Recruiting Myths: “Job Boards understand advertising.”
Ever seen a myth get repeated so many times that you’ve secretly wished it was a person so you could punch it in the face?
Me too. Especially this one.
I’ve read loads of blogs from job boards on how to write a job ad and based on those experiences, I can categorically say without any doubt whatsoever, that most job boards know jack shit about any form of advertising.
They understand job advertising like an electronic goods warehouse understands how computers are made.
What they do understand is how to game their algorithm so that it rewards more visibility to job posts that over-use certain keywords, which ironically just makes them even more unreadable. But it does boost the job board’s own Google ranking for each of those keywords.
Job boards are just warehouses for jobs. They’re in the logistics business, not the marketing business.
If you want proof, go and look at their ad campaigns for their own businesses. Most are laughably bad.
The one exception I can think of is the ‘Love Mondays’ campaign from Reed. And it might not be a coincidence that the only sensible article about job advertising from a job board that I’ve seen was also on Reed. Here it is if you’re curious.
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