Seventy-four percent of job seekers visit career sites and view them as the most important source of hiring and job information and yet a number of careers pages remain clunky, bulky and difficult to navigate. It’s a great time for a recruiting team to focus on employment branding specifically when it comes to their career site because they can set the standard and develop an obvious competitive advantage.

Online Career Sites Drive Employment Branding

Last week we had the exclusive on the top 3o career sites according to the research and analyst firm PotentialPark as part of their Online Talent Management Awards.  Being that the company careers page and hiring process is visual, we felt like a bulleted list (which you can also see below) just isn’t enough.  The hiring process is visual as candidates make quick snap judgements on where and when when it comes to applying online.  Companies that consider these touch points when engaging the candidate take into the account important components that aid in candidate selection: information available about the company, transparency when it comes to culture as well as the hiring process, online activities including social media and their presence both online and offline.

Personally, I like United Healthcare’s site as it gets my attention. Another page may resonate with you for a completely different reason. When it comes to career pages, here are the trends we are seeing in the marketplace. (click here to view PotentiaPark’s 2013 report)

• Only 16% of the 694 career pages incorporated mobile into their career page. Mobile is still a new territory and with multi-screen sharing becoming an important part of consumer marketing, expert companies to consider this in building their recruitment strategies going forward.

• 61% of job seekers expert employers to be on Facebook.  While Facebook doesn’t yet fully offer a robust search even with their social graph, job seekers are using Facebook to connect, research, and engage.  The expectation is that employers should also be on Facebook.com.

• Email remains as powerful engagement tool.  Last year’s findings found that 69% of job seekers like to apply for a job with email.  Proving that engaging candidates on many channels focusing on what I call touch points is essential to continued engagement with the job seeker that leads to establishing a relationship and filling a position.

Which career page grabbed your attention and would most likely compel you to apply?  I look forward to your thoughts and congratulations to our the top 30 online career pages.  Job well done.

Also listed here below are the top mobile sites.  While only a small number of employers are leveraging the power of mobile, this is a trend I see continuing.