TheLadders Blog

After many weeks of careful planning, my colleagues and I were proud to launch our inaugural JobMobile event in New York City last night. This was the first in a series of nationwide events that brought together the talent acquisition community to discuss major innovations and strategies in mobile recruitment. It also served as a festive platform for us to honor the top 1% of recruiting professionals in New York, better known as TheLadders ELITE.

Our CEO and Co-founder, Alex Douzet, gave a keynote presentation on the ever-increasing demand for mobile solutions across a broad spectrum of sectors, including recruitment. It’s estimated that within the next twelve months, employers can expect 50% of their web traffic to come from mobile devices. This shift in our businesses creates many opportunities, but also comes with its challenges.

Employers cannot simply transform their companies’ web experience to an iPhone screen. Mobile requires an intuitive design and user experience that brings convenience to the job seeker with functions like “one-click apply.” With that in mind, Alex discussed TheLadders’ latest projects, including our mobile-responsive site redesign for job seekers; the introduction of our proprietary, competitive-analysis tool, TheLadders Scout; and our impending mobile app that will allow job seekers to find and apply to the right job on the go.

I had the honor of moderating a diverse panel discussion featuring industry thought-leaders Karen Miller, vice president of people for Seamless; Jack Kelly, managing director and co-founder of the Compliance Search Group; Karsten Vagner, director of people for ZocDoc; and Melissa Enbar, director of recruiting for Birchbox.

Our goal was to have an honest conversation about mobile recruitment and discuss what’s working for their organizations and what challenges remain. This group did not disappoint! Not only did they share their best practices and common gripes, but they also talked about the differences in their approaches. For instance, corporate recruiters look for synergies between their product and marketing teams to build a mobile recruitment strategy that fits their brand and shows off their corporate culture; whereas agency recruiters tend to utilize mobile and social in different ways to attract the right type of candidates to suit their clients’ needs.

What I learned from this lively conversation is that every professional interprets mobile recruitment differently to suit their business needs. From the utilization of social media, to developing mobile-optimized career sites and mobile apps, to incorporating Skype and texting into the interview process, organizations can find large and small ways to attract the right candidate pool.

After the panel discussion, TheLadders Director of Client Relations, Employer Marketing & Sales, Thomas Murphy, honored TheLadders ELITE and presented them with their awards and ELITE jackets (I have to admit I’m jealous – those jackets are great)!

The night ended with cocktails and conversations. As always, it was a pleasure to meet so many great people and get a chance to chat. I want to thank everyone who was able to attend and give a special shout-out to our wonderful panelists for their participation. If you’re a recruiting professional who lives in Chicago, San Francisco, or Atlanta, keep your eyes peeled – we’re coming to your town soon!

Amanda Augustine is the Job Search Expert for TheLadders, the online job-matching service for career-driven professionals. She is a Certified Professional Career Coach (CPCC) and Certified Professional Resume Writer (CPRW) who provides job search and career guidance for professionals looking to make their next career move. Have a question for Amanda? Submit your question here for a chance to have it answered in her weekly column, and be sure to follow @JobSearchAmanda on Twitter and “Like” her on Facebook for up-to-the-minute job-search advice.

About a month ago, there was a rally held in Washington D.C. to protest a perceived lack of action by the government regarding climate change. This was estimated to be the largest group in history that has gotten together for this purpose – 35,000 individuals, filling the National Mall, from the Capitol building to the Washington Monument. For those unfamiliar with our nation’s capital, this is an expansive 1.2-mile piece of land.

I’m telling you this because TheLadders would now require a space of the same proportion to fit all of the employers on its site. That’s right – we hit a new milestone this week: more than 35k employers are using TheLadders to find the most qualified job-seeking candidates out there. Luckily, each hiring manager can search for candidates from the comfort of their own computer or mobile device, so we won’t be renting out the National Mall anytime soon.

Our primary goal at TheLadders is to match the right person with the right job. As a member of TheLadders’ Employer Relations team, I am reminded of this goal every day as I approve new employers to use our site. For those unaware, every single employer profile submitted has human eyes on it before it gets approved (more often than not, my own beautiful blues). Taking this step allows us to verify that only legitimate recruiting professionals are allowed to post and search on our site.

