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Job boards are the email of the recruiting world

Article by Jeff Dickey-Chasins (aka The Job Board Doctor)

New is always better than old. Don't believe me? Take an inventory of articles published in the last 12 months that focus on something new that will 'revolutionize' recruiting and leave all existing technologies/methods/disciplines in shambles. (This of course also applies to pretty much any industry you can think of, be it software, banking, or bagels). The articles always focus on the 'new'. Not the old. 9 out of 10 dentists can't be wrong - right?

Thus the title: job boards are the email of the recruiting world. Here's why:

• Email is old. So are job boards; they've been around since the (gasp!) 1990s. See above comment on the value of new vs. old
• No matter how hard vendors try, email just won't die. Ditto for job boards - they continue to be one of the top 2 sources of external hires for companies....

Read more @ http://www.jobboarddoctor.com/2015/03/17/job-boards-are-the-email-of-the-recruiting-world/

Post a Digital Marketing Job Opening now! - http://www.eMarketingSilo.com

 

Fiction #2: The best place to find a job is on a social networking site

This is an excerpt from Peter Weddle's article, "Three Job Market Fictions"...

Fiction #2: The best place to find a job is on a social networking site.

The conventional wisdom is that social networking sites are now the single best way to find a new or better job. According to pundits, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter have eclipsed if not replaced job boards, traditional face-to-face networking, print publications and career fairs as viable job search resources.

While such hyperbole gets media attention, it is a misinterpretation to think that these sites are all you need to find a job. Social networking is indeed a valuable job search tactic, but it is not the sole technique for conducting a job search or even the most effective. Indeed, for every person who has successfully found a job on a social media site, there are literally hundreds of others who have found employment using other tools.

In my 2010 Source of Employment survey, for example, we had almost 1900 people tell us that the single best way to find a job was by using a job board. Answering a job posting or archiving a resume on such a site was selected by over 28 percent of the respondents. The second highest response was a tip from a friend at 9.6 percent, followed by a newspaper ad at 8.4 percent, a call from a headhunter at 7.1 percent and a referral by an employee of the company at 6.4 percent.

Does that mean you should ignore social media sites? Absolutely not. But, take the chatter about the power of these sites with a grain of salt and use all of the tools at your disposal. Today's job market is the toughest in years, and you simply don't know which resource will end up working best for you. The key to success, therefore, is to play the odds and use every single one of them.

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Since 1996, WEDDLE's has conducted ground-breaking surveys of recruiters, job seekers and Web-sites providing employment-related services on the Internet.  Its findings and other research have been cited in such publications as The Wall Street Journal, Money, Fortune, and Inc. magazines and on national television and radio shows, including CBS This Morning, The Today Show and Bloomberg Financial News.

Am I Obligated to Respond to Blatently Unqualified Job Seekers?

I often hear job seekers complain about the amount of calls/emails they receive from recruiters pitching opportunities that don't align with their background nor stated objectives.  Folks who have their profiles/resumes publicly available tend to receive a higher amount of these solicitations.  I would agree it is rather spammy and annoying to receive work-at-home opportunities, door-to-door sales gigs, or insurance sales opportunities, especially when you're senior management and are very clear in your job seeker profile the type of work you're seeking.

Just as those folks don't like to receive unrelated job opportunities, I don't like to receive applications from obviously very unqualified job seekers.  I'm not talking borderline here; I'm talking about resumes from people where if I circulated the job description and their resumes to all my colleagues in the office (or every passerby outside on the sidewalk), every one of them would quickly and easily reach the conclusion these applicants are not a fit for my advertised job.  To job seekers who fall into this group... What are you thinking?

Some of these people even have the audacity to follow up and complain about not getting a return call or email.  I make a point to try to follow up with folks who reach out to me, but it's extremely difficult to do so when I have to sort through all of this applicant spam!  If you're currently flipping burgers at McDonald's (and that's your only job experience), I'm not going to give you the courtesy of a reply when you waste my time sending a resume in response to very clear job requirements on an advertisement for an Embedded Software Engineer with medical device experience.

I don't mind receiving unsolicited resumes.  In fact, I want to hear about people currently in the job market, or even better, someone who is contemplating a career move.  However, applying to one of my jobs you're not qualified for is not proper protocol.  I typically include specific instructions in my advertisements for those applying for the posted job and those who don't feel they are qualified but would like to send me their resume to file for future consideration.  It's amazing how many folks can't follow instructions.  Didn't we all learn how to do this in elementary school?

OK, I'm finished with my weekending rant.  Is it time for a beer?  Have a good one all!

Job Seekers Take Weekends Off, Too!

As we all know, the standard work week for most folks in the US runs Monday thru Friday.  Saturdays and Sundays are typically filled with personal activities away from the workplace (family time, hobbies, chores, relaxation, etc..).  Time spent "working for the man" drastically declines over the weekends.

