How to spot a good job board

There are thousands of job boards to choose from if you need to post a job. But not all are created equal. Here are some telltale signs that the job board you are about to post on is worth using.

1. It Looks Good: If the job board has good design, meaning a nice logo and well done interface with clearly spelled out call to actions and navigation.

2. Contact Info: If the job board puts their phone and email in a prominent place on the page. This means they're not afraid to be contacted. I always put my phone number at the top of every page of my sites.

3. Too Much Backfill: Many job boards these days backfill their listings with Indeed or SimplyHired. There's nothing wrong with this as it provides an additional source of revenue for them. But beware of sites that dont have any original listings.

4. Outdated blog: Many boards run their own blogs. If that blog hasnt been updated recently, watch out. Its a sign the job board is dying.

5. Does it Google Well: Do a keyword search for that job board based on its name or niche. If it doesn't appear in the first 1-2 pages of results, chances are the site doesn't get much traffic.

6. Do They Syndicate: This is not a total deal breaker since many sites can stand on their own for traffic. But see if your job board also syndicates to the major aggregators. If they do that means you get more than you are paying for. Its like getting multiple sites for 1 price.

7. Age: How long has your job board been around. The older its been online the more likely it is to be worthy of your jobs.

Chris Russell is the CEO & Founder of regional job board network, AllCountyJobs.com LLC.

Comment by Sandeep Marquee on August 16, 2011 at 10:37am: Good one Chris.

Comment by Tim Spagnola on August 16, 2011 at 2:48pm: Thanks for sharing this Chris- really good information

Comment by Eric Putkonen on August 16, 2011 at 3:43pm: As a recruiter, I must say #3 (backfill) and #4 (outdated blog) have been major flags for me when I looked for new job boards. I also looked at Alexa rankings for site. Actually, I have used Alexa to find highly visited job boards for sales people in Canada.

But it comes down to results...can I post an ad and get results. The results are hires from the job board.

Comment by Tim Spagnola on August 16, 2011 at 3:58pm: #3 & #4 were big for me as well Eric, but I must say #2 is the one that is always a give away. If you have to go digging for contact information....... run!

Comment by Kirby Cole on August 16, 2011 at 5:19pm: What are job boards?

Comment by Ben McGrath on August 16, 2011 at 5:47pm: @Kirby,

Indeed, SimplyHired (both mentioned in article), Monster, Dice, CareerBuilder, [ad infinitum] are examples of job boards.

Comment by Amy Ala Miller on August 16, 2011 at 6:13pm: I hear what you're saying, but I have to say we seem to have the best luck with Craigslist. Just a scrappy little community board, I don't know if you would even call it a job board - but yet most of my non-sourced hires either come to us directly through our careers site or craigslist. Go figure.

Comment by Chris Russell on August 17, 2011 at 8:13am: @amy I'm starting to hear bad things about CL, some of my clients complain they get too many crappy candidates from there. I guess it depends what city you recruit in...

Comment by Kirby Cole on August 17, 2011 at 9:42am: @Ben, I think you missed the humor in my post. My point was regarding the loss of relevancy of the job boards as we move to a social recruiting strategy.

Comment by Chris Russell on August 17, 2011 at 9:44am: @kirby..."regarding the loss of relevancy of the job boards"...I assume you are referring to the big national boards...us niche and local job boards will always be relevant.

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