities of human beings.

Think about those chess playing computers that have been trained so extensively over the years that they can no longer be beaten by pro-level chess players, even grand masters.

How does AI work? Basically, it relies on two basic components: artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Artificial intelligence is a process that involves training computers to learn how to make decisions for themselves. This can be done in a number of ways, but the most common is through machine learning.

Machine learning is a method of teaching computers to learn functional skills from observed data. This data can be anything, from text to images, video and more.

Through training and repetition, the computer learns to recognize patterns in the data and tries to apply these patterns to new situations.

Over time, the computer gets better at making predictions and classifications based on those patterns and thus becomes “skilled.”

When it comes to AI writing assistants specifically, these tools have been trained through reading and analyzing writing patterns from tens of millions of pages of text, some from websites and some from digitized books.

Then, given some basic instructions, the AI tool can generate one or more paragraphs of human-like writing in a matter of seconds.

Examples of given instructions could be something very specific like “write about how to plant cherry tomatoes” or even a broader subject such as “write about the civil war.”

How AI Can Be Used to Personalize Notifications

When it comes to scheduling interviews with recruitment candidates, most appointment tools will offer you the opportunity to send a number of notifications, typically via email, messaging of both.

The first notification will likely be sent to advise the candidate of the interview and offer link access to the booking tool.

The second notification will be sent as a booking confirmation when the candidate has chosen a time slot.

The third one will be sent as a reminder prior to the scheduled appointment.

And the fourth and final one will be sent after the interview, with next steps.

Each notification presents recruiters with the opportunity to build a relationship with the candidate and increase their level of interest and engagement through personalization.

However, if you want to take advantage of this great functionality, you can see how this level of customization can become time consuming very fast, especially if you're dealing with a large pool of candidates for multiple positions and/or employers.

But with the help of AI writing assistants, you’ll be able to create unique personalized notifications for each stage of the booking process at the click of a button.

As you’ll see later on in the article, you could use the AI-generated text as is, mix it with your own text, or simply use the AI content as a writing prompt for inspiration.

In all cases, you’ll be able to dramatically speed up your creative writing process to the point of making it feasible to personalize notifications at scale, even for large recruitment organizations.

The Benefits of Using AI for Notification Personalization

There are a number of benefits to using AI tools to customize your recruitment notifications. Some of the key benefits include:

Increased engagement rates

When you send candidates personalized notifications, you’re more likely to stand out from your competition. This can lead to increased engagement rates and a more successful recruitment process.

More relevant information

By tailoring your message to a specific candidate, you can send messages that are more relevant and appealing to them, increasing your chances of landing the best candidates.

Pre-assessment

By using AI to personalize your notifications, you can fine tune the recruitment process by sending key information to candidates ahead of time and then using their responses as a pre-assessment tool.

Improved candidate experience

By personalizing your notifications, you can create a more positive experience for your candidates, putting them at ease and helping them manage any apprehension about the recruitment process.

How to Get Started with AI-Based Notification Personalization

While there are many AI writing tools on the market, we’re going to use Jasper, one of the first movers in the space, to illustrate how to personalize your notifications at scale.

As stated earlier, there are typically four types of appointment scheduling notifications: an initial invitation email, a booking confirmation email, a reminder for the upcoming meeting and a post-meeting followup email.

For the sake of brevity, we’ll use AI just to personalize the booking confirmation email, as the other types would follow a similar process.

AI-Generated Personalization

To create our custom notification, we’ll first need to provide the AI writing tool with some basic information.

For this example, we’ll supply the main topic of the notification (using the heading Product Name as shown below) as well as the subject line for the email (using the heading Product Description):

Product Name: Apple Computer Interview.

Product Description: Congrats! You have successfully registered for your interview for the position of customer support specialist at Apple Computer.

Now, the AI email creation process follows a two-step process.

The first step is to take in the above information and turn it into a copywriting framework that the AI can then use to develop the foundation for your message.

In this example we’re going to use the AIDA framework, which stands for Attention, Interest, Desire and Action.

Let’s give our AI writing tool a spin:

Perfect. The second step involves taking the above AIDA information and turning it into a warm email addressed to the recruitment candidate.

Let’s run the AI writing tool one more time:

Great! We have now generated a confirmation email in mere seconds that’s personalized to a specific candidate and position.

Finally, you can alter this text to suit your personal preferences or leave it as is (in fact, if you were to send this email as is it’s highly unlikely the recipient would be able to detect the magic hand of AI behind the scenes.)

Tips for Using AI to Create Personalized Notifications

AI writing technology is new and so it’s constantly evolving. So, below you’ll find five useful tips that will help you get the most out of them:

1- Iterate and combine

The beauty of AI writing tools is that they’re designed to generate 100% original content every time. So, instead of running them once or twice, run them multiple times and pick the best text from each iteration.

2- Personalize your notifications based on the candidate's position

Another way to personalize your AI-generated notifications is to tailor them based on the candidate's position. For example, if you’re hiring for a managerial position, you’ll want the AI to know that you’re not hiring for an entry-level position.

By tailoring your AI notifications by role, you can ensure that each candidate receives information that’s relevant for them.

Here’s an example of an email similar to the one generated above but addressed to a management candidate instead.

You’ll notice that the only change in the AI input was a single word: “manager” instead of “specialist,” as shown below:

Product Description: Congrats! You have successfully registered for your interview for the position of customer support manager at Apple Computer.

Let’s run the AI writer one more time with the above input change:

As you can see above, by changing a single word in the input the AI writing tool generated a completely different email notification.

3- Test different types of messages

Another tip is to test different types of messages and see which ones lead to better engagement rates.

Since the AI creation process is so fast, you may want to split your personalized notifications into batches so you can do some A/B testing. This will help you to find the right mix of messages that works best for your recruitment process.

4- Keep track of engagement rates

As a follow-on tip to the one above, keep track of engagement rates so that you can improve your notification personalization over time. By tracking engagement rates, you’ll be able to identify those winning patterns that you can reuse for future campaigns. 

5- Always fact-check your AI generated output

While AI can do a great job at emulating human writers, and therefore save you tons of time, it’s not that good at generating accurate data.

In fact, it’ll often make it up in order to fit the narrative! So, make sure to use any hard data generated by your AI tool just as a placeholder to be replaced with properly curated information later on.

For example, if your AI output says “ABC Ltd. is the second largest employer in the tri-city area” because this makes your email message sound more compelling, make sure to fact check that this is actually true before sending it out.

Wrapping Things Up

Using AI tools to personalize your scheduling notifications at scale in a cost effective way is a game changer that can give you a clear competitive advantage over other recruiters, provided you adopt them early into your workflow.

Also, these tools are constantly getting better, allowing you to leverage their power into other areas of the recruitment process, such as writing offer letters, onboarding communications, orientation information, and so on.

Most AI tools offer free trials or money-back guarantees so you can assess if they fit the needs of your organization before committing.