Your recruitment website should be at the centre of your recruiting efforts.
You should, therefore, put as much time, effort and energy into it as you possibly can. Here are a few things to focus on:
1. Put the candidate first
Always, always, always think like a jobseeker. Build your recruitment website to be candidate focused and you’ll build a site that works.
Your site should be quick to download and easy to navigate. Make sure that is accessible by all and that all of the links work.
Put yourself in the candidate’s mind as she or he is moving around your recruitment website. What will they be thinking here or looking for there? Ask yourself how you help them achieve their goal – of finding out about your organisation and applying for your vacancies – quickly and easily.
Don’t waste their time. Don’t force them to complete long-winded and pointless application forms. Don’t collect information if you’re not going to use it.
2. Build your employer brand
Your recruitment website is the ultimate tool in building your organisation’s brand.
Be clear why your organisation is a great place to work and place these reasons front and centre throughout your pages. Take a look how the student recruitment teams do it for ideas.
3. Watch your words
The web is an open and unpretentious environment. Avoid the recruitment jargon of the past and make sure that the language on your site is clear, friendly and inviting.
Don’t confuse jobseekers by hiding vacancies behind cryptic labels. Sell each vacancy with compelling statements of why the candidates should want the job.
4. Use technology to improve ‘customer service’
Use autoresponders to acknowledge the receipt of application forms and email enquiries.
Provide Frequently Asked Question (FAQ) pages and downloadable guides to your recruitment process. Keep applicants informed of progress and remember that an automated rejection email is better than no response at all.
4. Brand your Applicant Tracking System (ATS)
Before you employ people to manage your applicant tracking system, find out whether it can be branded to look like the rest of your recruitment website.
Several organisations have implemented ATS that look nothing like the rest of their vacancy pages. This confuses jobseekers because they think they’ve left your recruitment site. It is also not the best way to improve your employer brand online.
5. Keep the human touch
It should be easy for jobseekers to contact you. Don’t remove or hide your telephone numbers and postal addresses. Give candidates the opportunity to speak with a real person if they want to.
Make sure that you don’t de-humanise the experience of applying to your jobs and your recruitment website will serve you well.
