Recruiting website

Recruiting Websites: The Right Structure for More Applications

The recruiting world has changed a lot in recent years. In the past, it was sufficient to publish job advertisements in local newspapers, but today you have to take a much more differentiated approach in order to attract qualified employees. But what does a good recruiting website look like?

We live in an employee market. This means that qualified employees are almost free to choose where they want to work. Many companies have not yet grasped this and are therefore struggling to find qualified staff. Almost all recruiting takes place online these days.

Whether via digital job portals such as StepStone and Co. or via social recruiting measures via platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok etc. The basis of any company's or agency's online presence is its own website. Many give away potential here, because they scare off applicants with unclear or unattractive career pages, if they even have their own website at all.

It doesn't matter what size the company is. It is also worthwhile for small companies to have their own website in order to stand out from the competition. This article is about how you need to build and design your website for recruiting in order to be perceived as an attractive employer.

Why is the website important for recruiting?

A company's own website is one of the first and most important points of contact for applicants. They not only want to find job vacancies here, but also get information about the company. The better you present yourself as an attractive employer, the better your chances of finding qualified employees.

Discussions often arise about how much sense it still makes to have your own website in times of social media when it comes to recruiting. Of course, social media has gained a lot of importance in recruiting, but relying purely on social media is very negligent. On the one hand, you lose interested people who want to specifically search for information on the company website. And on the other hand, you are dependent on external social media where you do not have 100 percent control.

What is important for recruiting websites?

So if you want to remain as self-sufficient as possible, the question still remains: What is important about the content of recruiting websites? How should they be designed and what should they offer?

The right information

The requirements and needs of potential applicants come first. Take a bird's eye view of your own company. What do potential new professionals and employees want to find on your website?

Anyone looking for a job is not only interested in the job itself, but also in the employer. Show what your company or agency stands for and what makes you remarkable as an employer. The more applicants identify with your company, the more likely they are to contact you!

What works very well here are reports from your own team. In short testimonials, your own employees can tell you in videos what their job is and what experiences they have had in the company.

Recruiting Testimonial
An example of a testimonial from employees

Of course, information about the available jobs is a must on every website. It is much more advantageous if you create a separate landing page for each vacancy, where you can go into more detail about the activities, requirements, etc. It is a good idea to display a portrait of each job and include employee experiences on each page. You might also consider displaying a portrait of the individual jobs on the respective pages and to include employee experiences.

You should also present the benefits of your company on the pages. Why should people choose you over the competition? Important: If you are not currently looking for new employees, you should not include a note stating that there are no vacancies. That way you miss the chance to receive interesting unsolicited applications.

In any case, the career section should be easy to find and should not be lost on the general company website, but should be made quickly accessible with a clearly visible button.

The application process

Applicants should be able to find out about your application process. The content of your recruiting website should address the following questions:

  • How do you submit an application?
  • What happens afterwards?
  • When will I receive an answer?
  • How many interviews are there?

All these questions must be answered on your website. Potential employees must feel that they are being met and must not have any unanswered questions about the application process.

Mobile optimization

Up to 82 percent and more of users surf the internet with their smartphone. Your website should therefore be optimized for mobile devices. Make sure that the application process can also be carried out comfortably and easily on mobile devices. The website should be as user-friendly as possible.

Avoid countless clicks being necessary to get to the desired ad. Buttons should be at least as big as the nail of your index finger and the application form must be optimized for mobile devices. This means: No cumbersome upload of PDF application documents.

Because no one has their records stored on their mobile phone. Name, e-mail and telephone number are enough for now. You can always provide the rest later.

Recruiting website design

Design is an important aspect of recruiting. Nobody likes to apply for a job on a website that still uses Flash Player or dates back to the 90s.

The design must be modern and appeal to your potential applicants. Use lots of photos of you, your team and your company on the website so that interested people can get an idea of the company at first glance.

Furthermore, it is important that you also use the corporate design of your company for your career pages. This is especially true if you run your career page alongside your actual website. Too big a change in style can lead to potentially interested people leaving site again because they feel "wrong" there:

  • Use the same main, secondary and accent colors and the same fonts.
  • Make sure that the content is structured in a uniform way using headings and a font size gradation across all pages
  • Don't forget the company logo

In addition, the website should also run smoothly from a technical point of view. Nothing is more annoying than a slow website. So make sure that your images and videos are compressed. Use a modern content management system such as WordPress and modern managed hosting such as Raidboxes.

Example of purposeful design

An example of a good career site is Spotify. The company stays true to its corporate design of the platform also on the career page, with minimalist design and simple navigation.

Just as with the search for music, interested parties can find suitable jobs via the keyword search and can pre-filter them accordingly. In addition, the site uses interesting design elements. For example, the recruiting website alternates between contrasted and blurred elements.

Recruiting Website Example
Spotify's recruiting website

Evaluate recruiting key figures

Once your recruitment websites are ready, the real work begins. Implement analytics on your sites to collect metrics. Some important recruiting KPIs are:

  • Conversion: How many job applications does the site generate ?
  • Impressions: How many people have visited the site?
  • Conversion rate: Ratio of the number of conversions to the number of impressions.
  • The ratio of new to recurring visitors
  • Traffic sources: the origin of your site's visitors
  • Hires: How many candidates are ultimately recruited through the career site channel?

Only when you know your key figures can you measure, evaluate and finally optimize the success of your career site.

As you see, there is a lot to consider if you want to use your website to attract new employees. However, the investment and time is worth it because you are creating an independent portal for recruiting and growth to your team.

Your questions about recruiting websites

What questions do you have about the design of your recruiting websites? Feel free to use the comment function. You want to be informed about new posts on the topic of online marketing? Then follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via our newsletter.

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