As more and more marketing moves online, all industries need to be hot on Search Engine Optimisation. In Human Resources, there are some simple SEO tips and tricks to help you attract the right employees when you’re recruiting.
Searching for job listings returns thousands of results. The top of these are usually large job boards, so it can be hard to companies doing their own recruiting to compete. This is where good SEO comes in to help.
Think about creating a careers microsite. Your company website will be targeting your company name and services to rank for. This won’t always match up with relevant search terms for the job you’re trying to fill. A microsite just for jobs listings will rank separately and bring it the right sort of search terms.
Make sure your listings are mobile friendly. Google ranks mobile friendly sites higher than ones that aren’t. It’s a quick win that’s easy to implement.
Plan your keywords. Write any job description with one or two relevant keywords in mind. Don’t be tempted to keyword stuff; the listing still needs to read well to a human being.
Target locally. There’s no point gaining traffic from a city an unreasonable commute away. Build the local area into your search terms to find candidates who can actually reach you.
Create unique content. Writing the 400th job description of the day? You’re probably tempted to copy and paste the same paragraphs about the company, but try to avoid this. Google will recognise and penalise duplicate content.
Create fresh content. Regular updates tells Google you’re offering something new. Even if you don’t have new jobs, why not share company news or a recruitment blog to keep content coming in?
Keep informed. Google regularly updates their algorithms, and the best methods of ranking are always changing. Keep to date with any changes or new requirements. Google always accompany new updates with a guide to go with it, so don’t ignore them.
Don’t forget about expired pages. If a job has been filled, don’t just leave the page to languish. Redirect it to somewhere relevant, like a similar job, or remove the page entirely.
List on Google Jobs. Google collates job information, but you can’t submit jobs to them directly. Instead, you need to format your job listing correctly, and update your sitemap with Google.
Use a short, descriptive URL for job listings. Not only does it look better, but it’s another place to slip in those all important keywords.
Make job listings shareable. These can build those all important backlinks, and helps get your job in front of even more pairs of eyes if people can share the posting with friends they think might be interested.
Promote job listings on social media. Social media doesn’t improve search rankings, but it can increase the click-through rate, which does. It’s also an easy to push the job ad further. You can post job listings on Facebook and LinkedIn where applicants can apply there and then, but you should share on sites like Twitter as well.
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