Category: Recruitment

JobBridge could only work if…

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date September 11, 2012
3 Comments on JobBridge could only work if…

With JobBridge in the news again I couldn’t resist to clearly put myself in the ranks of those who are against it. Not like the Socialist Pary members like Paul Murphy MEP who writes JobBridge to nowhere! (I like the article!), but quite close to it. The internship scheme is a good idea and could work quite well if done right. The one we have today is very, very far from it. It is no surprise it is causing such all these troubles for the government, with the majority of people expressing themselves unusually vocally about it. And the majority of the votes are the NO votes for the national internship programme.

The internship programme could actually work well. If… If the rules are set right. Imagine that a company can ONLY get an intern if the intern will be doing exactly what the company specialises in, and if the intern will learn skills during the internship that will make him the very attractive hire for the same company he got an internship from? To put this in real life example the rules should look somewhat like this:

1. No internships for the jobs that are paid minimum wage (by that same company). Why? The government has a chance to get unemployed placed in the job and it should aim highest possible paid ones.
2. Internship can be offered where the work performed is one of the core skills of the company. A marketing company can have a marketing intern, not a web designer. A web design company can have a web designer as an intern, not a marketing person. Why? Simply because the internship is there for the intern to learn.
3. Strictly no receptionist, admin, PA, and similar internships.
4. A company must provide a Mentor for the intern. Such a mentor should prove he/she will dedicate 10% of the working time to the Intern for the training. A mentor must be a senior staff member (in years of experience) and have the skills relevant to the internship.

The internship should be exactly the same as the initial training a new hire gets in the first few months on the job. It would give the company an extended period to test and try the intern before they make a hire. A trained intern after 6 months of the internship should be a far more interesting hire than a new candidate since the company has already invested in the intern who is ready to start the work immediately (or has been doing it for the months already).

Wouldn’t this make far more sense than the Internship programme we have today?

Tags core skills, initial training, internship scheme, internships, job, Jobs, marketing person, mentor, Mep, minimum wage, national internship, paul murphy, working time

Blogs Internet LinkedIN Recruitment Recruitment Agency Social Recruitment Twitter

What is The Recruitment Unconference?

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date September 4, 2012
No Comments on What is The Recruitment Unconference?

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.

Tags attendees, coffee, conference speakers, Conversations, delegates, Facebook, Looking For A New Job, Recruiters, Recruitment Conference, Recruitment Industry

Career Internet Job Site Jobs Recruitment Search Engine

JobsBoard.ie will let you find the job 3 times faster than Irish Jobs site!

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date June 20, 2012
No Comments on JobsBoard.ie will let you find the job 3 times faster than Irish Jobs site!

JobsBoard.ie will let you wind the page 3 times faster than Irish Jobs site!

There is plenty of job sites in Ireland. Each of them has plenty of jobs. Most of the jobs are the same on the job sites. So what site to choose? Perhaps the one with the most jobs? Perhaps the one you find shows the best results? Jobs most relevant to you? Jobs advertised by the employers you like? There is plenty of choices when it comes to job sites in Ireland.

There is one thing to consider. It is the speed of the job site. If you visit it regularly, the more important it is. Will you wait for 10 seconds to see the jobs you want? Will you wait for 10 seconds every time you visit the site? Not if you can avoid it, and not if there are faster sites that will let you browse or search the jobs a few times quicker.

Here is the sample of the JobsBoard.ie and IrishJobs.ie web sites. The speed load comparison is done by www.whichloadsfaster.com:

Why wait for your job forever? Visit www.JobsBoard.ie today and register for the daily new jobs now!

Tags environmental jobs in ireland, Irish Jobs, IrishJobs, irishjobs ie, new jobs

Blogs Internet Jobs Recruitment Recruitment Agency Search Engine SEO SERP Social Networks Social Recruitment Twitter

Recruitment SEO: How many web sites link to yours?

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date May 29, 2012
No Comments on Recruitment SEO: How many web sites link to yours?

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:

URL	Sites Linking
http://www.cpl.ie	568
http://www.hays.ie	294
http://www.morganmckinley.ie	265
http://www.brightwater.ie	127
http://www.jobsblog.ie	126
http://www.hrm.ie	125
http://www.collinsmcnicholas.ie	100
http://www.eolas.ie	100
http://www.careerwise.ie	86
http://www.EdenRecruitment.ie	77
http://www.peoplegroup.ie	70
http://www.frsrecruitment.com	68
http://www.Vantage.ie	65
http://www.icds.ie	55
http://www.Sigmar.ie	51
http://www.3qrecruitment.ie	46
http://www.rftgroup.ie	44
http://www.Stelfox.ie	34
http://www.recruitmentplus.ie	32
http://www.accountancysolutions.ie	26
http://www.Recruiters.ie	19
http://www.MatrixRecruitment.ie	14
http://www.harmonics.ie	14
http://www.hudson.ie	13
http://www.gempool.ie	9
http://www.qedrecruitment.ie	7
http://www.Brompton.ie	5
http://www.placeme.ie	5
http://www.enterprisepeople.ie	5
http://www.solasconsulting.ie	4

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.