What about the people who find themselves in the unfortunate position of being unemployed?  What does their time break-down look like?  As any career or outplacement service will tell you, searching for that next job should become a full-time endeavor.  Many suggest aligning your job search day as you would have scheduled your work day.  From looking at the stats on our job board (http://www.eMarketingSilo.com), it appears folks take this advice to heart.  We can see a fairly prevalent historical trend in regard to activity from job seekers...  Job Views drop by almost 75% on the weekends!

Now, I'm not aware of any company nor Job Board who turns their servers and computer systems off over the weekend.  One can still login, view and submit an application to job postings on Saturdays and Sundays.

Advertising Your Resume via Google Adwords

A while back I created a LinkedIn poll to see how many job seekers are utilizing paid search as a tool to advertise their credentials (whether a direct link to their resume, business profile, website, blog, etc..).  As you can see from the results, not many folks had ever used this medium to promote themselves to potential employers or recruiters (see - http://polls.linkedin.com/p/17507/ifpjb)

We run Adsense ads across our eMarketingSilo job board and recruiting center.  I happened to glance over at the ad box to see this...

  Dale does a very nice job with both the content of his ad as well as his landing page.  Clean, crisp web page containing links to his resume in 3 different formats (pdf, doc, rtf).  Additionally, his contact info is very prominent above the fold.  I also like the LinkedIn profile button that follows the page.  To avoid a long scrolling page, Dale has segmented his *resume* into 4 pages with corresponding menu items at the top.

Nice Job Dale, and way to think outside of the box!

Job Board Expectations, from a Candidate's Perspective

We recently surveyed our registered jobseeker community (thank you to all who took the time to respond).  Most folks had great things to say about eMarketingSilo (much appreciated); however, there were a few "additional thoughts" I wanted to highlight and perhaps clarify in case others have the same misconceptions about job boards (not just ours).

"A candidate comes to a job site with a lot of expectation. In this era, the candidate feels this online job search engine is the most efficient and most effective. A job site, hence, should be capable to find the right job for the right person, in a limited time. Typically every person coming here should end up with a relatively satisfied job in a satisfied time period."

Well, that's certainly an optimistic view to embrace, but hardly an accurate one.  First of all, we're not finding jobs for people.  There aren't enough resources in the world for us to commit to actively spending our days tracking down unique, individualized jobs for each and every one of you.  We run a recruiting service as well, and we don't find jobs for people in that department either (we find people for jobs, not the other way around; so if you're seeking out the services of a recruiter to find you a job, you'd better be an A-player, very unique, and very inactive in a job search; otherwise, that recruiter isn't going to spend any time marketing you.  A good recruiter will have the cajones to tell you that).  If you want me to find you a job, I can certainly consider doing that, but it'll be a heck of a time commitment on my end, and I'm going to charge you for it. (It's amazing how disgruntled some folks can be when they're utilizing a FREE service). Or perhaps a better alternative would be for you to hire a career coach.

"Have not received a single quality lead from your site."

I'm assuming you're referring to an employer contacting you about your resume?  Because we have over 1,000 jobs listed on our site.  If none of them is a fit for you, nor are you interested in any of the postings, well, there's a disconnect we have no power to change.  And again, we're not manufacturing jobs here (which in this current economy, fewer employers are actually creating any).  If an employer or recruiter isn't interested in your skill set at this time, we can't control that.

The purpose and mission of our job site is to collect opportunity and try to facilitate the connection of market supply to market demand.  Notice I said "help facilitate", not actually hold your hand and walk you to your next place of employment.  We can't control what skill sets the market (employers) are going to demand, nor can we control if you possess any of those marketable skills.  I can understand frustration on your end if you haven't landed a job in over 12 months (which a couple respondents checked), but anonymously (well, you thought you were anonymous, but I know who you are), flaming us for events outside our control isn't going to help you.  However, if you'd like to reach out to me personally in a constructive way, I'll spend 30 minutes with you to see if I can lend assistance/advice in your job search, but be prepared to hear the brutal truth... because I won't hesitate to lay it out there.

Do Andy Beal and Lee Odden know each other?

I wonder if Andy Beal (Trackur/MarketingPilgrim) and Lee Odden (TopRankMarketing) bumped into each other at the airport in Vegas.  The Affiliate Summit West is taking place this week out there.  Andy is giving a presentation on Reputation Management, and I'm not sure if Lee has any formal speaking engagements or not (actually I just noticed a Twitter post about speaking at 3:15 about Online Brand Management for affiliates, networks, and merchants).  I follow both of them on Twitter.  They're fairly active commenters. Both reported landing at the airport within moments of each other.  I've been trying to get them involved with our Broadcast Partner Affiliate program, but they're ignoring me.  Our Career Center platform and job search advice for internet marketing professionals would be a unique informational category for both of them, (as well as most internet marketing blogs out there).  That's the whole point of possessing skills and knowledge in this field.... TO MAKE MONEY BY WORKING DIRECTLY FOR EMPLOYERS OR CLIENTS.  Yet, most people who write/blog/Tweet in this field do very little to help their fellow marketers in this area.

