Developing effective e-recruiting websites: Insights for managers from marketers

In recent years, the practice of using corporate websites to recruit job applicants has increased steadily. Despite this trend, however, studies show that approximately 75% of job seekers find the sites too complicated to use successfully [Brown, D. (2004). Unwanted online job seekers swamp HR staff. Canadian HR Reporter, 17(7), 1–2] and that more than 20% have rejected job opportunities based on poorly designed websites [Pastore, M. (2000, March 29). http://www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=330331]. To address this problem, this article joins Internet marketing and employee recruitment research to offer six development implications for creating an effective “e-recruitment” source on a corporate website. Based on a job marketing approach to the recruitment process and consumer behavior research on persuasive communication and decision making, we present considerations important to creating an online recruiting website that effectively influences the search decisions and behaviors of a target market of desired job candidates.