Failing to use mobile technology as a candidate attraction channel is “turning your back on candidates”, a self-described “mobile recruiting evangelist” warned in-house recruiters last week.

As use of mobile communication tools such as smartphones and tablets to conduct many aspects of everyday life skyrockets, recruiters should “support the candidate’s choice” of channel, urged Dave Martin, managing director of Allthetopbananas.com.

He supported his argument with predictions from business intelligence firm the Gartner Group that mobiles will overtake the PC by 2013 in how users access the internet, and statistics from social media site Twitter that as of January, 40% of its Tweets were received via mobile.

In organisations, “mobile should be everywhere, across the board, not siloed”, Martin said.

And if an organisation has its own application, it should be available in an applications store, he continued.

In addition to being a tool of choice for many candidates now, Martin said that recruiters benefit from a speedier response to their approaches to potential recruits when using mobile technology. The average response to an email was 72 hours, compared to four minutes for a text.

Martin made his remarks at a meeting of The Forum for In-house Recruitment Managers (The FIRM).