Electronic Communication and Short Fuses

I've never sent out a mass unsolicited emailing promoting sex, online pharmacies, penile enlargement or any other scam that we can all probably agree would fall under the category of SPAM.  The lists I do maintain are opt-in.  I even hesitate to email folks I have an existing business relationship with.  Now, I'm not omniscient when it comes to knowing one's preferred method of communication.  I, for one, hold email as my personal preferred method of communication.  I'd rather get a "cold" email from someone than a "cold" call.  I've never flagged an inquiry from someone as SPAM, nor have I sent them a flaming email of displeasure in return.  I can't understand doing that in this day and age.

One of the first things I do in the morning as part of my daily routine is browse recent resume postings at Monster and other databases to which I subscribe.  I assume that folks posting their resume to places such as these are active in a job search and open to receiving contacts about job opportunities (in fact, their user agreement with Monster states they should be open to getting emails in regard to their resume).  This morning I came across a gentleman in the Los Angeles area who is an Online Product Manager.  Well, I know that we have current opportunities in his area posted on our website.  So, I proceeded to email him about these opportunities.  In Monster, candidates have the ability to state their preferred method of contact (either email or phone).  This person didn't state a preferrence.  Later in the day, this is what I received back from him:

Remove this email address from your spam lists. Federal law mandates that all junk email have an opt out option, which you have failed to provide. Do not continue to send unsolicited spam mail to this address.

http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/business/ecommerce/bus61.shtm

Huh?  Did he not read my email or understand why I contacted him?  I even found his LinkedIn profile where he stated he was open to receiving job opportunities.  So now, I'm assuming he flagged my email as SPAM with Yahoo.  Am I going to be blacklisted and have all future emails to yahoo domain emails bounce?  I don't know.  I'm wondering if I should call him to clarify or just let things be.

New Affiliate Program at eMarketingSilo

We recently launched an affiliate program through ShareASale.  Affiliates can earn 10% of referred sales (standard 30-day job posting retails for $135).  Folks can also earn $.50 per user who registers and submits a resume.  Things can start to add up very quickly for you!

We're working on integrating our jobs feed widget to contain affiliate tracking code.  In the meantime, we have some logos and text links you can utilize.  We'll be adding more as they are created.  SO, if you have a blog or website that attracts the internet/digital marketing crowd, then this would be a great program for you to passively promote.  If you want to get more active, simply look at who's posting ads for search marketing positions on other boards and make a simple phone call to the HR department or hiring manager.  What we offer is a no-brainer to most folks and a fairly easy sell.  Monster charges $395 for a single posting.  We're providing a lot more value with a targeted service to both active and passive prospects.  Our board solicits and publishing more specialized internet marketing jobs than any other service.  Many compelling reasons to use our service can be found on our website.  Be sure to refer to them in your sales pitch!

Sign Up Now! - http://www.shareasale.com/shareasale.cfm?merchantID=19268

"Google Dance" and History-Changing Updates

There's a couple questions I typically ask to gauge an SEO's depth of knowledge and experience.  However, I'm thinking about dropping them as I rarely get the answers I'm looking for.  I mean, they're not relevant at all to today's search environment, so why ask them??  I don't hold it against anyone if they don't know the answers.  They're subjective questions anyways.  This new generation of SEO folks doesn't seem to have an appreciation for history (kind of like the early twenty-something bartender I was chatting with a while back who had never heard of Poison, Motley Crue, or even Guns 'n Roses)

1.)  Pre-Everflux-- Google used to go through monthly update cycles (~ every 36 days) where they would typically do a deep crawl of a website and then update their datacenters (over the course of 4-6 days).  SERPs would change shortly afterward.  In a nutshell, sites would typically keep the same rankings for various keywords for a whole month.  Not much movement in between.  What was this monthly activity called?

Answer: Google Dance, See: The Google Dance Finally Explained; How many of you have a Google Dance Tool bookmarked in your browser?

1b.)  How did the folks at WebmasterWorld name these monthly cycles?

Answer: they named them similar to how the weather people named hurricanes, they went down the alphabet, assigning names as the updates occurred.

2.)  If you had to pick a defining moment in search engine history, when SERP rankings were turned upside down for many weeks and there were obvious big changes going on with the algorithm, what would that moment be?

Answer I'm seeking: The Florida Update of November 2003 (yeah, if you were a consultant at this time, it was a rough holiday season that lasted through the winter before things started settling down; see: Google's "Florida" Update, What Really Happened; Also see: Florida Update, Unprecidented nervousness, rage