Don’t rely on just one job board when searching for your next role
Job boards are one of the best starting points for launching your job search. They quickly show you lots of relevant roles and give you good ideas for what you could do next. However, you can’t just rely on checking your favourite job board for new postings, because it won’t have all the jobs that are relevant to you. In this quick post I explain why.
Job boards are great for aggregating job postings so you don’t have to start from the ground up by researching jobs at relevant companies one by one. The best job boards have plenty of postings, but are specialised enough to be useful (for example AngelList, which concentrates on startup jobs; or Escape the City, which focuses on opportunities for people that want to leave their city jobs behind). Some job aggregators are so broad (like Indeed) but lack good filtering features, making it really difficult to find roles that are relevant to you.
When figuring out how best to use the good job boards, it’s important to understand how they make their money. Job boards make money by charging companies for job postings (either through fixed prices per post or fees payable when a candidate is discovered through the platform). Movemeon, the job board specialising in opportunities for ex-consultants, charges companies 15% of the employee’s first year salary if they’re sourced through them. The basic pricing for posting one job on Escape the City starts at £200 for 30 days. This type of pricing means that companies will not send their job listings to all the relevant job boards, and only pick the ones that tend to work best for them for the particular role they’re hiring for.
These economics mean that you can’t just rely on your favourite job board or two to show you new roles, because you’ll be missing all the jobs that aren’t posted on there. Even if you think you have found the job board that fits your exact niche, it’s certainly not the case that you’ll see all relevant roles. Consider the 3-person startup that is creating something special in their front room. You might be interested in working for them, but they may not be able to afford to post on the job board you look at, so you’ll never see the role. Equally, there may be a leading startup who doesn’t believe in spending on recruiting so doesn’t post their roles on any paid job boards.
All things considered, job boards can provide a false sense of security and give you the feeling that you haven’t missed out on relevant opportunities. It’s not always enough just to set an alert on AngelList and wait for relevant roles to pop up; you should have a broad strategy where you make the most of multiple job boards. You also need to research other interesting companies in the space and stay on the pulse of who’s hiring for what.
At Otta, we’re rebuilding job search. Our product is the smartest way to search for entry-level jobs at startups in London. Find your next role at a fast-growing company by visiting our website.
