Pathrise Talent

What is the best day to apply for jobs? Our data shows that fellows got the most responses on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Apply during work hours for the highest responses. Applications that included a personalized cold email had a significantly higher response rate--up to 3x higher response rates. Check out our full 2024 report for startling data on the job market, plus data-backed strategies to help you land your dream job faster: https://buff.ly/4etV68s

Ghost jobs are one of the reasons it can feel harder to find a job today. These are fake job posting that companies never intend to fill or that have already been filled. A majority of recruiters said that ghost jobs made up at least 25% of jobs they posted, according to a recent survey, It’s not necessarily out of malice. Companies post ghost jobs to collect resumes for later and improve the company's image. While some say that ghost jobs are posted to make employees feel replaceable, plenty of others say it’s done to boost morale. Regardless of the reason, ghost jobs are a massive job sink for job seekers. To offset the effect of ghost jobs, just apply to more jobs. To avoid ghost jobs, try to target jobs posted no older than 1-2 weeks ago. For more tips to avoid ghost jobs, and other new job search pitfalls, check out our article: https://buff.ly/4dWzlxj

You're 8x more likely to hear back if you apply for a job within the first 4 days. After day 4, your odds decrease exponentially. We recommend “striking while the iron is hot” by applying to jobs no older than 1-2 weeks. Applying to newer jobs will also help you avoid “ghost jobs”, further saving you time.

You're 8x more likely to hear back if you apply for a job within the first 4 days. After day 4, your odds decrease exponentially. We recommend “striking while the iron is hot” by applying to jobs no older than 1-2 weeks. Applying to newer jobs will also help you avoid “ghost jobs”, further saving you time.

How many applications does it take to land a job? According to our data, 250-300+ In 2023, job seekers only had to send an average of 254 applications to land a job. But the job market has since changed dramatically. In 2024, job seekers needed to send 294 job applications to land a job, on average. This reflects a cooled-off labor market with more competition, especially in tech. Keep in mind that most of our fellows our seeking tech jobs, which is facing an especially competitive market. Different roles face very different timelines. UX designers, for example, have seen a significant increase in job search time. IT job search times remain relatively low. The rise of ghost jobs, automation in recruiting (ATS), and tech layoffs seem to have made the candidate experience harder. More applications are required. But with optimal strategies, job seekers can still find a great job--even faster than before. See our full report for the best time to apply for jobs and other key job search data: https://buff.ly/3XDrKx6

The best place to find a job is not always the most popular. While huge job boards like Indeed are certainly useful, we find that job-seekers have the most success when they can carefully filter jobs based on date and keyword. A job posting older than 2 weeks is exponentially more likely to reject you than a job posted this week. Similarly, finding just a few jobs that match your skillsets gives you a better chance than finding dozens of jobs that aren’t a good fit. These are our favorite places to find jobs in 2024. LinkedIn: Hosts millions of jobs with helpful filtering options. 97% of HR and staffing professionals use LinkedIn for hiring. That makes your LinkedIn profile almost a "second resume" that will be viewed repeatedly during the hiring process. However, one major downside is that companies use LinkedIn as a promotional tool for roles, so the "recently posted" jobs might not be as recent as they appear on the site. “Ghost Jobs”, or jobs posted that don’t intend to be filled, are also getting more common in 2024. Avoid Easy Apply and go straight to the company site to apply for positions. Google: A Google search is a surprisingly effective search tool. Try to limit your search results to only more recent jobs posted in the past week by changing your search settings. Look into “boolean searches” to get the most accurate results. Glassdoor: Excellent filtering options and convenient for company/salary research. Try filtering by different locations for varied results. To see more of the best job search websites, and how to use job boards to land a job faster, read our full article: https://buff.ly/3CdlO7i

The number one mistake job seekers make is not applying for enough jobs. It can take 200-300+ total job applications to get a job. We analyzed 6+ years of internal data in our new report. We found that job seekers sending 10-20+ applications per week got hired the fastest. Unsurprisingly, sending more job applications per week correlated with landing a job faster. However, applicants see diminishing returns when applying to 30+ applications weekly. This could reflect the quality of applications going down when applying to too many jobs. A busy full-time professional applying to 30+ applications weekly may not be putting enough time into research, targeting roles that aren’t a good fit for their background and skills. However, unemployed or part-time job seekers could easily apply to more than 30 job apps weekly. Some full-time professionals can certainly do so as well, just not the average. Job seekers often overestimate the amount of job applications they actually send. We recommend tracking every job application in a spreadsheet. For more new data on the job market, plus strategies to land a job faster, see our full report: https://buff.ly/3XDrKx6

Over 98% of Fortune 500 companies rely on an applicant tracking system (ATS) to review resumes for target keywords, according to a jobscan report. This means a robot is reading your resume first. Applicant tracking systems (ATS for short) are software systems that recruiters use to more easily sift through resumes. The ATS often uses AI to parse and filter resumes, usually based on keywords. Resumes that match the qualifications for a role get passed on to a recruiter for a manual review. A common misconception is that the ATS immediately rejects candidates who aren't perfect. But they're often using looser parameters. For example, the ATS may skip over applicants who don’t meet the most basic requirements or don't have their desired visa status. The ATS can be your best friend if you include keywords from the job posting in your resume. With a purely manual review of hundreds (sometimes thousands) of resumes, a recruiter could easily miss your resume. But if you match keywords to the job posting, your resume will be much more likely to be viewed thanks to the ATS. Check out our full guide to crafting your resume to bypass the ATS and get more interviews: https://buff.ly/3TVRrXH

What's the best job board? It depends on your role. We analyzed 6+ years of recruiting data to find what job boards got people the most interviews and jobs. Data Science: Lever, Company website, Simply Hired Engineering: Glassdoor, ZipRecruiter, LinkedIn IT and Cybersecurity: SimplyHired, Glassdoor, Indeed, LinkedIn Marketing: Glassdoor, Company website, Indeed, SimplyHired Product, Strategy, and Operations (PSO): ZipRecruiter, Glassdoor, Company website Sales: Glassdoor Software Engineering (SWE): Company website, Greenhouse, Lever Even though LinkedIn does not always have the highest interview conversation rate, we still recommend you put significant time and energy into LinkedIn. Especially building a strong LinkedIn profile. It's critical for networking. For more data on the job search, like proven strategies to get you a job faster, check out our full 2024 jobs report: https://buff.ly/4etV68s

Does requiring sponsorship scare companies away? Our data shows a slightly longer job search time for h1b visa holders compared to citizens. The job search is harder for non-citizens, yes. But not by as much as people think. This small difference may be surprising, but keep in mind that non-citizens who require sponsorship may be targeting companies they already know will be open to sponsorship. Job seekers requiring sponsorship may also have been more motivated in their job search, especially recent grads from US universities living in the US. Non-citizens requiring sponsorship did have to apply to significantly more jobs to get an offer, though. Applications that included a personalized cold email had a significantly higher response rate, for both non-citizens and citizens. Check out our full 2024 report for startling data on the job market, plus data-backed strategies to help you land your dream job faster: https://buff.ly/4etV68s