These tools allow employers, particularly smaller employers, to create their own private, low-cost job board and then make those jobs visible to thousands of job seekers with minimal time, effort and cost:

1.  Sign up for a free blog with Blogger.com.

Blogs are relatively easy to use for anyone familiar with a word processing program like Microsoft Word.  Blogger.com, owned by Google, has excellent documentation to help with any questions, and BINGO! your jobs postings are online at no, or very low, cost to you.

Advantages of doing your own blog:

• You control it.  Add and take down jobs as appropriate.
• Search engines LOVE blogs. They have a built in search-engine-friendliness that makes them easily digested by search engines, and that will bring the blog traffic and job seekers.
• Blogs really are easy to do.
  If no one on your staff is capable/comfortable or has the time, hire an intern from a local college or high school to set up and even, if necessary,  to manage the blog for you.  Blogs and blog posts are really very easy to do.

Be sure to do the following:

• Brand the blog with the organization’s name, e.g. Jobs-at-[OurCompany] or Jobs-with-[OurCompany] or [OurCompany]-Jobs
• Remove filled or canceled jobs ASAP!
  Leaving up jobs that are no longer ”live” will give your blog a bad reputation among job seekers. And, you’ll be annoyed by inquiries from job seekers looking for closed jobs.
• Indicate clearly your business name and the location on your blog in an About or Contact page.
  If your site looks too anonymous, visitors may think it’s  just another Internet job scam.
• Indicate clearly on each job/blog posting where the job is located (city & state), because that’s how people usually search for a job (e.g, “what” plus “where” is the most common search).
• Make it clear how job seekers can contact you.
  Include an address, phone number, and email link (or email addresses) for job seekers to reach you.  Put at least an email address at the bottom of each job posting you publish.
• Link your blog TO your main Website so that job seekers will know what your organization does.
  That also provides a good in-bound link for your organization’s main Website, which is always good for SEO.
• Link your main Website TO your blog with a nicely worded link that says “Jobs” on it (NOT “click here”!).
  Then, if someone visiting your Website is interested in working for you, you have made it easy for them to find your job opportunities.

2.  “Syndicate” your job postings by registering your blog with job aggregator sites that attract large numbers of job seekers.

• Job aggreation megasites like Indeed.com, a Job-Hunt sponsor, collect job postings from thousands of sites (job boards, associations, newspapers, employers, etc.) and attract millions of job seekers every month because of their enormous number of job postings.
• LinkUp.com is a smaller site focused exclusively on jobs posted on employer sites.
• One free link is available for legitimate employers in Job-Hunt’s Mega Directory of Employers, linking directly to the recruiting pages of over 8,000 employers.

3.  Add a comment to this blog with the URL of your company’s recruiting blog, and attract the visitors to this blog as well as increasing your chances of a free listing in Job-Hunt’s Employer Directory.

NOTE:  If you want to be included in Job-Hunt’s Employer Directory, you MUST include the CITY and STATE where your organization is located or where it is headquartered if it has more than one location.

———————————————
About the author…

Online job search expert Susan P. Joyce has been observing the online job search world and teaching online job search skills since 1995. Susan is a two-time layoff “graduate” who has worked in human resources at Harvard University and in a compensation consulting firm. In 1998, her company, NETability, Inc. purchased Job-Hunt.org, and Susan has been editor and publisher of Job-Hunt since then. Follow Susan on Twitter at @jobhuntorg.

More on Social Media: Social Media Home Twitter Toolbox 5 Ways Social Media Keeps Skills Up to Date Top 10 Twitter Job Search Lists 101 Best Twitter Career & Job Search Resources 8 Twitter SEO Tips for Job Seekers Top 50 Employers Recruiting on Twitter Top 50 College & University Career Centers Twitter Accounts

None of the big pharmaceutical companies are on this list either because I couldn’t find any of them, and, even though Best Buy has thousands of jobs posted on its Website (here), they are using Twitter only for marketing, so far.  No other large retailer showed up, either.

