The responses to the recent poll on LinkedIn:
When presented with a good IT candidate not available locally, would you do the phone interview?
Show that the phone interview is the way to start the interviewing process. Still, the majority of the recruiters would fly the top candidate in for the last round of the interview before the job offer is made.
You can see the results and put your vote here:
Did you hear Google released a major update to Penguin 2 on Friday? Matt Cutts (the head of Google’s Webspam team) recently confirmed on his blog that Penguin 2.0 is now live.
So let’s see how did the Google Penguin 2 update affect our Irish online recruitment industry. Here is the search result page for the word “Jobs” made in Google.ie.
Make sure if you do this search yourself that you are not logged in into Google yourself, have removed the Google cookie, etc – so that you do not see the Google’s “Personalised” search result for you.
Here is the new google.ie ranking for the search word “jobs”:
So what can we conclude from the list of the sites that a are on the first page for the phrase jobs? By comparing what we have used to see there before the Google Penguin 2 update we can see what sites have been affected. Let’s start with the sites not affected by the update:
The SAON Group web sites leading with the purchased Jobs.ie site on top and their original IrishJobs.ie is steadily on top.
Nothing changed there for years. In fact may years. The last change there actually when Jobs.ie overtook IrishJobs.ie. If my memory serves me correctly that was towards the end of 2005. Very shortly after that IrishJobs.ie bought Jobs.ie.
So since 2005 the first two search results for the search for “jobs” have not changed in Ireland. So is Google doing much really with all these Panda, Penguin & Penguin 2 “updates”? Well in the last 7 years the results on top are not changing at all. Or does IrishJobs.ie & Jobs.ie have so good SEO specialists to keep them on top for all these years? It must be one of those.
The next three slots are Findajob.ie (aka LoadzaJobs.ie), Indeed.ie and Monster.ie. So what’s new here? Nothing much really in relation to the Google Penguin 2 update. Long term there isn’t much that has changed in here in the last 10 years really. What has changed is that Loadza has changed its domain name several times. They cannot seem to get it right really. EmployIreland.com that was 4th there is replaced by Indeed.ie about a year or more ago when they came to our market. Monster is the 5th recruitment web site there for the last 10 years.
So in essence the top 5 results for the word “jobs” haven’t changed at all in the last Google Penguin 2 update.
Where the changes that did occur are on the bottom part of the search page. That is the space that in the last 10 years have been occupied mostly by the Irish start-up job boards or similar sites. FAS was always there somewhere. They did rebrand to SOLAS, but forgot to do it online. Hence FAS.ie is still there. Good old civil servants…
So what the Google Penguin 2 update did affect is the last 4 remaining slots the search results page fro the word “jobs”. You can say Google hasn’t changed much really. What we are going to look at is if the Google Penguin 2 update was good actually. Or is it a step back in the quality of the search results?
The bottom of the page of the search results for jobs has been occupied by start-up job boards. It always was a dynamic space. In the last 10 year, about 100 web sites appeared and disappeared from there. I can remember the first Irish Jobs Aggregator IrishJobs.ie featuring there, and a long list of the site showing Irish jobs listings. There was one recruitment agency that made up there – in 2010 when the CPL.ie new web site was released. In this new update, CPL.ie dropped to 128 places, while their other site CPLJobs.com landed on a much better 53rd slot. Is there a hint that CPL.ie got hit by the Google Penguin 2 update? Most likely from the way it is ranking now.
It is still quite strange that no other recruitment agency got listed on the first page for the word “jobs” there ever, isn’t it?
So what did Google Penguin 2 update replaced the Irish start-ups with?
Ie.Jobrapido.com – one job aggregator. Well, it is the only .com web site here. It actually does have jobs aggregated from sites like freelancer.com and similar. Some Irish recruitment agencies as well. The overall quality of the jobs advertised (content) if poor. A large number of jobs are taken down from the sites they are originally published on anyway, and the whole set of jobs is a really poor representation of the list of active jobs in Ireland. In essence a really poor experience for a job seeker.
JobsToday.ie – a UK newspaper publisher. Note that any link you click on that site it brings you to their UK web site (.co.uk). This results-driven by the backlinks from their newspaper releases is so wrong that it actually reminds of the Yahoo style paid search result placements from the end of the last century. It is pointless and out of place. It is no good to a Google visitor. There are simply a handful of jobs listed there on some UK newspaper web site.
