Wondering what's the importance of SEO in recruitment?
Think about it, where do candidates search for a job?
If your answer is “job boards”, you are sort of right.
However, a vast majority of professionals use Google to search for career opportunities nowadays.
As a result, they’ll usually find all of the popular job boards right at the top of the search page, detailing copious amounts of vacancies.
The key? Well, keywords!
Every month, around 30% of Google searches are job-related, which is staggering when you consider how many people use Google on a daily basis.
So, it’s hardly surprising to see why the search engine giant is rolling out their new Google for Jobs feature in the UK. The idea is to make it easier for candidates to find job sites, career pages of companies and the most relevant jobs.
With this in mind, how can your business ensure it’s SEO friendly and performs well according to the new Google for Jobs feature?
Here’s everything you need to know.
How SEO is helping the recruitment industry
As you know, SEO has played a pivotal role in transforming the digital marketing landscape. When a person searches for something on Google, they’ll get 10 links on every search engine results page (SERP). These links are organic results.
There are also links to ads at the top of the page.
As research suggests, only 5% of people will go to the second page of Google search results. Therefore, if you post a job that isn’t SEO friendly, there’s a high probability that it won’t be seen.
You have a greater chance of ranking higher if you’re trying to find talent for niche skills. And seeing as not many companies consider SEO when posting a vacancy on a job board or their career page, you can easily get the upper hand over your competition.
It’s a sure-fire way of attracting the very best talent – especially those who are passively searching.
Appearing on the first page of Google results also builds trust and credibility for your brand. You won’t look like a small-time business and it will make candidates buy into what you’re saying.
For instance, if you were searching for a brand new car, are you more likely to trust a dealer who is on the first page of Google or the second?
Making your job advert SEO friendly is one thing.
But if it’s littered with keywords and doesn’t actually say the right things, candidates are soon going to hit the back button.
To create a top job advert that resonates with top performing professionals, you need to:
- Choose the right length – ideally below 700 words.
- Focus on the job – don’t just waffle on about how great your business is.
- Don’t ask for the world – you’ll probably make the candidate feel underqualified.
- Use the right tone – make it fun, engaging and a true representation of your brand.
To learn more about perfecting your job ads, check out our previous blog: ‘Your Essential Checklist For Job Advert Success’.
How to get your website ready for Google for Jobs?
Google uses a machine learning artificial intelligence to generate results for a candidate’s job search queries.
To give your company the best chance of ranking high for certain job roles, you should try to include keywords throughout your whole website, not just on the job advert itself.
Google also uses structure data to recognise the type of content on your site, so you’ll need to mark-up your job ads by applying a piece of code on your website using Job Posting structure data.
This may look quite daunting and complicated at first, there are plenty of resources online that can guide you through the whole process of applying microdata.
You should also add a <lastmode> date in the sitemap for every job advert you post on your website.
Moving away from the technical side of things, normal SEO best practices like the size or speed of your website also play a key role in determining your job advert’s ranking too.
Using job boards
If all of the above sounds a little too complicated, you can always stick to posting your adverts on popular job boards.
Google for Jobs was launched in partnership with big players like Monster, LinkedIn, Facebook and Glassdoor.
So, if you post your job advert on one or more of these platforms, there’s a greater chance it will rank higher on Google search.
Final thoughts
In an ideal world, you should consider both avenues. By implementing the technical codes on your website career page as suggested by Google and using popular job boards, you’re more likely to rank higher when candidates search.
Just because it may feel like there’s a lot of work to do in the initial stages, it shouldn’t put you off from focusing on the SEO elements of recruitment.
While other companies continue to take shortcuts, you have the opportunity to go one step beyond and give yourself the best possible chance of securing some of the most exciting talents in your industry.
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