Cheezhead Recruiting News and Opinion

In yesterday’s post, I discussed some possible reasons why HR hasn’t gravitated toward utilizing search engines such as Google in the same way that their job boards of choice have done.

As a follow-up, here are some reasons why I believe HR will eventually leverage the power of search engines to source candidates:

1. The Net Rules – Anyone think this Internet thing is a passing fancy? No, OK. moving on.
2. Search Rules – Anyone think Search is a passing fancy? No, OK, moving on.
3. Low / No Risk – Starting a pay-per-click (PPC) campaign on Google starts at 5 cents per click, with a $5 starting fee. Yahoo!’s product starts at 10 cents per click, with a $50 fee. Neither is going to break the bank. You only pay if someone clicks and goes to your site. And you can stop your campaign at any time. Any other mediums offering that?
4. Sourcing Passive Candidates – You don’t have to optimize or pay for job-related keyword searches. Instead, go after terms that might attract those who aren’t actively looking for work. For example, "Texas Board of Nursing" gets almost 200 searches a day, while "Texas nursing jobs" get about 12 searches a day. There’s a good chance both groups are worth getting in front of if you’re a healthcare system in Texas, particularly if it’s at 5 cents a click.
5. Vertical Search – Because vertical search results tend to be served by relevancy instead of by the date a listing was posted, a question coming down the pike is sure to be "How do I optimize my job listings to be higher than my competition?"
6. Marketing Gets It – The marketing departments of companies like Wal-Mart and Chrysler are learning to love search. It’s just a matter of time before all marketing and, for our purposes, recruitment advertising, learns to love it as well.
7. Control – Search marketing can be as big or as small as you wish. Want a million people? They can do that. Want one? They can do that too.
8. Tracking – Accountability’s hammer is coming down on corporate America pretty hard, and HR is no different. The Web and Search in particular enables marketers to track results like never before. And measuring results is only going to get better and easier.

That’s mostly off the top of my head. I could probably go on all day about the benefits of search. I’m a true believer and an avid evangelist for search and its potential to redefine e-recruiting.

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