Job Search Engine Guide

You Can’t Buy My Love

   

But you can buy a detailed report describing the 2007 Top Sites for Job Search competition. 

   

Interested in the testing methodology and detailed results for each round?  Curious why your site scored below your competitors?  Looking for specific usability and performance analysis that can help guide future development?  It’s all available to you in a format that uniquely compares your site to each of the tested sites in the 2007 Top Sites for Job Search competition.

   

If you follow the Job Search Engine Guide, you know that I refuse to accept advertising of any kind.  If I ever do, then I think you should question my objectivity.  But objective tests like the 2007 Top Sites for Job Search competition require considerable time; and one way to make this a sustainable evaluation process, providing guidance year after year, is to sell the detail-level findings to job sites as competitive intelligence.

   

Price?  $4,995 for a customized report for your site; or $9,995 for the report plus an onsite visit to discuss the findings and recommendations.

   

Let’s be clear though … at the end of the day, what I really want is your commitment to site improvement … the fee is simply a crude way to make sure that we’re both focused on the same goal.

   

Do you want to improve?

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – SimplyHired Wins Round 10

   

SimplyHired continues to move up the leader board in the 2007 Top Sites for Job Search competition, notching a win in the Usability round to go with a win in the Search Agent round.

   

In the previous nine rounds we looked at the bits and pieces of the whole … individual bricks if you will.  In round ten, we look at the integration of the pieces.  Assembled correctly, the whole can indeed be greater than the sum of the parts; but too often, the electronic bricks of job search are assembled poorly, resulting in a substandard user experience.   

   

Usability is the mortar that binds together the great content and features offered by today’s electronic job sites.  SimplyHired is head and shoulders above the competition in seamlessly delivering features and content through a customer-friendly interface that is easy to use and understand.

   

To be the best – the most usable job site – each competitor was judged on the following design criteria:

   

¾      Interface simplicity;

¾      Intuitive navigation;

¾      Designed for accessibility;

¾      System performance;

¾      Consistent display of user path status;

¾      Key navigation above the fold;

¾      Placement of standard elements in standard locations;

¾      Predictable function of each screen element;

¾      Avoid distracting banner ads;

¾      Employ grid discipline in layout;

¾      Employ logical content grouping and chunking;

¾      Use standard names for standard operations;

¾      Design with clear focal point on each screen;

¾      Organic search results above the fold;

¾      Retain user settings throughout session;

¾      Suggest alternate spellings;

¾      Provide alternate paths when no search results found;

¾      Buttons look like buttons;

¾      Controls linked to user intention;

¾      Avoids primary navigation using drop-down lists;

¾      Able to refine search results with filters;

¾      Option to refine search results with additional words;

¾      No blind alleys;

¾      No dead-end paths;

¾      No unexpected results; and,

¾      No unnecessary info collected.

   

   

Each of the remaining three sites had strengths and weaknesses; and the overall scores were pretty close.  JobCentral was the fastest and paid strong attention to accessibility, but the interface is cluttered with banner ads and exhibits a lack of refinement that is understandable given JobCentral’s rapid expansion to meet the requirements of a replacement for AJB.  As Chad likes to say, Rome wasn’t built in a day.  True enough; but at this level of the competition, a little construction dust was enough to drop JobCentral from further contention.   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 10 Results

   

1. SimplyHired
2. Jobster
3. CareerBuilder
4. JobCentral

   

   

So we’re left with three medalists (in alpha order): CareerBuilder, Jobster and SimplyHired.  Who wins the gold?  Stay tuned.

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – CareerBuilder Wins Round 9

   

CareerBuilder took its second win in round nine of the 2007 Top Sites for Job Search competition by offering the most complete set of services in support of the job search process.  Frankly, the competition wasn’t close.

   

The best jobs sites offer the following support services to jobseekers – CareerBuilder offering more than the others:

¾      Personalized pages;

¾      Resume builder;

¾      Resume distribution to other sites;

¾      Resume match to job openings;

¾      Resume review service;

¾      Video resume service;

¾      Job recommendations based on saved info;

¾      Salary information;

¾      Expert career info;

¾      User-generated career info;

¾      Career assessments;

¾      Career fairs;

¾      Labor market information;

¾      Job trends from ad postings;

¾      Social networking features;

¾      Services for special communities;

¾      Company info on ad posters; and,

¾      Employer contact info for non-advertisers.

   

   

As we near the conclusion of 2007 Top Site for Job Search competition, it becomes crystal clear that this decathlon favors versatility over specialization. 