Now, there is no certification needed to make a recruiter “legitimate” – we simply use the information on each person’s profile to ascertain whether they are right for TheLadders. The information can be found in a corporate email address, it can be found on the company website they provide, it can be found in the “About Me” section they write, etc. We take a look at the total package and then make a judgment call. If an individual doesn’t meet our standards or have a complete profile, he/she receives a personal email explaining why they weren’t approved. Often times, those turned away contact our Employer Relations team to find out what they need to do to get approved, and eventually are.

So, is this process of maintaining a high standard for employers on TheLadders worth it? Are we able to have our cake and eat it too? This is a commonly used idiom, albeit one that has never made much sense to me. Rather, I would say that through our approval process, we are able to eat a larger piece of cake that is delicious while still being nutritionally sound. On second thought, maybe desert analogies are not the best way to categorize this success. More than 35,000 employers using TheLadders, all meeting our high standards for quality, is a mark of success that stands on its own.

Andrew Wilson is a Junior Account Manager at TheLadders, specializing in recruiter acquisition and onboarding for the Employer Relations team. He enjoys Cleveland professional sports teams, and things that don’t make him miserable.

Providing the means for a thorough understanding of TheLadders for employers has always been the main focus for Enterprise Account Management at TheLadders. We believe that proper education for our employer population will not only increase overall client engagement, but will contribute to maximizing proper and effective site-use as well.

More than a year ago, we started conducting “Spotlight Demos” on TheLadders in real time. In these sessions, rather than reviewing the entire site at once, we chose to pinpoint certain features for each month’s focus. This provided an opportunity to re-review permanent site functions and to introduce new features as they were added to the site. Choosing to do this on a more singular level has resulted in increased overall site use.

After measuring the success of the Spotlight Trainings, we quickly made these sessions more available to our recruiter base by increasing the number of demos held each month, and inviting more recruiters to participate. Since the start of the program, we have seen an increase of five times the amount of registrants per session, and that number only continues to grow. Additionally, by the end of each month’s training, the overall use of the highlighted topic spikes upwards of 15 percent, which is great news for our clients and the Account Management team!

Keep your eyes open for the Spotlight Training registration emails, and reserve your “spot” today!

Roxanne Prendergast is a Team Lead for the Account Managers in the Recruiter Relations department where she ensures that each client is properly educated on how to effectively maximize their time on-site.  Outside of work, she enjoys coaching both men and women’s volleyball at Yeshiva University.

Usually after the holiday season, the last thing you want to hear is that you have doubled in size. But here at the TheLadders, we are ecstatic to learn that we are twice as big as we were a year ago, meaning the number of recruiters on our site — not our waistline.

Over the course of 2012, our mission was to increase the volume of meaningful conversations between our recruiters and job seekers in three ways:

• Offering our service as a free resource to recruiters and employers
• Learning from our users to create new functionality for our recruiters and job seekers
• Providing compelling content about the recruitment process and how to best navigate it

However, in the end, we went back to what we learned in school and just did simple math: if we increase the number of recruiters, we will increase the connections with our job seekers. So, we did just that. Over the past year, our product, marketing, and recruiter relations teams were steadfast in their efforts to increase the population of recruiters on TheLadders. And succeed they did. I am happy to report that as of last week, TheLadders boasts more than 30,000 recruiters on our site.

What this means for you, our valued job seekers, is MORE conversations, MORE active job-postings, and MORE recruiters who are dedicated to your specific function.

Although we are proud of this milestone, please know that 2013 will be no different. We will continue to work tirelessly to increase recruiter activity and help you take the next step in your career.

Thomas Murphy is the manager of recruiter experience at TheLadders. Tom works with his team to understand how recruiters use technology to help them find the best candidates. When not talking shop about HR, he is trying to get back in shape so he does not embarrass himself at the team triathlon next year.

Recruiters frequently have days when they don’t have a spare minute to find new candidates for open positions, which is usually because they are busy meeting with employers to talk about MORE open positions that need to be filled. This is where a Talent Specialist comes in handy!  Recruiters with TheLadders have access to FitFinder, which is a service executed by a team of Talent Specialists that sources candidates for you.  In the last two years, the FitFinder team has worked with hundreds of recruiters, on thousands of job openings, to identify the most qualified candidates for their open positions.

