An Introduction to Online Recruitment

Online recruitment offers recruiters one of the most powerful and cost-effective ways to recruit staff for an  organisation.

In this article we take you through the key aspects of online recruitment and how they fit into the recruitment process.

What is Online Recruitment?

Online recruitment, e-recruitment, or web-based recruitment is the use of online technology to attract  and source candidates and aid the recruitment process. What this usually means is the use of a company’s own website, a third-party job site or job board, a CV database, search engine marketing or social media platforms to fill vacancies.

Careers Websites

The careers area of a corporate website is one of the most-visited areas of a website. With this in mind, the use of a careers area in a company’s own website as an online recruitment resource is now a common practice for many.

In its most basic form, the careers area is often simply a listing of vacancies in your company with details of how to apply etc. However, many companies invest in more extensive careers areas where in addition to their job vacancies they can also promote their company as a place to work, outline the company ethos and culture, detail employee benefits, feature “day in the life” articles about typical employees, have recruitment videos and even online recruitment fairs.

Job Sites & Job Boards

Most employers’ experience of online recruitment is through the use third-party job sites and job boards. Job sites and job boards are websites that advertise large numbers of job vacancies from many different recruitment agencies and employers. Job sites fall into two main categories:

1. ‘Generalist’ or ‘generic’ job sites: These are websites that advertise jobs across a wide range of job types and industry sectors. Well-known generalist job sites are Totaljobs.com, Reed.co.uk & CV-Library amongst others.
2. ‘Specialist’ or ‘niche’ job sites: These are website that focus on a particular job type, industry sector or location. For example, CareersinAudit is a specialst website that focusses on audit jobs.. While it focusses in audit jobs, it covers many many industry sectors and locations — as many industry sectors and locations require auditors. Caterer.com, on the other hand, focusses on the hospitality and catering sector but covers many different types of jobs and locations. STVjobs and S1jobs are two sites that cover all jobs in all sectors but which focus exclusively on one location, Scotland.
3. Aggregator job boards or job search engines: There are websites that bring together the job listings from many different job boards, company websites and other locations. They are like a Google or Yahoo! but only for jobs.  Candidates can search for jobs from all the job boards in one place.

For job seekers, job sites make searching for jobs much easier. Rather than having to trawl hundreds of employer websites, job seekers can find lots of vacancies in one place. Job sites and job boards will usually provide daily emails of new jobs, Twitter updates, RSS feeds of new opportunities, or SMS’s of new vacancies.

Most job sites and job boards allow job seekers to create online profiles and/or upload their CVs so that recruitment agencies and employers can view them. Job sites also provide other services to job seekers such as careers advice, web forums, salary surveys etc.

For recruiters, job boards offer an easy and cost-effective way to reach active candidates. Recruiters simply upload their vacancies and publish them on the job board for candidates to find. Many job baords now also offer simple candidate management tools and resources to help make a success of job posting.

CV Databases

A CV database is another important product in online recruitment. Candidates upload their CVs to the CV database and these CVs are then released to recruitment agencies and employers to view. While there are still a number of dedicated stand-alone CV database providers, most CV databases are now part of  a job site and job board and CV databases access is offered as an additional service to job vacancy advertising.

Search Engine Marketing

Search Engine Marketing is another method of online recruitment. Search engine marketing for online recruitment advertising generally involves utilising Per-Per-Click advertising on search engines such as Google, Yahoo!  or Bing in order to drive potential candidates to careers websites or job listings. Search engine marketing for recruitment does require some specialist knowledge and largely remains the preserve of recruitment marketing experts in larger companies and recruitment consultancies.

Social Media Recruitment

Social networks like Facebook, Twitter and professional networks like Linkedin offer employers another way of reaching potential employees. Many employers use their Facebook Fan pages and Facebook applications to promote their vacancies to wider networks. Most companies will also use Twitter to promote jobs. And LinkedIn offers a range of recruitment tools. However, rather like search engine marketing above, recruiting via social media requires some expertise and still remains the preserve of larger employers and recruitment consultants.

Candidate Management

Online recruitment also offers recruiters are range of producitivty tools to make the process of recruitment easier. Primary amongst these is recruitment software or Applicant Tracking Software. Recruitment software allows a recruiter to manage the full recruitment process from within a dedicated recruitment platform: vacancies can be loaded onto the sytem; automatically distributed to job boards; candidate applications can be recorded, rated and reviewed; responses to applicants sent; psychometric tests conducted; and even interviews can be set up — all from the within the software. For volume recruiters it is a vital part of an online recruitment strategy.

To conclude

As you can see, online recruitment covers a wide variety of activities. From a recruitment advertising and candidate sourcing point of view, success rests with choosing the most effective channel. In an ideal world you could use careers websites, job boards, CV databases, search engine marketing, and social media channels; but, being realistic, there is seldom enough time for that.

Recruiters with simple needs tend to use job sites and job boards and CV databases as a starting point. Job boards offer the most cost effective and, perhaps more importantly for small and medium-sized companies, the most time-effective method of recruiting online. If you needs are greater or your recruitment is extensive, it would be worth considering some of the other online recruitment options outlined.

Next steps? Check out these other guides and articles:

• An introduction to Applicant Tracking Systems
• What is Job Posting Software?
• An Introduction to CV Databases
• Active and Passive Candidates
• Flat fee recruiters