10-03-2020

4 Great Tips for Writing High-Performing Job Descriptions

Fabien Rivenet

 

You’ve spent hours writing the perfect job description. It’s been posted everywhere: on your website, on your social media platforms and on multiple job boards. But you have only received a few CV's and they are not even close to being the candidates you are looking for. Time to face the truth: your job description wasn’t that well written after all. 

 

At Drake, our recruitment teams are constantly writing job descriptions for our clients. We want to share our knowledge and experience with you and have gathered these four tips for you to try next time:

1. Use correct job titles: It’s the most important part of your ad. Be you sure to use a job title that the ideal employee is using to define their job and the words they’d use when conducting an organic job search online. Think about the difference between “secretary” and “administrative assistant”. Put yourself in their shoes and choose a title that matches their skills and avoids your internal lingo and terminology.  
2. Write longer job descriptions: Job postings with descriptions between 700 and 2,000 words get on average 30% more applications. Are you talking enough about the day-to-day? Does the candidate know who they will report to? How will their role impact your team and the business? 
3. Offer more information about your company: Provide your future employee a sense of your organisation’s style and culture. What do you stand for? What are your company values? Are you more of a mom-and-pop or a cutting-edge startup? Our research indicates that this information is as important as the salary.  
4. Be readable across all devices: Lots of job searches happen on mobile. Don’t be afraid to use paragraphs and bullet points. It will make your job ads clear and easily readable on a phone or tablet screen.

 

Your job description is the first contact you’ll make with a future employee. Be sincere, be professional, and always think of your ideal candidates when you draft your ad. And if you need help to attract better candidates, connect with our experts today.