Blogs Recruitment Recruitment Agency Search Engine SEO SERP

Recruitment SEO: Googoe Index Saturaton

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date May 28, 2012
No Comments on Recruitment SEO: Googoe Index Saturaton

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.

URL	Google Index
http://www.cpl.ie	496000
http://www.morganmckinley.ie	291000
http://www.hays.ie	184000
http://www.eolas.ie	10700
http://www.collinsmcnicholas.ie	7580
http://www.icds.ie	6980
http://www.brightwater.ie	5680
http://www.peoplegroup.ie	5490
http://www.rftgroup.ie	4810
http://www.Vantage.ie	4660
http://www.jobsblog.ie	4430
http://www.frsrecruitment.com	2390
http://www.hrm.ie	783
http://www.qedrecruitment.ie	610
http://www.careerwise.ie	602
http://www.Stelfox.ie	601
http://www.recruitmentplus.ie	533
http://www.3qrecruitment.ie	528
http://www.EdenRecruitment.ie	471
http://www.accountancysolutions.ie	446
http://www.MatrixRecruitment.ie	302
http://www.gempool.ie	190
http://www.Recruiters.ie	189
http://www.placeme.ie	145
http://www.hudson.ie	138
http://www.harmonics.ie	100
http://www.Brompton.ie	62
http://www.enterprisepeople.ie	37
http://www.solasconsulting.ie	5
http://www.Sigmar.ie	n/f

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.

Tags accountancysolutions.ie, brightwater.ie, Brompton.ie, careerwise.ie, collinsmcnicholas.ie, CPL.ie, EdenRecruitment.ie, enterprisepeople.ie, eolas.ie, frsrecruitment.com, gempool.ie, google search results, google searches, harmonics.ie, hays.ie, hrm.ie, hudson.ie, icds.ie, job seekers, jobs pages, JobsBlog.ie, MatrixRecruitment.ie, morganmckinley.ie, peoplegroup.ie, placeme.ie, qedrecruitment.ie, Recruiters.ie, recruitment agencies, Recruitment Agency, Recruitment SEO, recruitmentplus.ie, relevant keyword, relevant traffic, rftgroup.ie, Search Engine Optimisation, Search Engine Optimization, search engine results, Search Engines, search keyword, search phrase, Search Phrases, Sigmar.ie, site google, solasconsulting.ie, statistical analysis, Stelfox.ie, Vantage.ie

Internet Job Site Recruitment Recruitment Agency Search Engine SEO

Recruitment SEO: Links are the currency on the web!

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date May 25, 2012
1 Comment on Recruitment SEO: Links are the currency on the web!

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?

Tags recruitment agencies, Recruitment SEO, relevant traffic, Search Engine Optimisation, Search Engine Optimization, search engine results, Search Engines, site google, statistical analysis, www., www.accountancysolutions.ie, www.brightwater.ie, www.Brompton.ie, www.careerwise.ie, www.collinsmcnicholas.ie, www.cpl.ie, www.EdenRecruitment.ie, www.enterprisepeople.ie, www.eolas.ie, www.frsrecruitment.com, www.gempool.ie, www.harmonics.ie, www.hays.ie, www.hrm.ie, www.hudson.ie, www.icds.ie, www.jobsblog.ie, www.MatrixRecruitment.ie, www.morganmckinley.ie, www.peoplegroup.ie, www.placeme.ie, www.qedrecruitment.ie, www.Recruiters.ie, www.recruitmentplus.ie, www.rftgroup.ie, www.Sigmar.ie, www.solasconsulting.ie, www.Stelfox.ie, www.Vantage.ie

Internet Recruitment Recruitment Agency Search Engine SEO

Recruitment SEO: Alexa traffic ranking

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date May 24, 2012
1 Comment on Recruitment SEO: Alexa traffic ranking

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:

URL	Alexa Rank
http://www.cpl.ie	291100
http://www.morganmckinley.ie	336866
http://www.hays.ie	803824
http://www.brightwater.ie	874987
http://www.peoplegroup.ie	1274311
http://www.Vantage.ie	1441180
http://www.eolas.ie	1769945
http://www.jobsblog.ie	1817137
http://www.icds.ie	1854172
http://www.frsrecruitment.com	1997184
http://www.EdenRecruitment.ie	2428334
http://www.collinsmcnicholas.ie	2595232
http://www.hrm.ie	2811817
http://www.recruitmentplus.ie	3457055
http://www.careerwise.ie	4564311
http://www.Stelfox.ie	4828821
http://www.Recruiters.ie	4831059
http://www.rftgroup.ie	5312061
http://www.3qrecruitment.ie	6804532
http://www.MatrixRecruitment.ie	8119435
http://www.accountancysolutions.ie	8669731
http://www.gempool.ie	8720144
http://www.solasconsulting.ie	9507536
http://www.hudson.ie	12469855
http://www.enterprisepeople.ie	12578768
http://www.placeme.ie	17197072
http://www.qedrecruitment.ie	18446204
http://www.harmonics.ie	18661080
http://www.Sigmar.ie	n/f
http://www.Brompton.ie	n/f

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.