Twitter.com/jobs – The page with the HTML Title: Jobs at “Twitter –San Francisco”. San Francisco??? A search result to someone looking for a job in Ireland in Google.ie? Google? Don’t you have a Google Maps division? Or do you want us all to emigrate? What’s the story there? What kind of a (crap) search result is that? Or did the Google Penguin 2 algorithm value a social media sites results “a bit” too much so the results from the social media are going to creep into any search we make?
So to conclude what have the Google Penguin 2 update brought us? It removed Irish start-ups and replaced them with what can be the best described irrelevant search results. In their own vocabulary, they call it SPAM. Luckily for us, this only affects the bottom part of the page. The “under the fold” stuff. The top part of the page wasn’t affected by the latest update.
How did your site ranking feature in the Google Penguin 2 update last week? If you are stuck give the SEO Consultant a shout!
Great Recruitment Advertising Workshop event organised by Stephen Harrington Recruitment Manager: Sales | Marketing | Multi-Lingual @ Allen Recruitment. Here is the original announcement:
When and Where:
Aviva Stadium, Lansdowne Road, Dublin 4 – Vavasour Suite, registration at main reception.
Wednesday 24th April, from 8.45 to 11.30am
Enter via entrance A on Lansdowne Road
Car park is situated on Lansdowne Road
Who is attending?
Confirmed attendees include Jonathan Campbell (Social Talent), James Mailley (Monster), Jennifer Bray Kennedy (TMP), Ivan Stojanovic (Jobsboard.ie), Lynne Rooney (LinkedIn) and many more from many or Irelands best known companies.
The Format
We will run two sessions, in each one there will be four discussions happening at the same time. There will be no presentations, each discussion will be started by the discussion leader but after that, the conversation will go where ever the participants want it to. You can join in at any time by providing details of your own experiences or asking questions. If you find that one discussion is not so relevant to you, you can simply get up and join another one mid-way through!
The agenda:
8.45-9.10 Registration, Tea/Coffee and Pastries
9.10-9.20 Welcome by Brian Cunningham, MD Allen Recruitment
Session 1
Job Boards
When to use job boards, which ones should you use, quality applicant’s v quantity, filtering applicants?
Career Websites
Effectively advertising on your own careers site, employer branding, SEO, getting candidates on to your site
Alternatives to advertising
Searching for candidates directly (Boolean, xray etc), referrals, networking, job board databases
Start your own discussion
This is a break out area where anyone is free to start another topic that is relevant to them!
Tea/Coffee
Session 2
Job Boards
Getting the most from these, how people find jobs on job boards, getting your jobs to the top of the lists
Advertising Master class
How to measure success, getting your adverts noticed, the psychology behind advertising, what we can take from advertising in other industries and apply to recruitment.
Referral’s and Networking
Referrals, Networking, social networks & Talent Pooling
Start your own discussion
This is a break out area where anyone is free to start another topic that is relevant to them!
Well done again and thanks for the Allen Recruitment “cube”!
Here is a new job for the Recruitment Consultant advertised by the SAON Group (IrisJobs.ie):
Resourcer/Recruitment Consultant
Saongroup operates online recruitment websites for recruiters and career seekers across four continents – Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas – and websites live in 29 countries. The Group also includes Candidate Manager, a leading provider of recruitment management software. Saongroup.com has been headquartered in Dublin, Ireland since its foundation in 1995.
In March, Irishjobs.ie and Jobs.ie launched a new service, TalentScout, which in addition to advertising vacancies on www.irishjobs.ie and www.jobs.ie now gives their large corporate client base access to a Headhunting and Candidate Filtering service.
Due to the successful launch and client reaction to TalentScout we are now looking to expand the team and we feel that this position would be well suited to a candidate who is currently employed as a Recruitment Consultant. This is an excellent opportunity to progress your career with Saongroup, a company that is internationally recognised as a Market Leader in the online recruitment space. The role offers an excellent commission and bonus structure with a rapid path to promotion for the right candidate.