   

Indeed, winner of rounds one and two, and a personal favorite for basic job search, trailed the remaining contenders by a significant margin in delivering support services.  It’s as if Indeed is saying ‘we’re going to do one thing, basic job search, better than anyone else; and we’re not going to compete directly with the major job sites, like CareerBuilder, who we rely on for job listings’. It seems a sound strategy, helping Indeed become the leading job ad integrator; but this specialization also costs them a shot at this year’s title for best job site.

   

On the other hand, Jobster makes it to the final four without having won a single round to this point … but also, having not been the lowest performer in any round.  This is no small accomplishment since the later rounds feature only the best sites.

   

And it seems versatility comes in multiple flavors … in the final four we have a big-three job board, an employer membership site, an integrator with resume distribution, and a social networking job site.

   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 9 Results

   

1. CareerBuilder
2. JobCentral
3. Jobster
4. SimplyHired
5. Indeed

   

   

So it’s on to the tenth and final round.  One last site will be eliminated.  Three medalists will remain.  An ultimate winner will be chosen based on performance spanning all ten rounds.  The test?  Usability.  May the best site win.

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – SimplyHired Wins Round 8

   

Combining the advantages of passive and active job search, email alerts allow you to save job search criteria and receive matching jobs sent directly to you on a user-specified schedule – you can sit back and let the jobs come to you.  Problem is, the execution on most sites leaves much to be desired.

   

Scouts typically search the most recent content (although this is user configurable on some sites), limiting the volume of opportunities (fine on the surface), but unfortunately small data sets expose the weaknesses of today’s search engine technology. 

   

For you see, with rare exception (e.g. Just-Posted), today’s search engines determine relevance by ranking available content rather than comparing each ad against a standardized scale of relevance.  Predictably, when data sets are small, perhaps containing no truly relevant results, most search engines will still blindly rank the results, delivering poor or even ridiculous results.

   

So unless you like perusing daily emails containing mostly irrelevant results, size matters … the job sites with the most ads can return more relevant results.  And so it was in this test, with the three vertical integrators taking the top three spots.

   

The winner, SimplyHired, separated itself from the rest by scoring highest in relevance, and allowing users to setup alerts without first having to setup accounts. And as a fringe benefit, clicking on an emailed ad brings you to a landing page on SimplyHired with info about the advertiser, additional jobs at the same firm, and related jobs in the area. Brilliant.

   

In contrast, HotJobs requires users to setup accounts; and at least in this test, 50% of the ads sent via email by HotJobs were no longer available 45 minutes after the email was received.  So HotJobs exits the competition.

   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 8 Results

   

1. SimplyHired
2. Indeed
3. Jobster
4. CareerBuilder
5. JobCentral
6. HotJobs

       

   

Next up, the ‘associated services’ round.

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – JobCentral Wins Round 7

   

Round seven, the ‘Bait and Switch’ round, tests each of the remaining competitors for truthfulness in three areas:

   

1. Are they free of misleading ads?
2. Do search results consistently reflect user-specified search criteria? 
3. Can the claims each company makes about their site be supported through observation and/or independent sources?

   

By a significant margin, JobCentral has the fewest misleading ads; which really isn’t surprising since most of their ad content comes directly from major employers and State government-operated job boards.   This means that as a user, you’re much less likely to find bogus ads offering:

   

¾      High pay for low-skill part-time work;

¾      Work-from-home opportunities;

¾      Investment opportunities; and,

¾      Products and training for sale.

   

JobCentral ads also appear to be much less likely to include tag spam … a strategy where advertisers are allowed to manipulate the search process by including many keywords unrelated to their ad offering.

   

So JobCentral joins Indeed as the only two-time winners in this year’s competition.

   

   

Now the bad news for Monster – after winning round six, they were a distant last-place finisher in this round and are booted from the competition.  Ironic that an organization that seems to place an emphasis on protecting jobseekers runs a site that is rife with misleading ads, and worse, uses interstitial ads to pad their revenue, ignoring the risk to consumers of phishing and identity theft.  Before using Monster, I think you need to ask yourself if you can entrust your personal data to a company that is willing to place you at additional risk if the price is right.

   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 7 Results

    

1. JobCentral
2. Jobster
3. SimplyHired
4. Indeed
5. CareerBuilder
6. HotJobs
7. Monster

        

   

Baiting jobseekers – offering one thing, through advertising, labeling, incompetence or neglect, and then delivering something else – is a fraudulent business practice that should not be rewarded by consumers when there are better options.  So adios Monster … and on we go to round eight, the search-agent round.

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – Monster Wins Round 6

   

Disclosure – this is the test by which our eight remaining top job site contestants are judged in round six; and in this area Monster outperforms all the rest.

   

The truth of the matter is that job search can be dangerous … electronic job search more so since personal contact is greatly reduced, and in the world of cyberspace almost any individual can project the appearance of a professional firm.  Even the best job sites can be used by unscrupulous folks for spoofing, phishing, money laundering, and fraud.

