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Top 5 Reasons Someone Won’t Apply to Your Job

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Are you looking for more applications from your job board or career site? Whether there is an actual talent shortage, skills-gap or lack of skilled workers, candidates will only apply to jobs that give them the right information, period. So, what turns off candidates from choosing your jobs over someone else’s?

5 Reasons You’re Not Getting Applications to Your Jobs


#1 No pay rate

Really? Unless you negotiate each and every position you place, post the pay rate!  For $9-15/Hour jobs, a dollar more does actually matter! Plus, your job WILL NOT show up in Google jobs without it.

#2: Bad Job Titles

Consider this. There are a lot of customer services jobs, Manufacturing roles, and Warehouse Associates positions open at any given time. What makes any of them stand out? Ok, so bad may just be boring or too similar to other ones.

  • Location
  • Pay
  • Shift
  • Working Conditions

If you can capture someone’s attention with 2-4 of these indicators, you’ll find more candidates.

If the customer-service role you are placing will be 90% phone based, say so!

ex: “Customer Service Phone Operator for $15.50/HR”

If the current title is “Warehouse Associate,” consider changing it to “2nd Shift Warehouse Worker at Family Owned Shipping Company for $14/Hour”

A couple more examples:

“Line Cook Needed for Upscale Mexican Restaurant in Clarence for $14.50/Hour”

“Forklift Operator Needed in Kalamazoo at Electrical Company for $11.50 – Full Time”

Bonus tip!

You can add more info in the pay-rate field, and it will show up in the preview – brilliant! (see below)

Other things you can mention:

  • No seasonal layoffs
  • The Specific Name of the Company (if you’re worried about losing the sale, odds are, the company has already inquired with other staffing companies before, and you won’t be the last one, so focus on hiring instead of hiding the client)
  • Available Shifts
  • Community Resources that are nearby, like grocery stores, bus stops etc.

#3 Poor Job Descriptions

When you enter a job into your ATS, are you copying and pasting right from your client’s file? Are you editing it at all? Are you checking to see how it looks on your job board when your ATS pushes the job out?

Here are some hints:

  • Break the description into parts: About the job, what’s in it for the candidate, what’s required (as short as possible) and how to apply.
  • One long paragraph will get 0 applications
  • Always include pay scale, shift, and location (if you are looking to get your job seen in Google jobs, pay scale is a MUST!)
  • Double check how it looks on your job board. Remember, that is what people see, not your ATS description of the job.
  • No recruiter information: If you don’t want a lot of calls, share a name and email (If can also be an office email that your recruiters share). If you hire accountants, consider your LinkedIn profile and email. Some of the most qualified people won’t fill out every application they come across (especially if it takes more than a few minutes) but a quick email or phone call may do the trick.

#4 The #1 Reason You aren’t getting applications: They aren’t seeing your job!!!

If you aren’t sharing the link to your job on social media, email or newsletters, then how are people finding your jobs?  If you are spending a lot of time and money on sites like Zip Recruiter and Indeed but neglecting your job board, you shouldn’t expect applications from your job board.

On the other hand, if you are effectively marketing your job board and writing good descriptions, EXPECT applications.


Marketing ideas to drive traffic to your site:

Sending job newsletters to your candidate list

Ads on Social Media (there are some really easy ways to specifically target people too)

Re-Recruiting site visitors (just like when you see those Amazon ads stalking you 😊)

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