If you do not know this already, then let me remind you and if you do know, I hope you are actually doing something about it!  Correctly promoting job advertising content via your career site and other online channels represents your best opportunity of attracting accurately matched, active candidates who want the job you are looking to fill.  It even provides an opportunity to positively de-select multiple unsuitable applications by individuals who would not match your selection criteria.

All business organisations should want to promote its best attributes and the great potential in the opportunities available for an interested jobseeker (career seeker) or passive future jobseeker.  If you do this well you will attract better candidates, but do this without thought you will lose out to your peers, who are competing for the same talent. If people are your greatest resource, as we are consistently being told, make sure your recruitment strategy reflects this in how it promotes your Job Adverts.

So what are the areas to consider that will ensure your job opportunities are found, read and applied to?

• General Job Branding
• Copy that Converts
• Communication Mediums
• Recruitment SEO
• Job Ad distribution

The Job Advertisement is exactly that, it is an advert that is intended to appeal to a target reader to get them to convert (apply) by giving you their most relevant information in the easiest possible way that suits the visiting consumer of your offer.  Now this to me is obvious, so why are so many adverts for jobs so badly matched to the needs of their ideal reader?

General Job Branding

No measurable compensation or no mention at all of what the role will pay is a big mistake, just ask what reasons you have for not presenting some useful information about salary that will at least indicate the TRUE earnings in the role.  Be realistic, if you’re not in a position to pay top dollar (market value), then tune down on the experience level to fit your budget.

A crazy job title will also create problems; you might think it’s the best job title on the planet but if no one else knows it outside your company, no one will be searching for it when looking for a job.  Advertise your jobs with the best; most frequently used job title that matches the core duties of the job (You can call it what you like when you have someone in place).

Alternative Capture; this is not a high consideration in job advertising but is common place in online marketing.  Accept someone might find this job page and not be an exact fit for the role.  If this is the case you should look to convert these types of visitor, where at all possible.  Think about features on the page that can help them refer someone who is suitable.  They might like what they see about the company but not the job itself, so give them a chance to register and have someone call then to see if there is something else they can do for you.  They might be 100% passive when they find your job, ensure you give them a chance to stay passive but capture data about them to add to your passive talent pool for this type of job.  This could be links to knowledge areas (white papers, news articles etc) this type of job holder would be interested to have sent to them on a regular basis.

A simple apply process; I know from my own experience with client projects, one major turn off from a candidate is how difficult businesses make it for ideal candidate prospects to apply for the Job.  Key areas that are often missed are: not having a mobile ‘apply’ process that is actually fully mobile.  Other turn-offs are; no ability to apply via their online profile and online application forms that ask for 6 or 7 pages of data to complete.  These jobs will be dropped and they will move on to your competitor’s similar jobs.  These jobs are applied to and completed because the apply process is presented to them in a better way and can be completed more easily.

Reader Linguistics

You need to follow proven copy writing principles; way back when I first started in recruitment I was given training on how to write job adverts and this was based on traditional print based product or service advertising.  I see many job adverts today and know this skill is being lost to history.  I recommend you re-introduce copywriting skills training to your job owners or those responsible for job advert promotion.  Techniques like: hook lines, tag lines, compelling copy and structured readability with the addition of SEO related linguistics, all should impact on the final job content and its look and feel.

Communication Mediums

Times have changed regarding how your prospective audience receives and consumes information; we all know this, right?  So what do you think your target candidates want within their particular generational grouping when it comes to job and career related information?  They are all consuming information in many different ways (not many, if any are finding your jobs via the local press).  Jobs Adverts, should in my view, hold interesting to read but concise written copy, it also should be well designed and laid out on the page with additional options to have engaging imagery and areas to load related video and sound files.

Recruitment SEO

This is a subject in itself but in this case I will be brief.  If you have the wrong technical set up when promoting your job ads, you will be using much more of your recruiting budget with other external distribution channels than if your career site job pages where being indexed by the search engines.  Until your career site jobs are indexable in search results, job advert SEO will not benefit you.  If you do recognise the technical needs for recruitment SEO and your job ads are indexed by search tools then you need to ensure you create a successful On-Page SEO structure for your job ad pages.  On-Page SEO refers to many small elements around how text and images are set up in the HTML page environment, with the main areas being.  URL structure, browser title, H1 and H2 page titles, Linking text, Alt Text, Keyword Linguistics (writing words that your target visitors are typing to find job pages like yours) Keyword Density (getting the balance right and not spamming the page), Meta Description and Meta Keywords.  Get this correctly optimised and your job pages will start to climb the search result rankings.

Job Ad distribution

You need to consider both pro-active and viral distribution channels when creating a job advert page.  Firstly have you exported the job advert (via a multi posting solution or manually) to all other relevant online places you know your ideal candidates gather and matching the medium outlets they use, have links back to your career site job advert or directly back to your CRM/ATS software to complete the apply process been added.  External channels you to consider are; Job Boards, Association Sites, Industry Blogs plus Video, Pod (Audio) and Social job casting outlets.  Then within these distributed areas and on your career site advert page, have you set up options for your visitors to help you send, refer, share,  like and re-tweet (virally distribute) your content within their networks.

With people being your best asset in making your company a success, then it’s safe to say that finding the best people who match your available jobs is a vital step in achieving business goals.  So Job Advertising must be given the upmost consideration when you are looking to attract the best possible candidates for you to finally select the best persons available to fill your jobs.  That’s just common sense, right?

Author: Martin Shaw

For more information, please contact martin by email or call him on 07791 673 715.

About RecruitSmart Technology

Founded by Martin in 2012, RecruitSmart is a company focused on applying any combination of technology, on and off line marketing and communications and all their years of recruitment industry expertise to support a company's talent attraction, acquisition and management strategies.