Internet Job Site Recruitment Recruitment Agency SEO

Recruitment SEO: 29 Irish recruitment web sites SEO Ranking by mozRank

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date May 23, 2012
8 Comments on Recruitment SEO: 29 Irish recruitment web sites SEO Ranking by mozRank

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?

Job Site Recruitment Recruitment Agency SEO

Recruitment SEO: Google PR

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date May 22, 2012
No Comments on Recruitment SEO: Google PR

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.

Web Site	Google PR
http://www.cpl.ie	6
http://www.hudson.ie	6
http://www.brightwater.ie	5
http://www.hays.ie	5
http://www.Sigmar.ie	5
http://www.collinsmcnicholas.ie	5
http://www.eolas.ie	5
http://www.accountancysolutions.ie	5
http://www.morganmckinley.ie	4
http://www.hrm.ie	4
http://www.EdenRecruitment.ie	4
http://www.frsrecruitment.com	4
http://www.rftgroup.ie	4
http://www.recruitmentplus.ie	4
http://www.icds.ie	4
http://www.Vantage.ie	4
http://www.Brompton.ie	4
http://www.careerwise.ie	4
http://www.jobsblog.ie	4
http://www.Stelfox.ie	3
http://www.MatrixRecruitment.ie	3
http://www.gempool.ie	3
http://www.Recruiters.ie	3
http://www.qedrecruitment.ie	3
http://www.3qrecruitment.ie	3
http://www.placeme.ie	3
http://www.peoplegroup.ie	3
http://www.harmonics.ie	3
http://www.solasconsulting.ie	2
http://www.enterprisepeople.ie	2

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.

Career Job Site Jobs Recruitment

Careers Service: ‘DIT Style’

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date May 15, 2012
4 Comments on Careers Service: ‘DIT Style’

I got an email from the Dublin Institute of Technology to check their new Careers Site called “JobScene”.
This is the exact text that welcomed me there:

To access jobscene and view our current opportunities you must register first.

I must register to see jobs? I am guessing there is a reason for it? Perhaps it is a closed service just for DIT Students? Well, the second sentence reads:

To register: Enter your name, email address and date of birth. It is not compulsory to enter a student number.

So, I do not have to be a DIT Student to see the jobs? You just need my age? Why?

The fact that one cannot see the jobs without revealing his/her age is something I really do not understand. Not only it might be a slight problem that Google will not reveal it’s age, hence the website SEO is dead before it started, but why do you need my age, and email, name and whatever else you need to reveal the job openings just baffles me. The DIT Careers people obviously know something you and I don’t!

As a job seeker – one would never sign up to it.

There is also a great service for Employers. Here is what the DIT Careers Service site reads:

Employers: To pledge a job click on Hireland.ie.
What is Hireland.ie ? Hireland is an initiative brought to you not by the government or any lobby group, but by ordinary people who realise we all need to do things for ourselves. We need to Kickstart Ireland. So Hireland is asking Irish Businesses to think differently – and to pledge a short or long term job now.
WHAT HAPPENS WITH MY PLEDGE?
Your company will appear on our Pledgers wall and becomes a positive ripple effect for all to see. Your pledge will be counted and become part of Hireland’s Growth index and form part of a powerful voice that Ireland is open for business.

So as an employer I can’t advertise my jobs on the DIT Careers Service web site, but am sent to some other web site? And there I actually cannot advertise jobs but get listed on “Pledgers wall and becomes a positive ripple effect for all to see.”
Eek? I don’t need a ripple effect? I need staff?

Unbelievable? Yes, I agree. But here is a screenshot of the page.

Tags careers service, current opportunities, Dublin Institute of Technology, growth index, irish businesses, job openings, Job Seeker, jobscene, lobby group

Recruitment Recruitment Agency

The National Recruitment Federation (NRF) Annual Conference: “The Way forward“

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date May 8, 2012
2 Comments on The National Recruitment Federation (NRF) Annual Conference: “The Way forward“

The National Recruitment Federation (NRF) will hold its Annual Conference 2012 in City West Hotel on Thursday 10^th 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

Blogs LinkedIN Recruitment Recruitment Agency Search Engine SEO Social Networks Social Recruitment

LinkedIn: Follow a company button

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date April 17, 2012
No Comments on LinkedIn: Follow a company button

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!

Tags Facebook Like, Google, LinkedIn Follow Button, REcruitment Home page, Social Shareing

Blogs Career Jobs Recruitment

Video in recruitment in Ireland

Post author By Ivan | JobsBlog.ie
Post date March 12, 2012
No Comments on Video in recruitment in Ireland

I often get asked about the effectiveness of the video used for recruitment in Ireland. I always struggle how to explain that it so far never worked for a single recruiter in Ireland. The reason is that it does work really well for some recruiters internationally. I was never really able to define why does the video not fork here. I looked at about a hundred different video campaigns for jobs already. Neither really looked impressive. The visitor’s number as well don’t show impressive numbers. The average is about 3 views a day. There are just a few samples of the top of the YouTube search for the ‘Jobs in Ireland’.