The Deep Dive: How to use your recruitment website to attract the 3 Cs
Emily Buckley
Freelance Content Writer | Copywriter | Storyteller | DEI advocate | I write articles that get to the heart of the story and marketing copy that engages and compels.
Hello and welcome to the 10th edition of The Deep Dive, my monthly newsletter that focuses on the hottest topics in recruitment.?
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I take a deep dive into topics that matter to you, that affect you, and that can make you a better recruiter.
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This month, I’m digging into how you can attract the 3 Cs - Candidates, Clients and Consultants - to your website to ensure it’s working as hard as it should be and smashing your goals.
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Recruitment websites: a unique set of needs
Recruitment websites can be powerful tools for business growth in multiple ways, from driving applications to your jobs, to boosting your brand, to business development, to building a talent pool. In order to do all that they need to work hard, particularly as recruitment websites must attract and cater to multiple audiences.
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And that is the major difference between recruitment websites and those serving other industries. Rather than just reaching out to one defined target audience, recruitment websites need to work for three - candidates, clients and consultants. Recruitment websites therefore have a set of needs that are unique to the industry in order to appeal to these different visitor types.
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So, who are the 3 Cs?
Target audience profiles
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Candidates
Candidates will largely be coming to your website for one thing - to look for jobs. It’s therefore essential that you have a fully optimised, easily searchable job page with advanced filters to make it as easy as possible for candidates to find the right jobs.
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Ensure you have a candidate portal where they can upload their CV and set up job alerts so they can be notified when relevant opportunities are advertised.
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Candidates need to know that you recruit in their industry, at their level, in their preferred location.
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They’re looking for jobs and interview advice and they need to feel confident that they can trust you with their careers.
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Clients
Often a website can be heavily focused on candidates but it’s important to attract clients too - especially at a time when the market has shifted, with jobs falling and candidate numbers rising.
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Clients will be looking at the types of jobs you recruit for, what your recruitment solutions are, and how the process works.
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Ensure you have a section dedicated to potential clients, detailing the types of recruitment you offer and how you like to work with clients.
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It’s also wise to have a testimonials and case studies page that incudes client experiences.
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Consultants
In order to attract consultants to work for your agency, employer brand is everything.
Showcase your values, illustrate the type of agency you are through your branding, and include an About Us and Meet the Team page so they can get an understanding of the company culture and who they could be working with.
What your website needs to attract and cater to the 3 Cs
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Differentiated user journeys
When a visitor clicks onto your homepage, it must be immediately clear what kind of recruitment agency you are - your specialisms in terms of industry, level, contract type, and region (whichever of those applies). Your homepage content should appeal to all, giving visitors an overview of what you do and offer, but it should also be clear where different users should go next.
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Guide candidates, clients and consultants through your website by clearly signposting the different user journeys via calls to action buttons and links on your navigation bar. Make it clear how to navigate to user-focused pages, how to click onto the jobs page, how to contact your agency, how to find testimonials.
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Targeted content
Publish content that all three groups will find valuable. To make is easier for users to quickly be able to find content that is interesting to them, create categories, for example career advice (candidates), salary insights (clients), company news (consultants). Industry trends could appeal to all three audience types.
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Not only will relevant, valuable and engaging content keep all visitors on your website for longer, it could encourage return visits or prompt them to sign up for your newsletter. You’re also likely to increase the organic traffic from each audience type if you’re creating content that appeals to each.
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Strong branding that creates trust
A strong brand that tells the world who you are, what you offer, and what your values are, is something that all 3 Cs will want to see. Any prospective candidate, client or consultant will want to know that your values align with theirs and that they can trust you. This is how you can achieve that:
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Advanced jobs page
This is a crucial section of your website to get right and not just to attract candidates. Prospective clients, too, will be looking at your jobs page both to gain an understanding of the types of jobs you recruit for and to check how easy it is for candidates to search and apply for jobs - you’ll potentially be advertising their jobs, after all. We recommend:
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? Filterable jobs listings, including location, job type, category, salary range and keyword.
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?? Google for Jobs optimisation. Offering a free way to increase organic traffic to your jobs, this is a must. Google for Jobs schema and indexing should be implemented on all jobs.?
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?? Job alerts function.
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?? Candidate registration CTA.
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?? Ensuring the page is easy to find and navigate to.
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?? Adding the details of the consultant handling each job, immediately creating a connection. Include a picture, name and job title, plus clickable links to their LinkedIn profile, and internal contact details or their profile on your Meet the Team page.
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The right keywords on the right pages
When you are targeting three different audiences, you need to consider keywords that all three sets of people will be searching for. That way you’ll attract candidates, clients and consultants and not just one of those demographics. Work out the keywords and longtail keywords that you want to rank for and weave them into your website’s copy. There are three things to note here:
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2. Use your keywords 3-4 times per page - in the page title, the hero paragraph, and then another couple of times in the main body of the page.
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3. Don’t overstuff your copy with keywords or force them in. It’s important your copy sounds natural, not just from a readability and brand reputation perspective but because search engines will penalise pages containing keyword stuffing, meaning you’ll rank lower in the results.
Recruitment agencies need all 3 Cs - Candidates, Clients and Consultants - in order to be successful, which means catering for three different target audiences when designing and writing for your recruitment website. This requires more thought but the pay-off is that the ROI of your website is multiplied and you’ll be boosting the success of your agency.
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Want to explore this topic more? We recommend:
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All the best,
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Emily
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Want to take a deep dive into another hot topic for recruiters??
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?? I am Emily,?Wave's Head of Content and I am dedicated to writing content that people in the recruitment industry want to read.?
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Designing & Developing Recruitment Websites | Abstraction Labs
11 个月OMG! I'm stealing this term! Can't believe I wasn't using it already. I've been using clients, candidates and talent.