Thoughts from a Recruiter…

Does Money Matter?

A few days ago, I wrote my blog about online job boards and the issue of location.  I thought I’d continue on this theme and look at the way in which employers use salary when advertising jobs.

Let me start with a question.

Q – Would you still do your job if your employer did not pay you?

A – errr.. not sure I have to wait for your answer on that one do I!

I think we can fairly say that most of us would not keep doing our normal job without pay.  Except for a few exceptionally wealthy, or perhaps rather strange individuals!  But seriously, how many of you would apply for a job that did not pay the salary you want, or perhaps need, to earn?  I think we can safely conclude it will be very few.  So what has all this got to do with Job Boards.

Let me tell you.  When most job seekers look online for their next role, they have a number of criteria in mind.  Now one of those is location, as I explained in my last blog – The Trouble with Job Boards…

Another, and arguably the big one… is Money.  It’s all about the money.

Now lets just take a step back and think about how Job Boards and internet searching works.  If you read your local paper, it is quite simple to simply flick through the pages, glancing over the adverts which are in your area.  There are probably a couple of pages of them.  It’s quite easy to mentally sift the interesting from the er…. rubbish.  Even if you pick up a specialist trade publication, you only have to turn through a small number of pages to review the roles available to you.

The internet isn’t like that.  In order to write this blog, I had a quick look at Jobsite a couple of minutes ago.  Now I can’t tell you how many live jobs Jobsite have, because Jobsite only tell you they have in excess of 5000 live jobs.  However, to give you an idea, I did a quick search to find 975 adverts were placed in the last 4 hours alone.  That should give you a clue as to how many are on-line.  Another search shows me that over 5000 adverts have been placed today alone.  Now I don’t know about you, but I couldn’t simply glance over 5000 adverts to sift through to the few that interest me.  That’s where the job searching technology gets rather clever.

So, with the very best job boards, they have rather clever search capabilities.  In a few minutes, I can build a search string which will sift through every single job on Jobsite.  This search will tell me the roles which meet my target requirements.  Just a few moments later, I know Jobsite have 388 roles within a 30 mile radius of my home.  And that is only looking at those adverts placed within the past 7 days.  Just to clarify, that is just looking at those roles within my specialist skill sector, Human Resources.

Now here is my question.  Do you think I will narrow down the 388 to the ones that match my salary requirements before glancing through them all?  You bet I will!

So, if this is the case, why oh why would any employer advertise a role without stating a salary range.  The only answer I can come up with is they don’t fully understand the new world of internet based recruitment.

There are a few key criteria which will have a direct effect on the number of applicants you will see.  Salary and location are right there at the top.  So please, if you are thinking about advertising your next vacancy on the internet, make your recruitment budget work for you and do include the salary.

All the best

Jason

September 21, 2010 - Posted by Jason Perry | flat fee recruitment, HR, job boards, online recruitment], Recruitment, Technology, Uncategorized | Jobsite, salary, Show me the money