In this issue we begin a series of articles looking at some of the advertising products offered by job sites. We also conclude our review of the key metric of unique users and what role it can play in choosing a job site. And once again we provide a quick round up of the latest offers from job sites in the UK and Ireland.

Please feel free to forward this issue to a colleague, and let us know if there are any topics you'd like to see us cover in upcoming issues. We'd love your feedback.

Editor
Karl Schweppe

In this first in a series of articles, we look at the recruitment advertising products offered by job sites. This month we start with the bread and butter of job sites: vacancy or job listing products.  

Job Listings

Job Listings are the basic job site advertising product. Job Listings usually consists of a text description which allows you to detail your vacancy. Job Listings typically run on a job site from one week to 60 days (and sometimes more.) For all intents and purposes, Job Listings are like classified ads in a newspaper. 

Branded Job Listing

Branded Job Listings are similar to standard Job Listings except that they also include some kind of graphic (usually your company logo.) Nowadays, most job sites offer the Branded Job Listing as the basic vacancy advertising product for employers.

Display or Semi-Display Job Ads

Display or Semi-Display ads are more “graphical” than both standard and Branded Job Listings. Display or Semi-Display ads include the standard text description but in a more designed or formatted layout that can be tailored to match your corporate brand. Again, Display or Semi-Display ads are like display ads in newspapers. 

Jobs-by-email 

Most job sites include a jobs-by-email service as part of their basic Job Listing product. Candidates are sent a list of new jobs to their personal inboxes. Candidates have usually specified what jobs they want to receive and, if your vacancy matches their requirements, it will be on the list of jobs. In general, Job Listings are emailed to candidates only once during the advertising period. 

Sponsored and Targeted Emails

Many job sites offer you the opportunity to sponsor their daily candidate email. Options can include putting your job or message at the top of the email to all candidates or only putting it on the email of specifically targeted candidates. Alternatively, some job sites allow you to send your job ad on its own to only certain specified candidates.

Premium Positioning and Keyword Sponsorship

When a candidate searches for a job on the job site, the job site returns a list of matches in the search results. Some job sites allow you to have your job appear in a premium “top-of-the-list” position in the search results and thus increase the chances of candidates viewing it. Other job sites allow you to sponsor certain popular keyword search terms so that every time that keyword is used by a job seeker, your job appears in a premium position or “top-of-the-list” position in the search results.

Pricing

Most job sites charge a standard one-off fee for job advertising. That is, you might pay £250 for a single four-week job listing. Other job sites, however, use an “advertising week” or “advertising slot” pricing structure. In this case, you purchase advertising time. That is, you might get a four-week “advertising slot” which you can use to advertise one job for four weeks, two jobs for two weeks each, or four jobs for one week each. You might also be able to "keep" your unused advertising weeks for the next time you have a vacancy.

Most job sites will include your job on their job-by-email service as part of the basic package. But there are a few that don't, so be sure to check this. Beyond the basic listing, prices vary wildly from site to site. Some job sites include their pricing on their whatjobsite profile page. If they don't, click on their whatjobsite weblink and it'll take you to their site.  

In our next newsletter we'll look at some other advertising products that go beyond vacancy advertising and encompass recruitment branding. Find out more about job sites and recruiting online in our Help and Advice area.

In the last two newsletters we looked at the important metric of Unique Users and how it can give an indication of the popularity of a job site. We also learned that with a little bit of effort you can estimate how popular a job site is amongst the job seeker audience you want to access. Now we look at the limits of this metric in making the advertising decision, and what you can do to choose the right job site.

So, you've looked at the statistics and you think you know what job site you want to use. But statistics and relevant users will only give a general indication of a job site's users. Every job site has its own strengths and weaknesses. Only by talking to job sites, going through their user statistics with them, discussing your job vacancy and exploring the various advertising options, will you be able to make a well-informed advertising decision.

What's more, talking to job sites is also an excellent source of recruitment information and advice. These people know about advertising vacancies online and a tip from them can mean the difference between success and failure.

For example, many employers post vacancies to job sites in December. This is a source of regret for many job sites as they know that user traffic slumps in December. Except for Santa's little helpers, few people look for jobs at this time of the year. 

If those employers were to speak to job sites they would be informed about the decline in traffic in December. They might even be encouraged to postpone the ad or offered the option of extending the ad into busier month of January. The point is, for all the talk of statistics, the most important talk is the one you have with the job sites about your ad.

The recruitment of staff is perhaps the single most significant event that will happen to your business: it's worth a phone call or two.

Here's our round up of the current offers from our trawl of the job sites:

Quite a number of job sites are offering discounts on their online posting products: CareerStructure.com £210 (normal price £240); CWjobs.co.uk £195 (normal price of £250); RetailChoice.com £297 (normal price £350); Salestarget.co.uk £165 (normal price £195); Totaljobs.com £175 (normal price £250)