Job responsibilities:-
Skills required:
| Location | Dublin 2 (Dublin Centre, IE) | |
| Payment | Not Disclosed | |
| Category | HR / Recruitment, Sales – €35k+ | |
| Terms | Permanent, Full-time | |
| Last updated | 15/04/2013 | |
| Contact | Denise Hannon |
My Adecco goodies arrived in the post today thanks to the good people of Adecco Ireland.
Thanks, this will get my “iPhone 6” safe!
What is a recruitment conference? We all know the answer to that. It is a large meeting where a number of people (one by one) speak to the group. There are short breaks in between speakers, for the people get a coffee and network.
Who comes to the conference?
Speakers – are people presenting. Salespeople presenting how their solutions, products or services changed the industry for the better.
Delegates – people who sit, listen, take notes and have coffee in the breaks. Delegates are quite often people who are looking for a new job. They look around what else is there. Some attendees are there because they are sent there by their employers. They have to attend one or two of those a year. You can see them leaving quickly after the last presentation, to catch some time off for an afternoon shopping or something alike.
What is Recruitment Unconference?
Recruitment Unconference is a gathering of recruiters with the social media rules applied. There are no speakers. There are no delegates. Just recruiters who can behave as they do in the social media: lead conversations, contribute, listen, move to another room/topic, network or just have a coffee. Yes, there is a coffee here as well!
It is list Facebook or Twitter really. Everyone can talk about anything they want to really. Everyone can listen (follow/connect) whoever they choose. Anyone can comment, contribute and even ‘take over’ the conversation. Anyone can change the topic. Anyone can. And everyone is invited to do exactly that! Everyone is asked to contribute. Everyone’s opinion is asked for in a discussion on every topic he is physically present at.
Now that we know what the Recruitment Unconference is, let’s check on how the most popular one actually functions in the recruitment industry. This brings us to its founder @BillBoorman and his unconference events taking place around the globe. They are called TRU for The Recruitment Unconference. After the three characters, there is a name of the city or country the event is in. So you have TRULondon, TRUDublin and similar. If an event is held multiple times in the same city the name also gets a number Like TruDublin4. This is to form a hashtag for Twiter. Why is Twitter important? Well, the usual ways of communication like email and phone are one to one or one to many (mailing lists). The Unconference is different because everyone is welcomed to contribute. So social media is a place to look for any info (or post any info!) about the recruitment unconference.
Since the recruiters who attend the unconference are (in most cases) the natural users of the social media, they post their thoughts especially on the Twitter, as it is the fastest channel, in real-time during the unconference. They all use the hashtag so it is really simple to follow what anyone is tweeting about. That usually is a reflection on what is spoken about. You can usually follow multiple discussions from the same conference at the same time. What is the best about it is that anyone on Twitter can contribute to those discussions by using the same unconference hashtag. This makes the discussions leave the room and go out to social media. There the discussions get the life of their own.
The format that Bill has made for this TRU events is the following. There is a quick opening. The bigger the conference the quicker it is, since the larger the crowd is the harder it is to keep them quiet. Remember those are not your Delegates. These people are here to participate.
Tracks
Bill usually announces the tracks (topics) that will be discussed in different rooms. He also announces who is the track leader for each topic. That is usually an expert in that field. Or a recruiter who wants to share the recent experience with some new tool used for the recruitment, and ask for feedback. Depending on the size of the unconference there are usually 3 tracks running in parallel. They are held in separate rooms. Anyone can choose any track and even move to another track whenever they choose. Bill himself would for example move quite often from a track to track, hopping from a conversation to another and contributing to each one he hops in. Sometimes he would also bring the relevant points being made in another track that is happening in parallel.
As social media is not for everyone, the recruitment unconference is not for everyone as well. Some people prefer to be delegates rather than to participate. Social is not for everyone. The anti-social or traditional conference is not for everyone as well. People discovered they can apply the social media rules to the conference and that some types of conferences the social conference or the unconference is a much better format. Hence the recruitment unconference TRU that @BillBoorman started 5 years ago in London has spread to a long list of counties on different continents. Recruiters themselves found the unconference format to work better than the speaker-delegate format. Not all of the recruiters that is. But the recruiters that understood the social media and found the way how to use it for recruitment.
The #TRU in the City near YOU!
