The MAGNET approach: How to source, engage, and convert passive candidates in one workflow

Why sourcing, engaging, and converting passive talent is harder today

Sourcing is more complex

According to LinkedIn, 70% of the global workforce isn’t actively looking for a job, but 87% of both active and passive candidates would consider a new role if approached. 

But tapping into that talent pool is harder than ever. (Just ask any organization – 70% are struggling to fill roles.) There are a few reasons behind this current challenge: 

• Qualified passive talent is harder to identify. When 45% of LinkedIn profiles contain outdated information, searching for candidates by title or skills alone is unreliable. 

• Passive talent is selective. While many who aren’t looking for a job would consider a new role, research shows that those who actually make the jump do it for significantly better pay, better career growth, and stronger work-life balance. Plus, demand is high: Passive talent may receive messages from several recruiters at the same time, so they can afford to be choosy. 

• Sourcing passive talent takes a lot of time. Shortlistd reports that recruiters spend 13 hours per week per role on sourcing alone. That workload climbs when targeting passive candidates, who demand deeper upfront research, more personalized messaging, and more touchpoints than active candidates.

Engagement can feel like an uphill battle

Even when sourced successfully, passive talent is notoriously hard to engage. As one recruiter said on Reddit, “The market is super competitive, people rarely respond, and even after putting in hours (sometimes days) of effort, I often end up with nothing. No perfect candidate, no progress—just frustration.

According to hiring managers’ and recruiters’ experiences, fewer than 25% of passive candidates respond to outreach – compared to anywhere from 40–80% of active candidates. Some have reported response rates as low as 6% when using traditional outreach methods, such as LinkedIn InMails. 

Conversion is won or lost in the details

And even with success in sourcing and engaging passive talent, many companies lose them in the hiring process itself. The issue typically isn’t interest but rather the hiring experience.

A widely cited Talent Board survey found that 55% of candidates expect the hiring process to take no more than two weeks, yet 34% say they’ve waited over two months without feedback. 

It gets more concerning, though. 

Within a week of no further communication, most candidates will assume they’ve been ghosted, and that figure rises after two weeks. Meanwhile, 38% of candidates confirmed they were actually ghosted by an employer in the last year, while just 7% of candidates received an explicit rejection.

For passive candidates, these gaps matter even more. Unlike active job seekers, passive talent isn’t under pressure to leave their current role. As George Fironov, co-founder and CEO of Talmatic, tells us, “Delaying or feeding candidates with vague updates is the fastest way to lose passive talent.”

In other words, when it comes to converting passive talent, speed and clarity are dealbreakers.

The MAGNET approach to passive talent recruitment

We devised the MAGNET framework – which bundles sourcing, engaging, and converting talent in a single workflow – to fix these issues. It turns passive recruiting from a numbers game into a precision approach that works on every level.

Smarter sourcing: Match signals and affirm ability (M + A)

Old-school sourcing assumes availability is the best signal. But passive talent isn’t sitting on job boards. They’re busy driving projects, contributing to communities, and building their expertise. Those activities tell you far more than an “Open to Work” badge on LinkedIn. 

As Fironov tells TestGorilla, the best results come from “targeting people who are actively cultivating their professional visibility, whether it be through posting content, working on open-source projects, or speaking at events.”

Anush Gasparian, Director of Human Resources at Phonexa, agrees:  “The best sourcing happens in niche spaces and groups where your ideal candidates spend their intellectual energy. For engineers, that might be Stack Overflow, or for product managers, Slack groups.”

These fit signals are crucial, but only part of the story. After all, a polished profile or a single public talk doesn’t always prove someone can deliver in your role. That’s why the MAGNET workflow pairs signal-spotting with early validation of ability.

In practice, this involves finding signs of real capability during sourcing – whether it’s a developer consistently posting code on GitHub or a finance professional sharing detailed process improvements online. 

TestGorilla Sourcing brings these ability signals directly into the workflow, helping you spot candidates who might never appear in keyword-based searches.

Better engagement: Guide conversations and nurture momentum (G + N)

Once you’ve surfaced the right passive candidates, engagement is where everything changes. At this stage, candidates aren’t just evaluating a role – they’re weighing whether your company is worth their time, attention, and energy. 