   

Still, if you’re careful, the benefits of online job search far outweigh the risks; and a big part of being careful is choosing a job site that takes its responsibilities to you as a consumer seriously. Frankly, not all job sites demonstrate that they do.   

   

The best jobs sites disclose their:

¾      Owners;

¾      Leadership team;

¾      Board members;

¾      Partners;

¾      Physical address;

¾      Company phone number;

¾      Privacy policy;

¾      Copyright and intellectual property policy; and,

¾      Terms of use.

   

Plus, the best job sites provide:

¾      Feedback options;

¾      Customer service phone number;

¾      Guidance for avoiding and reporting scams;

¾      Help section with Q&As;

¾      Current system and community information; plus,

¾      Regular communication from the top management.

   

   

Since we’re down to the eight best job sites from our initial fifteen competitors, weaknesses are getting harder to find – these are all good sites; but Monster led the field by a significant margin in this test of disclosure, and they deserve special mention for their efforts to help jobseekers avoid online threats.

   

America’s Job Exchange has key pieces of disclosure in place, but they also have some work to do as they complete the transition from government-controlled AJB, where fraud was virtually nonexistent, to the new realities of the commercial market.  As the last place finisher in this round, they won’t be moving on to the next round.  Still, finishing mid-pack in their first competition as a private job site is impressive.  I suspect that GoogleBase, Microsoft LiveExpo, Craigslist, Oodle, Jobs.com, GetTheJob, and Just-Posted would have preferred to finish in front of AJE.

   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 6 Results

   

1. Monster
2. CareerBuilder
3. Jobster
4. JobCentral
5. HotJobs
6. Indeed
7. SimplyHired
8. America’s Job Exchange

      

   

On to round seven – the bait-and-switch round.  May the best site win.

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – CareerBuilder Wins Round 5

   

CareerBuilder tops the field in round five, offering users the most compete set of advanced ‘filters’, ‘sorts’ and search options.

   

Let’s say you are looking for:

   

¾      a sales and/or marketing job;

¾      in the Dallas, TX area;

¾      paying $80k or more;

¾      requiring a 4-year college degree;

¾      excluding jobs in medical sales;

¾      excluding national and regional jobs ads; and,

¾      excluding ads from your current employer.

   

Only CareerBuilder makes this as easy as filling in a few search boxes, and checking a couple boxes.   

   

In contrast, Jobs.com offers no advanced search capabilities … in fact, clicking the provided ‘advanced’ search link takes users directly to a list of search results rather than providing advanced options.  Pretty lame for a site owned by Monster; and frankly, given the limited options available to Jobs.com users, especially when compared to JobCentral and America’s Job Exchange, I have no idea how Jobs.com passed the screening process to be included on the list of sites published by ETA as alternates to America’s Job Bank.  Finishing last in this round drops Jobs.com from further competition.

   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 5 Results

   

1. CareerBuilder
2. SimplyHired
3. HotJobs
4. Indeed
5. JobCentral
6. Monster
7. America’s Job Exchange
8. Jobster
9. Oodle
10. GetTheJob
11. Jobs.com

   

   

Through five rounds we’ve looked at the combination of content in small, medium and large markets, basic and advanced search options, and search relevance delivered by each site.  With four distinctly different winners through five rounds, it’s clear that no site excels in all areas.  It’s equally clear that Oodle and GetTheJob are outclassed in this group … neither site has had a top five finish in any round.  So as we head to round six, only the eight best sites will move forward.

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – America’s Job Exchange Wins Round 4

   

Although America’s Job Exchange (AJE) is a new site, with limited traffic typical of a new entrant, below the surface is an old friend, the now shuttered yet award winning AJB.  So AJE is mature far beyond its years.

   

Maturity brings refinement, but just as important, the AJB/AJE interface was designed without the constraint of profit motives … no ‘featured ads’ clutter the results, no fear of direct comparisons to other sites limit filter choices, and no worries about generating metrics in support of high advertising rates guided navigational flow.  This freedom is reflected in the many basic search options, filters and sorts that give jobseekers unmatched control of the search process.  Hopefully this won’t change now that AJE is privately funded.

   

Yes, content is important.  So is search accuracy.  But the benefits of both pale without placing control of the search process in users’ hands.  And among the remaining twelve competitors, no site provides as many basic filters and sorts for date range, geography and relevance, as America’s Job Exchange.

   

For example, AJE provides the following options for limiting ads by date:

¾      Within Last Day

¾      Within Last 2 Days

¾      Within Last 3 Days

¾      Within Last 4 Days

¾      Within Last 5 Days

¾      Within Last 6 Days

¾      Within Last 7 Days

¾      Within Last 14 Days

¾      Within Last 30 Days

¾      Within Last 60 Days

   

On the other hand, LiveExpo takes a page from the Craigslist playbook and provides limited options for filtering and sorting results by relevance for user-specified date ranges and distances surrounding specific geographies.  Too bad – after finishing third in round three, Microsoft’s LiveExpo places last in this round and exits the competition.