The recruitment unconference, the #TRU will come to the city near you if it didn’t already. You will not find a flyer in your post with a list of fabulous speakers. There is not even a list of delegates. To be honest not even flashing your own business card is a welcome gesture. Connection on LinkedIn and Facebook or Follow on Twitter is on the other hand. If you are a delegate type, trust me, it’s not for you. Where you will find about #TRU is in the social media channels, and there only. On Bill’s Blog as well. And from there to hashtags on Twitter. While I am writing this the #TruHelsinki is on right now. Guess what it is all on social media in real-time as well. You can follow it here: https://twitter.com/#!/search/?q=%23TruHelsinki&src=hash.
If you like what you see there we will see you soon at #TRU. If not, that’s OK too.
In the Links are the currency on the web we looked at the total number of links no the web that the Link Count tool from SEOmoz would show for our 20 recruitment agency web sites. But not all the links are equal. The more I think about it, it would be fair to say that no two links are the same. One (smart) way thinking about the links is to count just the web sites that link to your web site. So if there are 2 or 2 million links from some domain to your web site it would still count as one.
If we look at our 29 recruitment agency web sites list and www.JobsBlog.ie between them where is what we get:
The results show that only 5 Irish Recruitment agencies have more web sites linking to them than this blog. If you want your jobs to be seen by as many possible job seekers and as many possible clients (employers) it would be natural to want to bring visitors from as many sites to your site. Therefore having as many web sites linking to your site would help you get more candidates and clients. As simple as that. The above table show how good are you at that particular task. If your site is not on the list, you can get this figure for your site and compare yourself with the competition.
Even more important than this direct traffic of visitors that you get from other sites is the fact that from the perspective of the search engines like Google, your site the more “important” the more web sites link to your site. So the more links you have to your site – the more likely is that Google will display any content on your site above the similar content on any other web site. This is extremely important for the ranking of your jobs. When a similar job is advertised on many job boards and recruitment agency web sites, the site that will get listed on top is very often the one that has the most links from other web sites.
How to get more links to your web site?
Submitting your site to an online directory? – that is the most common answer I get when I do the Recruitment SEO Training. Unfortunately, the answer is always – no. Why not? The practise was abused and Google decides to in most cases ignore it, and in some cases even penalize it.
Just do not buy links. Please. – That is what Google would say, and in my experience, this is the best advice possible in most cases.
Spamming social media with your links. – Will make sure you get ignored, not followed by anyone but bots. Again the time and money the drain.
SO WHAT THEN?
Think about what links do you click at on the web.
You might click on a link in the article you are reading on some site. If you are reading a review on some blog, about the new tool the LinkedIn has launched, and there is a link to that tool within the article – you might click it. Ask yourself how did that article ended up on a publication you are reading? Can you submit your content there? With a link to something new and cool on your web site? If you are thinking of PR submissions at this stage, I can tell you, you are on the wrong track. Think of guest blog posts. Think of the places where different people publish content. You are probably getting where I am going with this… yes the combined name of all such sites is Social Media.
Imagine the following scenario:
First in Google for your keyword!
Your web site has one page, and the site is with that page linked first for your main keyword. One would say this is the search engine optimisation done very well. The site is first for its keyword. What else can one ask for?
First in Google for all your keywords!
When will realise there are multiple keywords your site need to be first for in Google searches. One page will not make it easier. You will create one page for each keyword. It usually starts with the page for ‘Clients’ and ‘Job Seekers’. You will optimise each of those pages to get on top of Google searches for your search keyword of the search phrase. Most recruitment agencies would naturally want to be ranked on top for the phrase “Recruitment Agency” – to attract Clients. Then there are similar keywords targeted to Job Seekers like “Jobs in IT”, or whatever your agency specialises in. If you get first for those search keywords – have you done your SEO good? Of course, you are first in Google for all your main keywords.
Highly ranked in Google for every single one of your jobs, pages and blog posts (and having tons of them!)
In this scenario, you are not really first for search phrases like the usual hot one “Recruitment Agency”. Instead, all your jobs are on top or close to the top for ANY relevant keyword to that job. You cannot really define what keywords you are highly ranked for since it depends on what jobs you have advertised on your site at that time.
