3 Tips to Get the Most out of your Job Board Budget

According to Statistic Brain Research Institute, 18.5 million people are hired from online job postings each year. Online job boards can be a great tool for hiring, but they can also become expensive to manage. A single job posting for 30 days costs $375 on Monster, $419 on Career Builder, and $495 on LinkedIN. Bearing in mind that the average time to fill is over 30 days, these expenses can add up quickly with additional costs for renewal. In such a competitive market it’s important to be strategic about how you utilize job boards. Below are three tips you can use to get the most out of your job board budget and find great candidates.

1. Attraction-Based Job Descriptions

If you notice your job posts get a lot of traffic but not many applications, the problem might be in your job description. We recently wrote a guide to attraction-based job descriptions for your reference. In a market where employers must remain competitive for talent, it’s extremely important to make your job look desirable. A Glassdoor survey says 76% of jobseekers want to know why a company is an attractive place to work. The best way to do this is to highlight the benefits and incentives of working for you. Include a short narrative about your company and emphasize the potential for professional growth. In a candidate-driven market, you will want to do your best to make sure that candidates can imagine themselves working with your company in order to generate interest.

2. Understand the Job Board Monopoly

Due to recent acquisitions, the leading online job sites are becoming somewhat of a monopoly. One of the most popular sources for candidates is Indeed. According to SHRM, 65% of all online hires come from Indeed. In 2016 Indeed acquired Simply Hired, and in 2018 they acquired Glassdoor in order to achieve free Google indexing for their job posts. This means when you post a job on Indeed, candidates are able to find it with a google search. Knowing the channels through which candidates on the leading job boards come from can help you better design your strategy. Doing some research can help you learn where to post in order to see the most success while staying within your budget. These acquisitions allow Indeed to dominate the market and continue to increase prices.

3. Know When to Sponsor

Many job boards will ask to sponsor your job ad for a fee in order for you to reach a greater audience. However, this may not be the best strategy when you are looking to fill a job with a highly targeted person in mind. With a sponsored ad you will need to sort through sometimes hundreds of applications to find a candidate with the specific skills you are looking for. Sometimes these applicants can use up your sponsored ad budget before you find the candidate you’re looking for. A sponsored ad might be useful if you are trying to fill multiple similar positions at once, but not for a targeted search. It’s important to know when to sponsor, or when to implement a different strategy (such as hiring a recruiter) in order to make the most of your budget.

Because of the growing talent shortage, it’s harder than ever to find qualified candidates to fill positions through job boards. It’s important optimize your job board strategy in order to remain competitive and find the talent that you need. Improving your strategy can help you get better results within your budget.

Bradley Staffing Group is a full-service staffing firm based in Wayne, PA. We are committed to matching A-level talent with best-in-class businesses. Our knowledgeable and well-trained staff brings a combined 70+ years of staffing experience to our clients and candidates alike. http://useful-sock.flywheelsites.com/contact-us/