   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 4 Results

   

1. America’s Job Exchange
2. JobCentral
3. Indeed
4. SimplyHired
5. Jobster
6. CareerBuilder
7. Monster
8. HotJobs
9. Jobs.com
10. GetTheJob
11. Oodle
12. LiveExpo

   

   

On to round five … which of the remaining sites offers users the most compete set of advanced ‘filters’, ‘sorts’ and search options?   

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – JobCentral Wins Round 3

   

Surprise, surprise … JobCentral jumps from next-to-last in round 2, to take first in round 3. 

   

Think of the 2007 Top Job Site Competition as a decathlon, where instead of testing speed, endurance, strength, and skill, we’re testing ad coverage, relevance and features in large markets and small.  It’s possible that a winner will emerge without winning a single event; but to do so will require the competitor to be free of weaknesses, finishing well in all events.  Still, we shouldn’t expect that the fastest sprinter will be the strongest in the shot put.

   

Rounds two and three were as different as a sprint and a marathon.  Whereas round two looked for ads in Boston, MA, a population center of about 4.5 million, round three looked for ads in Baker City, OR, population of 10,000.

   

As it turns out, government employment represents a more significant proportion of the economy in many smaller towns in the west … these towns are often county seats, and citizens expect access to government services regardless of population density.

   

So the job boards that don’t include government job ads for Baker City are missing a key sector; and this is a sector where JobCentral shines brightly.  With the closing of America’s Job Bank, JobCentral stepped forward to provide similar services, and they have successfully executed relationships with 30+ State government employment agencies … Oregon included.

   

   

Additional surprises in round three? 

    

Monster placed next to last, paying a price for trying to limit comparison between other job sites – for example, instead of offering the typical filters of one week and 25 miles, Monster offers filters of 5 days or 10 days and 20 miles or 50 miles; and when Monster finds no results (indicating limited coverage) for a specified search, they substantially broaden the search without notifying the user … returning many results that do not match the original intent.

   

LiveExpo placed third, perhaps indicating that organizations in smaller communities are more likely to use free classifieds rather than paying top dollar for listings on national job sites.

   

Just-Posted, despite a 5^th place showing in round one, came in last in this round, and therefore exits the competition.  Unfortunately the site was undone by a change in a third-party feed that resulted in erroneous records displaying for the Baker City search.

   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 3 Results

   

1. JobCentral
2. Indeed
3. LiveExpo
4. SimplyHired
5. Jobster
6. CareerBuilder
7. GetTheJob
8. HotJobs
9. Oodle
10. America’s Job Exchange
11. Jobs.com
12. Monster
13. Just-Posted

   

   

On to round four … which site offers users the best combination of ‘filters’ and ‘sorts’ to allow the display of search results in relevance order for user-specified date ranges and distances surrounding specific geographies?  May the best site win.

   

2007 Top Sites for Job Search – Indeed Wins Again

   

Two rounds, two wins for Indeed.

   

In this second round, fourteen of the top general job sites were tested to find jobs for ten hypothetical jobseekers in Boston, MA.  Roughly five times the size of Tulsa, OK (round one test location), Boston provides plentiful job opportunities. Thus, this test puts more emphasis on the ability of each search engine to prioritize their search results.

   

Indeed continues to impress by providing the most relevant opportunities with very few duplicates.

   

   

Surprises in round two? 

   

GoogleBase dropped from third in round one to last in round two.   While GoogleBase did the best job of weeding out duplicates in this round, perhaps their methodology is too aggressive in eliminating marginal content and partial matches because in the end they returned the fewest relevant results.  As a result, GoogleBase won’t be back for found three.

   

Jobs.com jumped to third in round two, from ninth in round one – impressive, but I can’t explain it.  In round three we’ll see which of the previous rounds was a fluke.

   

Jobster tried my patience – their site was painfully slow yesterday – but no points were awarded or deducted for speed in this round.  Alexa data indicates that Jobster is “Slow (72% of sites are faster)”, but performance yesterday seemed atypical.

   

   

Best Job Sites – Round 2 Results

   

1. Indeed
2. SimplyHired
3. Jobs.com
4. CareerBuilder
5. America’s Job Exchange
6. Jobster
7. Monster
8. LiveExpo
9. Oodle
10. GetTheJob
11. Just-Posted
12. HotJobs
13. JobCentral
14. GoogleBase

   

   

Round three challenge?  Who has the most jobs listed for a small western town?  May the best site win.