November 9th, 2022 | Sterling

3 Ways the Gig Industry Can Prepare for Seasonal Hires

Holiday season is quickly approaching, which means demand for seasonal workers across the country will increase. Even with the economic inflation, according to Retail Dive, the US is projected to increase sales this holiday season between 4%-6% over the previous year. And there is no better resource for companies trying to fill these roles than the gig industry. Gig companies have spent decades innovating products to help businesses develop temporary workforces in times of high demand to share the load and carry out services without going through a formal employee hiring process. Whether companies are looking for in-store temporary hires or delivery drivers, the gig industry will play a huge role in helping these businesses thrive during the holiday rush.

How Should Gig Platforms Prepare?

Being prepared for high volumes of candidates that rush to find gig work is critical to capitalizing on gig seasonal workers and can lead to permanently expanding your workforce with candidates interested in representing your brand. In order to onboard top talent, your onboarding process must be extremely user-friendly and accessible on a smart device. Here are three ways to get your platform ready by the holiday season:

1. Equip Your Platform – A user-friendly platform is great, but in order to gain quality candidates, it’s imperative to integrate with a background screening partner that can provide your platform with the candidate data it requires. And depending on your gig workforce, the candidate data needed may be different. Adding a partner like Sterling, who specializes in the gig industry, can help reduce turnaround times by setting up customized workflows.

2. Automate Your Process – Integrating your platform with a background screening partner is Step 1. Step 2 is to create an effective workflow by automating all possible parts of your process to reduce the number of human touches needed in the onboarding process. Services like API integrations can add an additional level of automation to the backend of a platform, which helps advance candidates’ record information and communication between databases, minimizing the need for manual review. Sterling’s API integration already helps many gig platforms save cost and time.

3. Partner with a Responsive Team – Having a well-equipped and automated platform is vital, but to finalize your preparation for the holiday surge of gig hires, gig companies need to make sure they are partnering with a reliable and responsive support team that will be available to help them during the rush. Sterling provides our clients with a dedicated client support team that is available via phone or email to answer questions about our system. We also provide your candidates with a candidate support team to help field calls from people onboarding to your gig platform. The right partner can enhance the experience and timeline for both you and your candidates.

Conclusion

Gig companies should start evaluating their platforms now to better prepare for workforce growth due to the the upcoming holiday demand. From automating existing processes and having a responsible support team backing you, your platform will be ready for the seasonal gig hiring that is just around the corner. Contact us now to learn how Sterling’s Gig team can help get your gig platform prepared.

Sterling is not a law firm. This publication is for informational purposes only and nothing contained in it should be construed as legal advice. We expressly disclaim any warranty or responsibility for damages arising out this information. We encourage you to consult with legal counsel regarding your specific needs. We do not undertake any duty to update previously posted materials.