i have two clients within the recruitment market – and they’re on the
opposite poles too: financial and construction. Now after reviewing the
year with both we came to the same conclusion. Online-only approach
does not work. Or maybe it would work if you had unlimited funds to pay
for SEO and SEM campaigns, AdWords and pay absolutely HEAPS for SE
positioning. But in the cost-effective small business world, having a
site with joblistings – and don’t get me wrong, all interactive with
loads of jobs and as current as possible – and advertising in industry
papers/magazines seems to be the most effective combination.
Which
came as a bit of a surprise, we all look for jobs online, innit? And
after an industry moves online (as we’ve seen with most shopping,
travel, flights…) it stays online? Well recruitment seems to have
moved online and stayed in print just as well. Now I’m not sure i can
explain the phenomenon, in my opinion it could have something to do
with the printed word still carrying some weight, or with the fact that
most of professionals (apart from IT/Marketing) are still reading
papers instead of online-papers and blogs, and thus advertising in
print still yields good results.
As i said, i won’t attempt an explanation, however i thought that our findings might interest some of you guys.
For
both companies the best results were obtained after slight rebranding -
nothing fancy, just bringing the company’s corporate look a bit up to
date. Careful competitor research, bit of market research and putting
together paper ads – then analysing what worked and what didn’t. So in
the end the advert served as a teaser to look for ‘more’ on the
website, and the website had to make sure it had ‘more’ and it all
worked just fine… Classic marketing, innit?
So next time someone
offers to put you on top of Google listing for ‘jobs’ for gazillions,
sit back and consider advertising in two of the industry papers. Seems
to work…