You’ll find the U.S. Department of State is the only branch of the U.S. Federal Government or ANY U.S.A. government entity, that is recruiting on Twitter.  I very recently discovered that the city of Kingston, Ontario, Canada, also recruits using Twitter.  Interesting…

Researching this list reminded me of slogging through the Fortune 500 ten years ago, looking for the large employers that were smart enough to (1) have a corporate Website with “current” content and (2) use their corporate Website for recruiting (and not hiding the job listings).  If I remember correctly, in 1999, only about 10% of them did that.  Closer to 95% do it now.  Wonder how long it will take the majority of them to adapt to Twitter for recruiting…

Food for Thought

Part of this (present vs. missing employers) is “the economy” of course, but not all of it.  Look to these employers, below, to find management that pays attention to what’s going on in the marketplace and that is smart enough to stake out their claim to the appropriate technological footprint.

The List – The Best and the Brightest?

Many companies have customer service and marketing accounts, but use for recruiting is just beginning and will probably pick up as the economy improves and Twitter becomes more popular.  More Twitter accounts will be integrated into Job-Hunt’s vast collection of resources as employers use them more.

If you find an employer’s Twitter recruiting account that is not included, please let me know.

NOTE: We have posted a continuously updated version of this list with more than 160 employers included on Twitter as a Twitter List – JobHuntOrg/Employers Recruiting, one of the top lists on Listorious.com.

For now, this list is in alphabetical order within country:

	Employer	Location	Twitter Account
Global:
	KPMG	HQ in Switzerland	@KPMG
	Wipro, LTD	HQ in India	@WiproCareers
United States:
	Accenture	HQ in NYC	@Accenture_Jobs
	Access Communications	San Francisco & NYC	@accesscareers
	ACULIS, Inc.	Salt Lake City, UT	@aculis
	ADP	HQ in Roseland, NJ	@ADPCareers
	Allstate Insurance	HQ in Northbrook, IL	@AllstateCareers
	Assurant Solutions	Atlanta, GA	@AssurantCareers
	AT&T	HQ in Dallas, TX	@ATTjobs
	Burger King	US-wide	@BKCareers
	comScore	HQ in Reston, VA	@comScoreCareers
	Davita, Inc.	Lakewood, CO	@DaVitaJobs
	Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu	US HQ in NYC, NY	@JoinDeloitteUS
	Ecolab	St. Paul, MN	@Ecolab_Jobs
	EMC	Hopkinton, MA	@EMCCareers
	EMC	Hopkinton, MA	@EMCCollege
	Ernst & Young	US HQ in NYC, NY	@Ernst_and_Young
	Expedia	HQ in Bellevue, WA	@Expedia_Jobs
	Follett Software Co.	HQ in McHenry, IL	@FSCCareers
	Forrester Research, Inc.	Cambridge, MA	@forresterjobs
	Fullhouse Interactive	Milwaukee & Chicago	@fullhousecareer
	Gartner, Inc.	HQ in Stamford, CT	@GartnerJobs
	Hershey Company	Hershey, PA	@HersheyCompany
	Hewitt	HQ in Lincolnshire, IL	@HewittCareers
	Hyatt Hotels & Resorts	HQ in Chicago, IL	@Hyattcareers
	Hyatt San Antonio	San Antonio, TX	@HyattSanAntonio
	Intel	HQ in Santa Clara, CA	@JobsatIntel
	J.B. Hunt	HQ in Lowell, AR	@WeHaveFreight
	Kaplan Test Prep Services	NYC, NY	@KTPA_Careers
	Keller Williams Realty	HQ in Austin, TX	@KWCareers
	Kissito Post-Acute Care	Roanoke, VA	@kissitocareers
	KPMG US	US HQ in NYC, NY	@KPMGUSCareers
	Kroger	HQ in Cincinnati, OH	@KrogerWorks
	LexisNexis	HQ in NYC, NY	@LN_Recruiting
	Mattel	El Segundo, CA	@MattelRecruiter
	Mattel	El Segundo, CA	@mattelmba
	Mayo Clinic	HQ in Rochester, MN	@mayoclinic
	McCormick & Schmick	Portland, OR	@Careers_At_MSSR
	Microsoft	HQ in Redmond, WA	@JobsBlog (looking a bit inactive)
	MTV Networks	HQ in NYC, NY	@MTVnetworksjobs
	MTV Games	HQ in NYC, NY	@MTVGamesJobs
	MySpaceJobs	Beverly Hills, CA	@MySpaceJobs
	Raytheon	HQ in Waltham, MA	@Raytheon_Jobs
	Razorfish	HQ in Seattle, WA	@RazorfishJobs
	Sodexo	HQ in Gaithersburg, MD	@SodexoCareers
	Spotsylvania Regional Medical Center	Fredericksburg, VA	@CareersAtSRMC
	Thomson Reuters	HQ in NYC, NY	@TRCareers
	Twitter (of course!)	San Francisco, CA	@jobs
	United Parcel Service	HQ in Atlanta, GA	@UPSjobs
	UPMC	Pittsburgh, PA	@UPMCCareers
	US Dept. of State	HQ in D.C.	@DOScareers
	Verizon	HQ in NYC, NY	@VerizonCareers
	Warner Brothers	HQ in Burbank, CA	@WBCareers
Canada:
	City of Kingston	Kingston, ON	@KingstonCareers
	Vancouver Pinnacle Marriot	Vancouver, BC	@VanMarriott
UK:
	IBM/UK		@IBMUKcareer
	KPMG		@KPMGRecruitment
	PepsiCo		@PepsiCo_UKjobs
	Royal Bank of Scotland		@JobsatRBSgroup
Australia:
	Deloitte Australia		@Green_Dot
Belgium:
	IBM/Belgium		@ibmbejobs
South Africa:
	IBM/South Africa		@IBM_CEEMEA_Jobs

