Employment Advertising

Purpose of Process:

Employment advertising is a way to invite candidates to apply for open positions within the company. It can also serve as a means of enhancing public relations.

Recommended Steps in the Process:

  1. Review your recruiting strategy to determine what recruitment methods appropriate for this situation. Before deciding on any one type of advertising, consider other techniques which may be more faster and more cost effective (e.g. Are internal candidates available? Are you scheduled to attend a job fair soon? Do you have resumes/applications that you can retrieve?) And of course online employment advertising is most common.

  2. Review all the job openings and decide for which openings you want to advertise. Typically this will include openings for which it is difficult to find qualified candidates, or critical job openings. 

  3. Most job openings are advertised on the Internet (see Employment Advertising and Recruiting on the Internet)

  4. If you choose a printed form of advertising, send copies of the Job Opening form (see the job opening approval process) to the Advertising Agency or directly to the publication (see Process Tips below). Instruct the advertisement agency on the size of the ad and/or the cost constraint. Decide on which day(s) to run the ad, based on readership patterns. The Advertising Agency is knowledgeable on readership patterns.

  5. The Advertising Agency will send you a draft for your approval.

  6. Have the hiring manager review and provide feedback on the draft ad.

  7. Provide feedback to the Advertisement Agency and approve the final version.

  8. Immediately after the advertisement appears in the newspapers, review it for accuracy and appeal. If you find an error, ask that it be rerun at the next earliest date in which the readership levels are similar, or ask for a refund.

  9. The Advertising Agency will send you a bill for the cost of the advertisement. Review the bill for accuracy, then pay the agreed amount.

Process Tips:

Newspaper advertising is, at best, a moderately effective means of recruiting. Your newspaper ad may not be read by your target audience. Furthermore, many non-qualified candidates often respond. In addition, newspaper advertising is expensive. For alternative means of recruiting, refer to the Recruiting Strategy Development process.

You can send your employment advertisement directly to the publication, which may result in a cost savings. However, often publications have an arrangement with advertisers, where the advertiser receives a discount from the publication, and charges you the same as what the publication would charge for advertising directly. Another advantage of using the advertisement agency is their knowledge of the business, such as where and when to advertise, what specific wording will receive the most attention, etc.

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