If you don’t have jobs in a particular industry, or for some reason, they don’t rank as well as your competition, you write blogs about those industries. In essence, what you are doing is you are creating more content and publishing it on more pages on your web site. Those new pages then start ranking for the keywords you are writing about. What you are doing is you are saturation Google index and the Google search results pages with your entries. This enables you to capture traffic for any search phrase you are interested in. Your web site becomes an inbound marketing platform that is quite simple to use. Need some Java developers? Just write about the Java development on your site. Get that content in Google index, and anyone searching for Java Development will see your site listed in the Google search results. If you write interesting articles and they are nicely presented in the search results – anyone looking for a Java development will come to your site!
This is what I call Google Saturation. It is a process of submitting the content on your web site to Google, for various search phrases you are interested in. Notice the difference between the top two scenarios. We don’t have the ”Main Keyword(s)” we want to rank for on top of the search engines.
The table below shows the Google Saturation of 29 recruitment agency web sites and www.JobsBlog.ie as a marker. The number next to each web site shows the total number of pages Google has from each web site.
Note that this table is the first on in this Recruitment SEO series that show really drastic differences between the 29 randomly chosen recruitment agency web sites.
By looking at your web site visitors logs in a program like Google Analytics you will notice that even linked first for your most important keyword it still delivers traffic that is a very small percentage of your total visitor’s traffic from Google for all the other keywords combined. If you have a high Google Saturation – meaning hundreds of thousands of pages featured in the Google search results, the traffic for your main 10 most important keywords brings less than 1% of your total traffic! And as such, the ranking for one individual keyword becomes irrelevant to the overall traffic of the whole site. If you want to make a success in capturing the largest possible amount of free traffic, this is definitely the route to go. Think big! THINK BIG!
Google Saturation is one of the key factors of SEO. It is also the most often ignored one.
Search engine optimisation is in essence a huge amount of statistical analysis and a lot of trials and errors. There is not book about it, since by the time it gets printed it is completely outdated. There are two SEO Rules:
Content is King
Links are the currency on the web
Nothing else matters as much to your web site ranking as the content you have on your site and the links from other web sites to your site. If you get those two things right – you will get the free traffic from the search engines. Relevant traffic – people searching for what your web site text copy is about.
We looked at the Google PR, MozRank and Alexa rank of the 29 recruitment agencies. Today we will look at the links towards those 29 web sites. The numbers next to each recruitment agency web site show the total number of links found on the web pointing to each domain. The more links to it – the more search engines ‘Like’ the domain, and hence show it’s web pages higher in the search engine results.
This site JobsBlog.ie is within them again as a tracker for performance.
|
URL |
SEOmoz Link Count |
| www.hays.ie | 117643 |
| www.cpl.ie | 59629 |
| www.morganmckinley.ie | 34688 |
| www.eolas.ie | 8333 |
| www.brightwater.ie | 6766 |
| www.jobsblog.ie | 6552 |
| www.peoplegroup.ie | 4235 |
| www.hudson.ie | 3357 |
| www.careerwise.ie | 2689 |
| www.3qrecruitment.ie | 1707 |
| www.Sigmar.ie | 1630 |
| www.hrm.ie | 1453 |
| www.EdenRecruitment.ie | 766 |
| www.rftgroup.ie | 580 |
| www.collinsmcnicholas.ie | 578 |
| www.icds.ie | 539 |
| www.frsrecruitment.com | 491 |
| www.qedrecruitment.ie | 358 |
| www.accountancysolutions.ie | 318 |
| www.Recruiters.ie | 305 |
| www.gempool.ie | 189 |
| www.Stelfox.ie | 187 |
| www.recruitmentplus.ie | 177 |
| www.Vantage.ie | 149 |
| www.harmonics.ie | 141 |
| www.solasconsulting.ie | 110 |
| www.MatrixRecruitment.ie | 92 |
| www.placeme.ie | 25 |
| www.enterprisepeople.ie | 23 |
| www.Brompton.ie | 12 |
Any surprises above?
After ranking the Irish recruitment agency web sites based on the Google PageRank and less known SEOmoz rank here is the one most marketers are familiar with: Alexa. What Alexa does exactly and how does it do it was a topic of a debate from the day Alexa have started publishing the traffic ranking scores. Some people like it, and some don’t. As with most of the ranking algorithms, it is usually the people featured on top that agree with Alexa’s results, and the ones ranked towards the bottom would have a different opinion. But that is the nature of every semi obscure ranking system. And in the world of SEO, nothing is really that straight forward!