Stay tuned for more lists like this, and come back as this one expands.

Good luck with your job search!

(c) Copyright 2009.  Job-Hunt.org All rights reserved.

About the author and list compiler…

Online job search expert Susan P. Joyce has been observing the online job search world and teaching online job search skills since 1995. Susan is a two-time layoff “graduate” who has worked in human resources at Harvard University and in a compensation consulting firm. In 1998, her company, NETability, Inc. purchased Job-Hunt.org, and Susan has been editor and publisher of Job-Hunt since then. For the latest news and updates, follow Susan on Twitter @JobHuntOrg.

Having worked in HR myself, pre-Internet, I can understand how people in HR feel, at least to a certain degree.  However, I’m not letting HR off the hook for 2 reasons, both of which are really in the self-interest of every employer to consider:

1.)  Today, it’s very easy to use technology to manage many of the problems that technology creates.

Like using an autoresponder. It automatically sends out email in response to an action:

*  Receive a resume or application, triger an autoreply that thanks the person for their interest and acknowledges receipt.

In these days of spam filters and technical glitches, it’s nice to know that something was received, rather than just wondering or, perhaps worse, following up ad nauseum to find out if the resume/application was received.  Just take the uncertainty out of the equation.

*  Send out a message when a job is filled. “Sorry you weren’t the candidate chosen, but the position has been filled. Thank you for your interest.  Your resume will be on file…” 

Not personal but also not leaving the job seeker hanging out there wondering what happened, still hoping for a good outcome.

There are inexpensive autoresponder solutions out there, and they have been there for years.  Yes, they require some set-up and management.  Ask anyone on your ecommerce Web team how to find one and set one up.

Autoresponders are MUCH better than ignoring job seekers, again, removing the uncertainty, because… (see # 2)

2.)  Technology can create a much bigger problem for the employers who treat job seekers so carelessly and rudely. 