While our service was saving recruiters time sourcing candidates, it wasn’t uncommon for the selected job seekers to decline interest or become unresponsive once contacted by the recruiter. So, we took it a step further and are now “pre-screening” qualified job seekers to confirm their interest in job openings before submitting their information to recruiters.

Now, within 72 hours, we are able to provide recruiters with job seekers who are not only a fit for their openings, but have confirmed interest in their jobs! This gives recruiters more time to build relationships and schedule interviews with the right job seekers.

Having piloted this service for more than six months, we are extremely satisfied with the positive feedback we have received from our recruiters and members alike. So, if you are a recruiter and haven’t experienced FitFinder, what are you waiting for!?

Carrie Markworth is the Jr. Manager of the FitFinder team at TheLadders. She has spent the last two years mastering Boolean search and helping recruiters find the perfect match for their open positions. When she’s not working, she is out exploring Manhattan and trying to find the best burger in the city! 

TheLadders is happy to announce a new partnership with eQuest, the world’s most utilized job posting distribution solution which enables companies to automatically post their open positions on TheLadders. Effective this week, eQuest clients can automatically post ALL of their professional positions on TheLadders, with no additional effort or cost.

This partnership is a true win-win for both parties. eQuest is able to offer their clients ease of use and free advertisement, and TheLadders can now showcase open positions to its members that historically wouldn’t be published on its site. In the coming weeks, TheLadders will see an increase of more than 50,000 jobs due to this new partnership.

The hard work between TheLadders’ and eQuests’ development teams over the past few months has brought this partnership to fruition. We’re thrilled to bring more job opportunities to our members and give recruiters more tools to create meaningful connections with potential candidates.

Thomas Murphy is the manager of recruiter experience at TheLadders. Tom works with his team to understand how recruiters use technology to help them find the best candidates. When not talking shop about HR, he is trying to get back in shape so he does not embarrass himself at the team triathlon next year.

Last week, TheLadders hosted The Ladders Connect, the first in a series of events featuring a dynamic panel of industry thought leaders. Hosted at Helen Mills, one of New York City’s most unique venues, nearly 150 guests gathered for a thought-provoking panel discussion about the challenges faced when hiring a multi-generational workforce.

Moderated by TheLadders Job Search Expert Amanda Augustine, the panel included:

• Tom McElroy, Global Head of Recruiting Operations & Systems, Bloomberg
• Anne Molignano, SVP of Human Resources, Sony Music Entertainment
• Sara Patterson, Head of Talent Management, Condé Nast
• Mitchell Schwartz, Director of Staffing, Hewlett-Packard

The special evening kicked off with an introduction and product announcements from Alex Douzet, COO & Co-Founder of TheLadders. He proudly alerted the audience that we are now a free resource for recruiters and employers, which was met, not surprisingly, with huge applause. In fact, we currently offer:

-          Unlimited Search

-          Unlimited Post

-          Unlimited Targeted Hiring Alerts

After the presentation and panel discussion, guests mingled with their industry colleagues over cocktails and conversation. Reflecting the event’s theme of meaningful connections, everyone received an all-device, solar-powered charger to stay connected with TheLadders’ more than 5 million, on-the-go members.

Save the date for our next event, taking place on January 10, 2013, at Grand Central Terminal. Details to follow!

Lisa Hagendorf is the Vice President of Public Relations for TheLadders where she is a huge ambassador of the brand in the office. At the gym. And on the street. She just can’t stop talking about TheLadders. Ever.

This week, I am in Las Vegas at the Onrec Global Recruiting Trends Conference 2012, speaking about “Building Meaningful Relationships between Job Seekers and Employers” and “The Value of Information: Strategy for Innovation.”

Additionally, we are seizing this unique opportunity to announce to the community that we are now a free resource for recruiters and employers. In fact, we are proud to announce that we offer:

-          Unlimited Search

-          Unlimited Post

-          Unlimited Targeted Hiring Alerts

In a nutshell, TheLadders now offers for free what LinkedIn, Monster, CareerBuilder, Indeed, Dice and the rest of the industry offer for a fee.

