Article by Sion Mooney
Recruiting via the Internet has been widely touted
as the only way forward for recruitment technology. Whilst the
demise of traditional media has been greatly exaggerated, one area
of undoubted growth has been the 'must have' careers section on
the company website. Almost every FTSE 100 Company has a Careers
Centre of sorts and barely a week goes by without a Unigate or
Falkirk Council espousing the cost saving of taking recruitment
on-line. However, even though articles talk of financial benefits
derived by recruiting successful applicants, what about potential
applicants who don't apply? Are you missing out? Do you know why
people apply to your company, or more importantly why they don't?
It seems obvious 'if they can't apply, then they won't apply.'
In all the excitement to get on the net, companies have lost
sight of their customer, the applicant. 'User experience' has
become a business buzzword within Internet design circles but is
virtually ignored within the recruitment industry. If you were
launching a new brand of cola you would do some research, right?
Well, what's the difference with your careers website? Placing the
user (or applicant) at the centre of your careers centre web-site
design will dramatically increase the number of applicants and
consequently, the financial return from your site. For example,
recent studies have shown that successful Internet recruitment can
saves you £5000 per hire.
Unfortunately, the bottom line is that most Careers Centres are
unusable. We've all visited a web-site where we can't easily find
what we need, so we've found another site that does. If your
careers site is frustratingly slow to load, difficult to use with
complicated navigation then your competitors will receive the
application that you missed. (This counts manyfold if you are a
recruitment website because your careers centre is your company!).
Usability testing could transform your site from a dog to a cash
cow. For example, a 200% increase in click-throughs from home
pages is not uncommon. Usability is about getting back to the
recruitment basics - without applications you can't make hires.
Have you got a map?
Would you invite an interviewee, and potential employee, to
your site but neglect to give them a map and then let them wander
round the building? Of course not, but that's what careers sites do
every day. By knowing your user you can make it easy for them to
apply to, and become excited about, your company. The internet job
seeker is 'task oriented' - wanting to get in and out of your site
quickly. If they are applying from work they don't want to draw
attention through flashy animations or music. At home they
wouldn't want to sit on a telephone line for two hours trying to
apply. If you are an IT software company with an unusable careers
website then what will be the applicants first impression?
Show me the money!
By increasing site usability, you make it easier for applicants
to apply - so creating a larger candidate pool. Once you've got
the ultimate in usable sites you can add more rigorous selection
criteria to handle your new found higher volumes of candidates.
What a great problem to have! Of course, the financial
implications are huge. The £5000 saving per careers site hire is
obvious, and reason enough to generate a business case. Reduced
time-to-fill is a given. Harder to measure will be the
applications from high quality passive candidates who now apply
because it's so much simpler than before. Remember, even the best
employer brand means nothing if applicants can't apply.
Next Steps
Find out more about usability. Read a book or dip into a
website. Find a way to get your site reviewed by your users. If
you've got a budget for a professional company with trained
psychologists then give your site the overhaul it deserves. The
return on investment justifies the expense. If you can't afford
that, then let your recent joiners or your HR team try out your
site's usability. If you do this before any expensive IT
developers touch your site, you'll stop mistakes before they
happen. Even better, if you're redesigning your site you can save
up to 90% of your IT redesign budget!
Sion Mooney
Strategic Recruitment Specialist, with extensive experience in
Internet recruitment. Recent clients include Motorola and GlaxoSmithKline.
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