How you guide the conversation sets the tone for everything that follows – and generic outreach is one of the fastest ways to lose interest. The numbers don’t lie: LinkedIn reports a 40% increase in response rates when recruiters personalize their messages. This means that the opposite – lower rates from candidates when they’re generically messaged – must be true.

“Don’t send a message that you can send to anyone else.” – Anush Gasparian

What does that look like in practice? 

Mention something concrete – a project the candidate delivered, a talk they gave, or even a detail from their portfolio that stands out.

“Highlight a skill or two that has largely contributed to an achievement of theirs, and link that skill with the real impact being worked on in the job being reached out for,” Finorov advises. “The response rate skyrockets by a well-placed, short, and sweet tailored note.”

Gasparian agrees with this tactic: “Reference something specific they worked on and why it caught your attention. Did they do a project, give a talk at a conference or is a line from their profile eye-catching?”

Another way to break through with passive candidates is to lead with compensation. “I’ve done the research, and my response numbers reflect it: Tell them the comp in that first contact,” one recruiter shared on Reddit. “They didn’t engage you. Don’t waste their time.”

Once a candidate responds, your focus should move from proving relevance to building trust. Fironov advises, “Talk about the team, the tech stack, or anything related to company vision so that they’re joining a mission, not just filling a job vacancy.”

That said, grabbing passive talent’s interest is only half the battle. You also have to keep the momentum going.

“The biggest mistake is letting days go by before you follow up,” Kevin Wasonga, Head of Growth at PaystubHero, tells TestGorilla. “You’ve got maybe 48 hours with a passive candidate before the window closes.”

Momentum doesn’t mean bombarding talent; it means hitting purposeful touchpoints. Share feedback on their published work, introduce them to a potential teammate, or send a relevant article with a note that connects it to their experience.

Gasparian puts it simply: “Ensure every touchpoint justifies their continued investment of time. Tell them about the next steps before ending a call or after sending them an email to maintain momentum.”

But perhaps most important to momentum is consistency. As one recruiter pointed out on Reddit: “The biggest thing we do to drive engagement is consistent communication (phone calls – if you have their number – and follow-up email), and trying to have the same person reach out every time so they know who to expect.”

There’s technology that can help you do this quickly and easily. With TestGorilla Sourcing, recruiters can connect directly with skilled candidates and track all further communications, making it easier to maintain steady engagement without overwhelming them.

Stronger conversion: Evaluate fit and tighten timelines (E + T)

Even when you’ve engaged a passive candidate, conversion isn’t guaranteed. Because they’re already employed, they’ll only move if the process feels worthwhile. “Every interaction with them should feel valuable to them, whether they join you or not,” Gasparian highlights. 

That’s why evaluating skills early is so important. Passive candidates won’t sit through vague interviews or endless rounds of screening. Structured skills evaluations, like the ones TestGorilla Evaluate offers, enable you to measure candidates’ capabilities quickly and objectively. That way, you keep your recruitment efforts focused and show passive talent that you respect their time.  

Structured evaluations also give passive candidates what they need most: proof that they’ll succeed. Without that confidence, they’ll likely stick to the comfort of their current employer and turn down your offer.

Once you and your passive candidates know they’re a strong fit, the next thing they need is clarity on what comes next – and that depends on your timelines. You have to act fast, especially if you’ve already made the decision to hire them. 

Take Kevin Wasonga of PaystubHero as an example. He had a client who was stuck at a 7% conversion rate until they began sending offer letters and pay details the same day a candidate said yes. “That speed is what kept them from drifting to another company,” Wasonga tells TestGorilla.

When you evaluate fit with structure and fairness – and pair evaluation with fast, transparent timelines – passive candidates are far more likely to go from curious to committed.

Magnetize passive candidates 

Recruiting passive talent isn’t about casting the widest net, blasting out messages, and hoping someone bites. It’s about making every interaction count.

The MAGNET framework reframes passive recruiting as a process grounded in evidence, trust, and speed. By spotting real signals of fit, validating ability early, personalizing outreach, and keeping momentum alive, you can transform passive talent into long-term hires.

And that’s where TestGorilla comes in. With TestGorilla Sourcing, you surface candidates who already show fit signals; with TestGorilla Evaluate, you prove their skills objectively. Together, they make MAGNET practical.

Ready to turn passive talent into a strong pipeline? Create a free TestGorilla account or book a demo today.