The recruiter-first playbook for filling PT, OT, and rehab seats at volume, built on a white-label ATS that answers every clinician in seconds.
30-day free trial. No setup fees, no long-term contracts.
Filling physical and occupational therapy seats is not nurse staffing with a different title. The pool is smaller, the licensure rules are stricter, and the best clinicians are already treating patients all day. Win these hires and you win them on speed and on-brand outreach, run at volume. Here is the playbook, and how ATS Mako runs it for you from first touch to offer letter.
Four realities that decide whether your therapy requisitions fill or stall.
Physical therapists, occupational therapists, PTAs, COTAs, and speech-language pathologists are graduated in far smaller numbers than nurses, and every hospital, SNF, home-health agency, outpatient clinic, and school district is competing for the same people. When supply is that tight, the recruiter who replies first often wins the candidate outright.
A PT license, an OT registration, NBCOT or FSBPT status, state-by-state rules, and compact eligibility all decide whether a great resume can actually work a role. Screening for it late in the process burns days you do not have. Front-load the credential questions or watch candidates stall at the offer stage.
Most qualified therapists already have a job and treat patients all day. They do not sit refreshing an inbox. They answer a text between visits. If your first touch is email-only and lands tomorrow, you are talking to someone who never saw it.
You may need to fill dozens of therapy seats across multiple sites at once, but a clinician expects to feel recruited, not processed. The only way to do both is automation that fires instant, on-brand, personalized touches at scale so recruiters spend their time closing, not chasing.
Ask these on the application, tag the answers, and never lose a candidate at the offer stage over a credential you could have caught on day one.
PT versus PTA, OT versus COTA, SLP versus SLPA - each carries different scope, pay, and licensure. Capture it on the application so a mismatch never surfaces after three interviews.
Ask whether the candidate holds an active license in the state of the role, whether they are compact-eligible, and their board status. A status-triggered question on apply keeps unlicensed candidates from clogging the pipeline.
Outpatient ortho, SNF, home health, acute care, and pediatrics are different jobs. Segment your audience by setting experience so the right roles reach the right therapists instead of a spray-and-pray blast.
A therapist who can start in 30 days versus 90, or who only wants PRN weekend coverage, changes which requisition they belong in. Ask once, tag it, and route accordingly.
One white-label platform replaces roughly nine disconnected tools. Set the trigger, and ATS Mako handles the rest.
Give every clinic, region, or contract its own branded Apply Here page and pull applicants from job boards, referrals, inbound email, and QR codes on a flyer at a therapy conference straight into one pipeline. Resume submissions become applicant records the moment they arrive, so nothing sits unseen in a shared inbox.
A status-triggered SMS fires the instant a therapist applies, on-brand and personalized with merge fields, confirming you got their application and asking one easy next step. No recruiter has to be at a desk. You reach a working clinician on the channel they actually read.
AI-powered candidate ranking parses resumes and scores against your criteria - discipline, license, setting experience, and engagement - so recruiters open a shortlist of therapists who can actually take the role instead of reading every CV by hand.
Conditional sequences follow up over days only when there is no reply and stop the moment the candidate responds. Persistent without pestering, and it never forgets a busy clinician who meant to reply after their last patient.
AI voice call screening can qualify high-volume applicants around the clock and feed results into the pipeline, while self-serve interview scheduling lets a therapist book between shifts. The back-and-forth that loses candidates simply disappears.
Generate an on-brand offer letter and let the therapist accept and e-sign online as a native step in the pipeline. From first touch to offer letter, every message reinforces your brand, not a vendor logo.
Therapists do not live on job boards. Meet them where they actually are.
Therapists trust other therapists. A fast, texted referral ask to your best PTs and OTs, tracked in one inbox, is your highest-quality channel. Make the ask easy and the follow-through automatic.
Students on clinical rotations become licensed hires. Capture them early with a branded Apply Here page, stay in touch with a nurture sequence through boards, and be first in line when they pass.
The best allied-health talent is already employed. Reach them by SMS with a short, respectful, opt-out-honoring message, and route the ones who reply straight to a recruiter.
Travel and PRN therapists move often. Keep them in a segmented audience and re-engage the moment a contract in their preferred setting opens, instead of re-sourcing from scratch every time.
Speed wins these hires. Guardrails keep you out of trouble while you win them.
The moment a therapist applies is the moment to answer. Automation makes the first minute realistic and reaches a working clinician on the channel they check between patients.
SMS recruiting is regulated. Capture lawful prior consent, keep a clear opt-out such as Reply STOP on every text, and let quiet-hours protection queue messages to local business hours.
A single conditional follow-up the next day recovers real interest without nagging. It fires only when there is no reply and stops the instant the candidate responds.
The candidate pool is far smaller and more specialized. Physical therapists, occupational therapists, PTAs, COTAs, and speech-language pathologists graduate in smaller numbers than nurses, so every setting competes for the same people. Licensure gates every placement, most qualified therapists are already employed and answer by text rather than email, and speed to first reply matters even more because a scarce candidate will not wait. The workflow that wins is instant, on-brand outreach plus credential-first screening, run at volume.
Front-load the credential questions. Capture discipline and level, active license status in the state of the role, compact eligibility, board status, setting experience, and availability right on the application. A status-triggered form and AI candidate ranking keep unlicensed or mismatched applicants from clogging the pipeline so recruiters open a shortlist of therapists who can actually take the role.
Text. Most qualified allied-health clinicians already have a job and treat patients all day, so an email-only first touch that lands tomorrow rarely gets seen. A status-triggered SMS that fires the instant they apply, personalized with merge fields and carrying a clear opt-out, reaches them on the channel they read between visits and gets the fastest reply.
Yes. Give every clinic, region, or contract its own branded Apply Here page while every pipeline rolls up into one view. Segment candidates by discipline, license, and setting experience, then use bulk actions and automations to message, move, and manage many therapists at once without going off-brand.
It is when you do it right. SMS recruiting is regulated under TCPA in the US, so outbound texts need lawful prior consent and a clear opt-out such as Reply STOP. ATS Mako honors business-hours-only sending and automatic opt-out handling, and email outreach keeps automatic unsubscribe handling intact, so you can move fast while staying on the right side of the rules.
It replaces roughly nine disconnected recruiting tools with one white-label platform. Applicants land in one branded pipeline, a status-triggered first touch answers them in seconds, AI candidate ranking surfaces the licensed shortlist, conditional sequences handle follow-up, self-serve scheduling and AI voice screening remove phone tag, and branded e-signed offers close the hire. Every touchpoint reinforces your brand, from first touch to offer letter.
Message, move, and manage thousands of clinicians from one white-label platform. Start your free trial or see it live on a 30-minute demo.
Free support and guided onboarding included. No hidden fees.
