Top tips for online recruitment success: Managing Candidate Applications

In our continuing series on the top tips from the job boards for online recruitment success, we come to managing the application process.  This is a tricky topic for many job boarders as there is something of a split between them as to the best way to have candidates apply for jobs. The majority of job boarders prefer to have candidates apply via a web form on their own job board website; others, however, avoid such web forms and simply give candidates your email address to apply to.

From the recruiter’s point of view, however, both methods will work adequately.  From the candidate’s point of view, there’s little difference between them. Both offer a simple and straight-forward application process. What advocates for both types of applications do agree on, however, is that once employers take on the application process themselves, they too often mess it up.

The most common frustration for job boarders is when a recruiter redirects a candidate to their own company website to apply for jobs — the only thing is, they redirect the candidate neither to the job nor the application process but rather to their website homepage. In other words, they expect the candidate to go and find the job all over again on another website. The drop off rates for such candidates is estimated at over 80%.

Some employers do actually redirect candidates to their career website, and even to the job, and even to the job application process, but then require a hugely complicated registration and application process from the candidates. Again, it’s simply too much for the candidate and drop off rates are put at some 40 to 50%.

The key to successful online recruitment is to get the best people to apply for your job. The best people simply won’t bother with poor or overly-complicated recruitment methods. Even in recessionary times like these, there’s no good reason for cheesing off candidates. Good quality staff will not and should not put up with poor recruiters.

Some recruiters will be indignant about this and claim that candidates should make the effort to apply for jobs —even if it’s complicated. What candidates should do and do do is neither here nor there. The reality is they don’t apply for such jobs. Indeed, the reason they don’t has a lot to do with what recruiters should do and do do. That is, recruiter should make the effort to respond to candidates and treat their applications properly but they don’t. And that is why so many candidates do not go through the application process. They have done so countless times before and have never got a response.

With this in mind, then, the key thing is to do is to simplify the application process. Make it easy for good candidates to apply for your job (be that via the job board, by email, of via your own website). And most important of all, respond to them when they do: you’ll be outdoing the vast majority of other recruiters.