2023 SEO Strategies For Recruiting and Marketing

ATS and recruiting
Myriam Jessier
January 6 2022

Every month, Google processes over 300 million job-related searches. If you want to reach qualified candidates where they search online, search engine optimization (SEO) for recruiters is essential. We offer several tips you can use to attract candidates. Our SEO strategies can help your business attract clients and top talent!

SEO for recruiters

Why is SEO crucial for recruiters?

SEO encompasses a number of strategies to help your job postings rank within Google results. It is therefore crucial for recruiters because millions of job seekers turn to Google when searching for their next position. Without SEO, any business will struggle to find good candidates and attract clients.

8 Proven SEO Recruitment Tips

Your agency can benefit from recruitment SEO by adopting the following tips:

1. Keyword Research

First, it’s important to understand what keywords and phrases people are searching for when looking for jobs.

In order to determine which keywords to include on your pages, you will need to conduct keyword research. Start by thinking about potential keywords and analyzing your competitors’ job postings and keywords, then use keyword research tools like Keyword Surfer or SERPstat to develop and evaluate your list.

You’ll also want to consider the search intent of each keyword as part of your recruitment SEO strategy, and think about how it could help your company achieve its goals. Your keywords should be specific:

  • industry name
  • job title
  • location (city)
  • company name
  • experience required (junior, intermediate, senior)

This can help you attract more local candidates and match them with jobs best suited to their unique skills. Choosing the right keywords can also help you gain visibility with qualified candidates.

2. Incorporate your keywords throughout your site

Where to put your keywords?

  • In the titles of your job postings and your career page.
  • In the meta titles of these pages.
  • In the content of the pages.

3. Optimize the website for mobile search

According to Recruiting.com, 89% of job seekers use a mobile device when searching for a job. You need to make sure that your site and its pages are actually optimized for mobile search. If your site is not mobile-friendly, your visibility in Google results will suffer. This means that your site content should be easy to read and navigate, and no pinching or zooming should be required to view your content. In addition, job seekers should be able to submit their online resume directly from their mobile devices.

4. Publish quality content

Google rewards quality content. This means providing consistent and useful information about career opportunities.

Each new piece of content is another opportunity to use keywords that will help increase your site’s visibility in search engine results. You can even use your keyword research to help you identify topics that interest your target audience.

In addition, you need to keep your content fresh and up-to-date. If you’re a recruitment agency, you may even consider creating a blog with relevant tips for job seekers. You can post job search tips, interview tips and general career information. This can help you build your online reputation while helping potential candidates.

5. Update frequently

If you add new job postings to your site on a regular basis, it will help, but you can also get creative with blog posts, articles and other content, which is what many agencies do when it comes to SEO for recruiters.

6. Build links on the web

Search engines like Google see links from other websites as evidence of your site’s quality and authority. The more trustworthy websites you have, the greater your visibility will be. However, getting links to your site is often easier said than done.

7. Use location-based keywords

Job seekers often search for employment opportunities in specific areas, so be sure to incorporate location-based terms into your keywords. Use the names of cities, states and regions where your jobs are located as keywords. If you’re a recruiter, you may also want to consider creating content that deals with a specific region, city or province.

8. Share job opportunities on social networks

You can also use social media to build brand awareness, share job opportunities and drive traffic to your website. Individual recruiters can also share career advice on their social media sites to extend the online reach of your recruitment business.

Google's official job posting guidelines

Google’s goal is to improve the quality of results for candidates. After all, searching for a job often takes time.

That’s why our top priority is to provide job seekers with authentic, reliable, and up-to-date content in Google search.” Quote from the official documentation!

The main topics targeted: the directApply property

There is a new structured data property and a new editorial content policy.

The directApply property is optional, but it allows you to indicate whether your job posting allows direct applications. A direct application refers to a short and simple process that the user must follow on your page to apply for the job.

If your site offers users any of the following experiences, you most likely offer what we call a direct application:

  • The entire application process takes place on your site.
  • Once the user accesses your page from Google, they should not have to click on an apply button or provide personal information more than once to apply.

The integration of this information into Google is ongoing. Therefore, you may not see this change immediately in Google search.

New editorial content policy

To make it easier for people to understand your content and apply for jobs, we’ve created an editorial content policy specific to jobs in Google search. This policy provides guidelines on how to write a job posting. For example, it should not contain text or images that make it difficult to read. It should also not contain excessive ads or ads that distract the user, nor should it contain content that is of no interest to the job seeker. Job postings should also follow basic grammatical rules, such as the proper use of capitalization.

Following these guidelines will allow us to improve the quality of our results and develop new features in the product.

To give everyone time to prepare for this change, the new editorial content policy will go into effect on October 1, 2021. To learn more, check out our developer documentation.

 

Top criteria for site owners to build trust with job seekers

Based on our survey results, it’s important to meet the following criteria on your site to build job seeker trust:

  • Make sure the job postings on your site do not include spam and are not fraudulent. Fake jobs fall into this category. Be sure to tag only pages that contain a single, active job posting.
  • Make sure you provide a quality user experience. According to users, sites with poor user experience are those that ask for unnecessary information, have poor quality pages (e.g., those with excessive or obtrusive ads) and/or have complex application processes (e.g., with constant redirects). A poor user experience also hurts the number of applications submitted by job seekers.
  • Remove expired job postings. Don’t keep job postings on your site that are no longer accepting new applications. Job seekers also complain a lot about applications that go unanswered by the employer. When you remove the job posting from your site, be sure to also remove the corresponding markup or update the validThrough property. We encourage you to use the Indexing API to keep us informed of this change. Trying to access a job posting that has expired, especially after being redirected multiple times, is a very frustrating experience.
  • Make sure the date the job posting was published is authentic. People rely on this information to determine if the job is still open for applications, if it is popular, if they still have a chance of being hired, etc. Don’t pass off old job postings as new and don’t update the DatePosted property if no changes have been made.
  • Do not include incorrect or misleading information in the job posting or markup. This includes salary, location, hours, type of position, or other specific details. To avoid pitfalls, make sure the job posting correctly describes the position and that the markup is true to what you are offering.

Learn more about PRAGM

Want coaching to help your company attract qualified prospects? Contact us to learn more about our services and training. SEO is constantly evolving and you need a trusted partner to keep you up to date with the latest trends in SEO recruitment. We offer SEO plans for professional recruitment in Quebec, Luxembourg and Switzerland!

Want to learn more about the benefits of SEO?

Choose PRAGM to optimize your recruitment strategies!

Click here to learn more

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