Customer service, including the way an employer treats job applicants, isn’t much of a secret any more, and it will become less of a secret in the future.

Be rude to applicants, and they have many tools and venues to “out” that rudeness, very publicly, causing great damage to an employer’s image in the marketplace.  Hasn’t happened yet, but it will.

Bottom Line

Employers who treat job seekers with casual rudeness are making a mistake that will be very expensive for them some day soon.

1.)  Active candidates – those who are looking for a job

2.)  Passive candidates – those who are (supposedly) happily employed and NOT looking for a job.

By posting your resume on one of the job boards or by responding to a job posting you see, you are an “active” candidate.  And, therefore, by definition, undesirable.

Don’t we all know idiots who – inexplicably – remain employed while much more intelligent, talented, capable, and hard-working people are shown the door. 

Based on my observations of who stays and who leaves, particularly during a mass layoff, the discriminator isn’t talent or even good work.  It’s 100% LUCK – “right place; right time.”

FINALLY, someone in the recruiting world is seriously questioning this idiotic (IMHO) belief.  Ronald Katz has written an article on ERE.net (Electronic Recruiting Exchange – an online forum for recruiters to exchange ideas and network).

Mr. Katz’s article is “What’s So Great About Passive Candidates?“  Read it and the responses and understand the marketplace you are facing.  Many recruiters do not agree with Mr. Katz, unfortunately.

Job seekers responses:

*  Ignore it all, and job hunt actively - you WILL find intelligent recruiters and employers out there who really are looking for the best candidate, regardless of employment status.

*  Be “Active,” but try to look “Passive” – a variation on the old playing-hard-to-get game that is seen in the dating world.  Don’t put your resume on the big job boards?  Not sure that’s a good idea given how many recruiters “fish” through those resume databases looking for good resumes, although also searching are scammers, insurance sales people, credit rating clean-up services, etc.

 Other posts:

*  Talent War?  What talent War? - my rant on this subject from December, 2007

*  Passive Candidate – An Illusion - by Ann Clifford of Safari Solutions, from May, 2008

*  He’s just not that into you – great expansion on the dating analogy, from Marenated by by Maren Hogan, today

 So, keep this in mind, and know that in a hyper-competitative job market as we will be having in early 2009 (at least), at least some foolish people will hold your job search against you.  I’m a firm believer in “what goes around, comes around” and the people who hold your job search against you now, will find themselves in the same boat (getting the same treatment) at some future point.

Good luck with your job search!

1.  Over 66% of the recruiters taking the Webinar use LinkedIn for recruiting.

Wow!  I’ve talked with many recruiters who have said that LinkedIn is an important source for them.  And I’ve also interviewed several job seekers who landed new jobs via LinkedIn.  So, I knew it was important! 

I wonder what the poll results would have been if they’d been asked about using Monster, CareerBuilder, Yahoo HotJobs, etc.?

But, THIS data proves the point!  If you are NOT using LinkedIn to promote yourself and your personal brand, you are really handicaping yourself in your job search, now, and, probably increasingly handicapped in the future. 

[Read the articles by Job-Hunt's Social Networking Pro Jason Alba and also Deb Dib's article on how executives can use LinkedIn for their job search for ideas on how to leverage LinkedIn for your job search.] 

2.  Nearly 20% of recruiters use no social networking sites at all.

I wonder about these people.  It seems to me that they are either very well known/networked in a small niche, techno-phobic, or they are planning to change jobs in the not too distant future.

3.  Facebook came in at #2, after LinkedIn, with close to 8% of the recruiters using it.

4.  Twitter (0.9%) is being used more than YouTube (0.9%).

Here are the Poll results, as reported by ERE.net.

So, if you haven’t done it already, time to bite (byte?) the bullet, and create (or expand and polish) that LinkedIn Profile and your LinkedIn network.

Good luck with your job search!