The writing could be on the wall for recruiters’ own networks of candidates, as social networking sites such as LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook gradually erode their value and make them obsolete, argues Matt Alder, director of product strategy at recruitment and marketing agency Penna Barkers.

“At some point in the future, your contacts and networks are not what is going to be valued,” Alder told delegates at ‘Social Media in Recruitment’, an event organised by online recruitment marketing consultancy Web Based Recruitment. “In the future you will be able to see who works at any company, what they do, what they are interested in and how to contact them.

“I think it is an unstoppable force and whether it happens next year, the year after or 10 years’ time, it will happen. I think that has profound consequences,” he adds.

Alder believes this is ‘great news’ for recruiters, as sourcing becomes very easy.

Bill Fischer, co-founder and director at Work Digital and TwitterJobSearch.com concurs that social networking will drive change in the way recruiters manage their networks.

“I believe there will be a conversion” from tightly safeguarded networkers to access to all, Fischer says. However, he anticipates that some agencies will be more successful in exploiting social networking than others. “Some people will get through to these contacts over others,” Fischer says. “The challenge is, even if you have the same contacts, how do you establish the relationships and the ability to capitalise on that to make you stronger than your competitors?”

Fischer says that because social networking makes it so easy to contact candidates, recruiters who want to gain a competitive advantage will have to go back to building relationships with candidates.

According to Fischer, certain sectors such as IT and retail will take the lead in seizing the opportunities posed by such technology.

Alder says that one effect of the spread of social networking is that the employer brand becomes more important and must be central to retention strategy. Any recruiter will be able to find out who works at Microsoft, for example, and because of this transparency, retention is set to become a problem. Competitors such as Google would also have access to such information.

Mike Taylor, managing director at Web Based Recruitment, told Recruiter that social networking did not necessarily mean the end of the traditional recruitment agency.

“If I was working at Shell or BP and I was line manager, I would have an online recruitment strategy. [But] if I knew I was getting good service from a recruitment agency and it was cost-effective, there is no question as to why I would not want to go out and use them.

“You are not going to get 100% take-up on anything. All 100% won’t be signed up to a particular network. There must be other ways of finding them. If a recruitment agency specialises in that sector, they would have quite a good handle on where to find them and who is up for a potential move.”

Social networking sites will clearly play a major role in the future, however it’s likely that those recruiters who continue to add value by building relationships by enhancing their offering through the social networking will continue to flourish.