Almost every major job board has a Pay Per Click (PPC) ad buying model these days. This is great because it allows for flexibility based on performance and shifting needs over time.
But with online advertising, the most important thing to think about are the conversion rates, not the prices. What percentage of impressions click, what percentage of clicks start the apply process, what percentage of apply-starts become applicants, and what percentage of applicants are hired. If you are looking at these rates at every step of the way, and always looking to test and improve on them, you are doing it right. This brings us back to the concept of the "click" itself, and why they are not all really the same thing. Clicks from different websites are worth different amounts of money based on what place in the apply conversion funnel that click represents.
Top of funnel clicks, such as those on Glassdoor, keep the visitor on the page. The job is i-framed in, and the candidate only goes over to the real job detail page after a secondary click. Middle of the funnel clicks have a user directed off the career board and to your organization's ATS where they can explore the job description fully and begin their apply process. The deep funnel click occurs when a user on a job board, such as Glassdoor, clicks on a job title and is then reading the full job description, and only at the end of the job description, when they click "Apply Now", is the click actually charged, directing that user to the application process.
Deep funnel clicks can typically offer the best ROI, but when hiring for high volumes, you need to employ the best strategy to get high conversion rates. Without a steady stream of applicants for your open positions, you will not be able to adequately fill your openings efficiently, resulting in more time and resources to obtain organizational goals. Recruiting metrics will show where your best conversion rates are coming from. By utilizing automated technology to adjust your PPC ad buying, your recruitment marketing will deliver.
This adaptive buying technology, combined with AI tools to take care of your ATS and CRM, and a strategic branding strategy, ensure that TA Teams are free to focus on engaging applicants with a personalized candidate experience. Choosing a PPC strategy without smart data analytics would render meaningless all the hard work done to build the rest of your recruiting infrastructure. Plus, there is no time to waste when there's a massive volume of positions that need to be filled. You do not have to worry about adjusting your PPC strategy when tools exist to do that job for you, instantly focusing your ad buys where they are most effective.
Clicks mean different things on different sites, and represent different parts of the application funnel for candidates. Therefore, bidding on clicks means nothing without the ability to monitor and understand Click To Apply ratios. When hiring for high volume, it's much more important that your PPC buys are focused on the proper channels. It's not easy, but it's critically important to find the right solution to help your organization make sense of it all, i.e., to always be driving quality hires to the jobs needing them the most.
