Your Job Posting Needs SEO to be Found: How to Do It
Looking for hires? If your job posting isn’t optimized to be found, you’re not going to find them. We’re going to share how to use SEO to find what you need.
It’s the bane of all employers and recruiters. Good employees are hard to find.
You’ve placed job postings everywhere. All the job site. On Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. You’ve not even ruled out job posting on Craigslist or going down the local diner to post on a cork board.
You’ve cold called, hot called, re-called. You only catch the bottom of the barrel, if that.
Don’t settle for the bottom of the barrel. Your business and clients deserve much better.
One of the areas where HR recruiters struggle when it comes to job posting, is SEO. It’s an oft-neglected or even outright ignored area of job recruiting know-how.
The crazy thing about SEO is that if you’re not on the first page of a search result, your chances of being found are slim.
The top listing in Google’s organic search results only gets 33% of traffic on that result. The percentage goes down with each successive result position. By result fifteen, the percentage goes down to practically zero.
So, you want your job posting to be as close to the top as possible. This is why you need to optimize your job posting for the web.
Get Into the Meta Title
Your SEO should start with the title of your post. The “meta title” is what appears both in the search engine and in the tab at the top of the browser.
You only have seventy characters to do this in. Even less in some cases.
You want to make your meta title as short and sweet as possible. This is where a large amount of the SEO magic happens.
Job posting meta titles should tell the person searching exactly what you are looking for. If you’re recruiting for a CNA position, CNA should be one of the major keywords.
Also, avoid gimmicky titles. Nobody is going to search for “super nurse” when they are looking for a Pediatric Nursing position.
Take Care of The Body
It’s the central portion of your posting. It shouldn’t be long and overstuffed. But it needs to be long enough.
It contains the job description, which company is posting, qualifications and other information. Keep it neat and to the point. Include the keywords you chose above.
Google’s search algorithm looks more and more for quality over quantity every day. Google’ goal is to deliver quality search results that include no spam.
You want the body to be quality. Keep it short enough. 500 words should be sufficient to convey all you need.
You want people to get the gist of the position quickly. Make sure the text is spaced appropriately. And no long blocks of text. You don’t want people coming to your page saying “TL;DR” and leaving.
Go Mobile
It’s the late 2010’s already and you still find websites that aren’t mobile-friendly. It’s crazy that you still have to go to a desktop to change certain settings on your PayPal account. Paypal is known for its mobile capabilities, but even they are a little behind the times.
Make your content mobile friendly. If someone wants to send their friend your job posting over text or Messenger, they need to be confident the other person will be able to read it. You are solely responsible for providing that capability.
Plus, Google’s algorithm awards a SERP boost to mobile friendly sites.
It’s a double benefit to you. People will be able to read your content everywhere. And it will help with your ranking on search engines.
Remember The Others
CNA. Certified Nursing Assistant. Hospice Nurse. Nursing Home CNA. Depending on what job the posting is looking to fill will determine how many smaller or “other” keywords you want to include in the job posting.
Make a list and check it twice. Do you know all the synonyms for the job you’re posting about?
Do your research. Find out all that the job entails and think of the people who might be searching.
Include keywords from various duties and skills associated with the job.
If it involves working with a social media platform, include the name of the platform. If it involves cooking Hispanic food, include “Hispanic food” in the post.
But be careful. Don’t keyword stuff you posting. You want it to be informative, precise and optimized.
Don’t Forget to Get Social
Social Media is the amplifier of the net. It sends your signal farther and faster than any other platform out there. The speed at which your signal travels depends on how well you present your material.
Social media links may or may not change SERP, but it will give you exposure otherwise unavailable.
You want engagement. You want people to share. You want people to “Like” and “+1” your content.
Here is where you might be able to get away with something catchy. Just don’t go overboard with it.
You might have a little more creativity with social, but it’s still good to stay professional. You are hiring professionals. Remember that.
Backlink-It
Backlinks are like high-level connections in the real world. A lot of success in real life depends on your connections to people who hold all the cards.
It’s very similar with SEO and SERP. Google looks at your site’s connections to help determine where you end up in the ranking.
If high-quality sites link back to your post, then you’re more likely to have a higher SERP.
You can get the link to your site out there by posting on job boards, relevant niche sites, and your own site or blog.
You can also make connections by find relevant, reputable sites that might want mutual benefit from backlinks. The whole “I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine” thing is an excellent way to grow your network and create lasting relationships online.
Help Is On The Way
If you still need help with making your job posting SEO friendly, OptiJob is here to help. With us, you can dominate SERP, be more social, and totally go mobile with ease.
It’s never too late to start optimizing your job posting. Don’t give up. And keep recruiting.