What does Alexa web site ranking number mean?
What does Alexa say about their ranking number? They say that the Alexa number associated with each web site is its ranking in the overall global web traffic. So a site with the Alexa’s No. 1 is the web site with the most visitors, and as the ranking number grows the lower you are on the list of the sites based on the number of visitors. So the smaller the Alexa ranking score, the more traffic your web site has (according to Alexa).
So here is the same list of the 29 Irish recruitment agencies and the www.JobsBlog.ie within them so you can use it as a benchmark. There are some results that are just “screaming out” in this Alexa web site traffic ranking list. I’ll let you be the judge of it yourself:
Why are there two web sites that have no data in Alexa? I have absolutely no clue.
Now, if you compare the Alexa ranking above and the two lists we have looked at before: The Google PageRank and SEOmoz MozRank, there are some obvious similarities. It is especially obvious towards the tops of the lists. The same recruitment agency web sites feature the top spots, and there are no “Big Surprises” there. If your site is high in one listing, it is high in the other two as well.
102 people have visited the Recruitment SEO: Google PR yesterday, where I listed the 29 recruitment agency web sites based on their Google PageRank. It even stirred some comments and discussions in social media. Mostly on LinkedIn as it is expected since the recruitment social network LinkedIn is a “natural habitat” for an average recruiter.
Google PR has its quirkiness. It is fantastic and horrible at the same time. It needs to be looked at relative to each web site as opposed to the absolute ranking number. That makes it almost useless to the people outside of the search engine optimisation industry. This is why so many people dismiss Google PageRank. It is not the easiest to “get” actually.
Today we will look at the same group of the 29 recruitment agency web sites and this blog www.JobsBlog.ie and compare them a different by third party ranking mechanism. We will look at the ranking by the SEOmoz: MozRank. Here is what the SEOmoz site says about the MozRank:
What is MozRank?
MozRank represents a link popularity score. It reflects the importance of any given web page on the Internet. Pages earn MozRank by the number and quality of other pages that link to them. The higher the quality of the incoming links, the higher the MozRank.
How is MozRank Scored?
We calculate this score on a logarithmic scale between 1 and 10. Thus, it’s much easier to improve from a MozRank of 3 to 4 than it is to improve from 8 to 9. An “average” MozRank of what most people think of a normal page on the Internet is around 3.
How can MozRank be improved?
A web page’s mozRank can be improved by getting lots of links from semi-popular pages or a few links from very popular pages.
Note that MozRank is all about links. The number of links to your web site and their link quality. It is very safe to assume that a higher MozRank results in the larger amount of the referral traffic – from the web sites linking to your site.
| Recruitment Agency | mozRank |
| http://www.morganmckinley.ie | 6.22 |
| http://www.cpl.ie | 6.17 |
| http://www.hays.ie | 6.11 |
| http://www.Vantage.ie | 5.84 |
| http://www.eolas.ie | 5.62 |
| http://www.brightwater.ie | 5.49 |
| http://www.hudson.ie | 5.42 |
| http://www.gempool.ie | 5.04 |
| http://www.jobsblog.ie | 5.01 |
| http://www.peoplegroup.ie | 4.95 |
| http://www.3qrecruitment.ie | 4.93 |
| http://www.hrm.ie | 4.92 |
| http://www.frsrecruitment.com | 4.84 |
| http://www.placeme.ie | 4.74 |
| http://www.harmonics.ie | 4.56 |
| http://www.Sigmar.ie | 4.34 |
| http://www.rftgroup.ie | 4.33 |
| http://www.collinsmcnicholas.ie | 4.29 |
| http://www.careerwise.ie | 4.15 |
| http://www.icds.ie | 4.09 |
| http://www.EdenRecruitment.ie | 4.08 |
| http://www.Brompton.ie | 3.9 |
| http://www.qedrecruitment.ie | 3.75 |
| http://www.Recruiters.ie | 3.69 |
| http://www.accountancysolutions.ie | 3.68 |
| http://www.recruitmentplus.ie | 3.63 |
| http://www.Stelfox.ie | 3.55 |
| http://www.MatrixRecruitment.ie | 3.43 |
| http://www.enterprisepeople.ie | 2.71 |
| http://www.solasconsulting.ie | 2.67 |
Notice the difference and the similarity of the SEOmoz MozRank ranking of the 29 recruitment agencies above and the Google PageRank ranking from the blog post yesterday. How to judge if your MozRank is good compared to the other recruitment agencies? This blog http://www.jobsblog.ie/ has a MozRank of 5.01. The general rule you can adopt is – if your company web site is below a personal blog, you might want to do something about it.