So, why are we giving away our unparalleled services for free when recruiters and employers are willing to pay for them? Here are five reasons:

• As of last year, we no longer focus only on $100K+ jobs; instead, we target all professional job seekers. Candidates on TheLadders can pay $25 per month to gain full access to our network. However, we also offer a freemium model for job seekers, which afford the ability to apply to targeted hiring alerts, as well as be searchable and contacted by recruiters and employers.

• The revenue we generate from job seekers enables us to continually optimize the job-matching experience, enabling us to fulfill our mission of matching “the right person for the right job.”

• As I mentioned in my recent blog post “Introducing the ‘Less than Free’ Business Model,” free enables us to improve product features for job seekers. Free is also exciting for recruiters, as they are just as essential to our success as job seekers.

• Free enables us to embrace and migrate our ecosystem to the next generation of job search — mobile — empowering us to re-envision our business with a “mobile-first” approach.

• Having recently reached a milestone of 25,000 recruiters and employers, free will enable us over the next three years to provide access to our network to more than 100,000 active recruiters and employers in the U.S., positioning us as the leading platform for professional jobs.

Mobile is disrupting the way job seekers interact with content, and we are contributing to this disruption.

Over the coming months, we will release several new innovations for both job seekers and recruiters. Our next milestone will be our job-seeker app launching in early 2013, followed by native iOS apps for iPhone and iPad. Stay tuned…the future of jobs is coming and TheLadders is pioneering the trail!

Download Alex’s OnRec Presentation — Building Meaningful Connections ›

Download Alex’s OnRec Presentation — The Value of Information ›

Alex Douzet is Co-Founder and COO of TheLadders. In this role, Alex is responsible for the company strategy, global business operations, and product development.

Earlier this week, I had the pleasure of participating in Mediabistro’s first-ever Career Breakfast, a Google + hangout where a small panel of HR professionals and career experts gave their insight into various aspects of the job search process. This week’s topic was “What Really Happens After You Submit Your Resume.”

There’s a lot of advice floating around about standing out from the crowd during the application process. I’ve always believed, and my fellow panelists agree, that the best ways are the simplest. First, be qualified. The fanciest song and dance routine won’t get you anywhere if you can’t do the job. Second, have an easy-to-read resume that quickly conveys your experience and skills. A study done at TheLadders revealed that your resume has about six seconds to make a good first impression.

Whether you submit your resume through an advanced applicant tracking system or directly to a human being, the goal is the same. You want to submit a resume that lays out why you’re right for the job. It should be clear and clean: as free of bells and whistles as possible. A great resume won’t guarantee you a job, but a solid, well-timed, customized resume will likely get you an interview, and that’s the first step.

According to the responses I received, our audience got real value from the conversation. I love the opportunity to give insight from the recruiter/hiring manager side. I look forward to participating in many more of these events and helping more job seekers navigate the often frightening and confusing realm of the job search.

David Gaspin is the Manager, Talent Acquisition at TheLadders. When he’s not busy hiring amazing people for TheLadders, he keeps busy by trying to sound important – whether to his team, job seekers, or (for a real challenge) his 5-year old son.

As any of our career experts will tell you, having a great personal brand and a clear and concise elevator pitch to deliver your professional value is key. Get your pitch right and it could be just what you need to unlock networking opportunities that could lead to your dream job.

We’ve teamed up for a co-promotion with AMC’s new series the The Pitch to announce our first Twitter contest! Share your super-brief elevator pitch on Twitter using the hashtag #mypitch and you could win a 3-month Premium membership on TheLadders.

How to Enter

1. Follow @TheLadders on Twitter
2. Learn more about crafting your elevator pitch from our selected articles.
3. Tweet your personal elevator pitch with the hashtag #mypitch
4. If your #mypitch tweet is a winner, we’ll DM you with info on how to redeem your free membership.

Now onto the technicalities: The contest, beginning on Sunday, May 6 at 12:00:01am ET and ending Wednesday May 16 at 12:00:00am ET, is open to legal residents of the United States. Winners will be notified on or around Thursday, May 24. Contestants must be at least 18 years old and have a registered Twitter account. For full details, see contest terms and conditions.

That’s enough from me—now I want to hear from you! See you on Twitter.

Kate Addicott is lead copywriter & voice behind @TheLadders. When not tweeting, Kate creates content to engage members and attract new ones. (At exactly 140 characters, the preceding bio is Twitter-ready.)