Any surprises in the recruitment agency web sites ranking by SEOmoz MozRank above? Do you find it more or less relevant than the Google PR ranking?
Working on the search engine optimization of the recruitment agency web site, the first thing one should look at is the competition. What other agencies are competing for the same keywords. One could widen the analysis further, and look at what other sites like job boards, recruitment social media sites, employer career pages or blogs are competing for the same keywords. The first task is checking your direct competitors. The quickest way to check ‘Who is Who’ in your industry is to check the Google PageRank (Google PR). There are million other things you should measure, but Google has done its best to measure it all for you, and give you a very simple score. Google PR number. From 0 to 10 (where 10 is the best).
Here is a list of randomly picked largest recruitment agencies in Ireland and their web site Google PR score.
Note I have also put this blog here in the mix. It is a benchmark really more than anything else. The rule of thumb could be here if you are above JobsBlog.ie you are OK. If you are below you should look into it since your SEO is obviously not really done right, hence no job applicants on your company web site.
The National Recruitment Federation (NRF) will hold its Annual Conference 2012 in City West Hotel on Thursday 10th of May. “The Way forward” is the theme for this 2012 Conference.
What is NRF?
The NRF is a voluntary organisation set up to maintain standards in the Recruitment Industry.
Web Site: www.NRF.ie
Twitter: @NRFIreland
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/#!/nationalrecruitmentfederation
LinkedIn Group with 632 members: http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=2285891
NRF Annual Conference 2012 Speakers:
Kevin Green, global conference speaker and CEO of REC UK. Kevin will report on worldwide recruitment trends that may have an impact on Ireland in the coming years.
Brian Mac Neice, an Expert in High Performance will advise attendees on driving improvements in the performance, focus and culture of their businesses.
Frank Durrell from the UK is one of the most talented and experienced digital media trainers in Europe. Frank will outline the latest technology in social media. Senator
Mary Anne O’Brien will impart her experience both as an agency user and as a Senator working with Politicians on legislative issues and laws that affect the recruitment industry.
The Keynote Speaker: Ian Taylor. Ian is the youngest Irish man to climb Mount Everest. Ian will share with the delegates how, with endurance and commitment, he achieved his goal and how the method he used when times got tough can be applied across the corporate world.
Chairing the Conference is Barbara McGrath, NRF committee member.
Contact Jackie Gaughan to book your place: Member Services, NRF, PH: 01-8161712 or Email: Jackie@nrf.ie
If you are still wondering why have you placed the Facebook ‘Like’ button on your home page this will be interesting for you!
If at some stage you got bored checking how many Facebook ‘Likes’ your page got and you have offered an iPhone draw when you reach 10 000 ‘Likes’ this is even more relevant for you.
Remember that job site dressed in the social network that has sent you those nice young people to show their fabulous Recruiter Package? The one that cost more than your total advertising budget? Well, they would like you to place their button on your Home Page. And guess what they do not want to you pay for advertising them on your home page. They want to help you get more followers on their platform. Why? So that they can sell those to you. In a lovely Linkedin Recruiter Package.
Quite a strange sales model from LinkedIn, isn’t it?
Google did something similar some 6 months ago asking all web site owners to put a ‘Google+’ Button. Blogs accepted it because of the simplicity of installation of it. Does it drive any substantial traffic or bring any other benefit? Well no.
Do you think web sites will not get the LinkedIn Follow button?
If you decide to place a LinkedIn Follow button on your page, here are the three nice formats you can choose from:
Will LinkedIn Follow button slow your web site? Yes.
Does the speed of the site affect the site ranking in Google? Yes.
Will you site drop in Google index because you have placed a LinkedIn Follow button. Yes, a bit.
I have to admit the ‘Like’ from Facebook was more original than any of the copycats. They could have really come up with something better in all this time!
Despite hiring intentions remaining weak, the percentage of employers surveyed expecting to add to their workforce is the highest since Quarter 4 2008
Dublin, Tuesday, 13th March 2012 – Manpower, the leader in contingent and permanent recruitment solutions, today releases the Manpower Employment Outlook Survey, which reveals that overall hiring activity will remain sluggish in Quarter 2 2012. Of the employers surveyed in Ireland, across five regions and 11 industry sectors, 7% anticipate an increase in headcount, the highest percentage since Quarter 4 2008, and 10% expect their workforce numbers to decrease, resulting in a Net Employment Outlook of -3%. When adjusted to remove seasonal variations, the Net Employment Outlook stands at a muted -2% which is relatively stable both quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year.
“Our Q2 research results reflect the uncertain business environment and challenges faced by employers. Rapid adjustments are required to operate at present; businesses have to manage demand fluctuations, increasing operating costs and competitive pressure, which require maintaining tight control over costs and increasing productivity,” commented Krissie Davies, Manpower Ireland Managing Director. “A workforce strategy aligned with the business strategy, as well as flexibility, are likely to be critical to success in the current climate,” she added.
Industry results
Employers in eight out of 11 industry sectors anticipate negative hiring activity for Quarter 2 2012. The strongest Outlooks are reported by employers in the Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing (+10%), Public & Social (+4%) and Pharmaceutical (+3%) sectors. In contrast, the weakest hiring intentions are anticipated by Restaurants & Hotels (-17%), Transport, Storage & Communication (-17%) and the Mining & Quarrying (-13%) sectors employers. A subdued hiring pace is also expected in the Construction (-8%), Finance & Business Services (-6%), Wholesale & Retail (-5%), Manufacturing (-3%) and the Electricity, Gas & Water (-2%) sectors.
“Industry sector results correlate with the two-speed recovery pattern that has emerged in recent years. Employers in the Agriculture, Forestry & Fishing and Pharmaceutical sectors anticipate positive hiring plans while the weak Outlooks in the Wholesale & Retail and Manufacturing sectors is due, in part, to low consumer spending in Ireland,” said Davies. “The current uncertainty in the EU will likely continue to challenge tourism and export-led businesses during the first half of the year,” she added.
The Outlook for the Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing sector strengthens by 6 percentage points compared to Quarter 1 2012 and by a considerable margin of 17 percentage points year-over-year. The Outlooks decrease in seven out of 11 industry sectors both quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year. The sharpest year-over-year declines are reported by employers in the Restaurants & Hotels and Transport, Storage & Communication sectors where Outlooks sink 22 and 19 percentage points, respectively.
Regional results
Employers in three out of five regions surveyed expect negative headcount growth in the next quarter. Munster employers report the weakest hiring plans with an Outlook of -10% which represents a decline of 11 and 7 percentage points quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year, respectively. The Net Employment Outlook for the Ulster region stands at -5% which improves marginally compared to Quarter 1 2012 and the same time last year. The most positive Outlook is reported by Leinster employers (+1%) and employers in the Connaught region report muted hiring plans with an Outlook of 0%.
“The employment market will remain challenging for job seekers in Quarter 2 2012 and networking is key. Manpower recommends carefully reviewing job specifications to invest time applying for suitable roles. It is essential to tailor CVs and cover letters to highlight the skills and competencies needed by each of the different organisations one is looking to join. Outlining not only responsibilities, but also achievements and carrying out sound company research, can help one’s CV stand out from the crowd,” recommended Davies.
The holding pattern on hiring is most prevalent across the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region with employers in 12 of 23 countries reporting relatively stable hiring plans compared to the first quarter of the year and those in nine anticipating an increase in the hiring pace. The hiring picture is mixed compared to this time last year, with Net Employment Outlooks falling in 13 countries but improving in seven. Regional hiring plans are strongest in Turkey (+26%), Israel (+17%), Romania (+13%), Norway (+11%), and weakest in Greece (-13%) and Spain (-8%).
The next Manpower Employment Outlook Survey will be released on 12 June to report hiring expectations for the third quarter of 2012. The Manpower Employment Outlook Survey is available free of charge to the public and can be downloaded from www.manpower.ie.