Everyone knows how to write a job advert. But what is a little more challenging, is knowing how to write a good job advert. A job advert that grabs attention, that makes people want the job, and gets you the best people for the job applying. Because the best candidates on the market can afford to be a bit choosier when it comes to where they apply: They’re more qualified and in-demand. And these are the candidates who you really want.
Which is why we’re here to offer you our insight, from our extensive experience in job advert writing, to teach you how to write a job advert that will appeal to your ideal candidate, in 2023.
How to Write The Job Advert
Let’s start with the actual content of your job advert. We write job adverts everyday here at Dynamic. And two of the most important aspects of how to write a good quality job advert, is the content that goes into the job adverts, and how you present this content.
Focus on the Candidate
Don’t just focus on what you want from the candidate: On the experience, what technology and what skills you want the person to have. The days are gone of talking about “the ideal candidate”, as if they’re a fiction of your imagination.
This obviously is important, as you want to make sure that you only receive qualified applicants for the role and aren’t sifting through hundreds of unqualified CVs. But it’s also important that you really sell the role as what it is, a fantastic opportunity at a great company.
Because the best person for the role isn’t likely to apply to an advert that has had little to no effort put into it. They aren’t going to be interested, when there are plenty of other opportunities on the market that are more attractive,
Sell The Opportunity by Reframing the Boring, Into the Exciting
Sometimes what your job advert needs, is to turn the boring (but necessary) roles and responsibilities of the position, into the opportunities it represents.
Being able to communicate effectively with stakeholders, clients, and customers is probably not the most exciting part of anyone’s day. But as you move into more senior positions, it becomes a vital skill. So instead of:
- You will communicate effectively with senior clients, explaining complicated technical processes in terms that non-technical individuals can understand.
Try and reframe it into an opportunity instead:
- You will have the opportunity to work closely with technical and non-technical clients, developing client communication skills that will be invaluable in your career.
Give Details About The Company, Without Going Overboard
Depending on your industry and the position, your company isn’t necessarily the most important thing to the job seeker. Typically, a bigger concern to them will be what the requirements of the role are and what their responsibilities will be. Only once they know they will be a good fit for the role, will they invest the time to find out if your company is somewhere they want to work.
So try not to dedicate too much space on the job advert and too much of your readers attention span on a section about your company, and just give the relevant information that will interest them:
- A brief breakdown of your company, the size and scope of the business.
- Some insight into your company culture.
- The location of the role and the manner in which they will be working (Hybrid, 2 days a week in the office etc.)
- Any awards you have won, for the quality of your work or for your work environment.
- And most importantly, why they should want to work there. What’s great about the company, that separates you from the rest.
How to Structure Your Job Advert: with Examples
The structure and the way in which you present the information in the job advert can be often just as, if not more important, than the actual content itself. You can follow these steps to create a clear and consistent structure to use for all your job adverts.
Break It Up Into Clear Sections
A quick way to prevent your job advert from receiving any applications, is presenting the job seeker with a wall of text.
Your job advert should be easy to navigate, drawing the reader’s attention to the important information. The easier you make it for the applicant to find what they’re looking for, the more likely you are to receive applications from the candidates you want to see.
Typical sections that your job advert could include are:
- “Key Details”
- “About the Company”
- “Role Responsibilities”
- “Skills and Experience Required”
- “Company Benefits” or “What’s in it For You”
Start By Highlighting the Key Details
There are often hundreds of job openings for the same or similar jobs. And in a highly competitive industry like IT, where IT Professionals have more choice, you’re going to have to work harder to stand out from the crowd. So how do you make your job sound better than all the others out there?
First things first, is grabbing their attention right off the bat, by listing the salary, location, work environment (flexible working hours, remote working etc) and any other attractive qualities you can think of. While you want people to read the rest of your job advert, you don’t want to make people go hunting for the details they need to decide that they are interested in reading further.
Job Advert Example: The Key Details
While it may be tempting to put important details like the years of experience you want for the role here, the goal is to grab attention and get the reader interested in your role. Not to start making demands from them right off the bat.
Be Clear With Your Expectations – Responsibilities and Requirements
One of the things candidates hate most is a vague job advert. If someone is going to apply to your job, they want to know exactly what the job entails, what your expectations are, and if they are qualified to do the job at hand. If not, why would they bother wasting their time applying for the job, and potentially interviewing for the role, just to find out they were never a good fit to begin with?
So organise the role requirements and responsibilities into easy to read bullet points, so your expectations are as clear as possible. And if some of your requirements are flexible, or just desirable but not essential, then say so. If you would accept someone who is 80% right for the role, and you’ll provide training for the other 20% if you really like the candidate, letting people know will attract candidates who otherwise may have passed on applying.
Job Advert Example: Responsibilities and Requirements
And Be Clear With What You’re Offering
Unsurprisingly, salary is the number one most important thing to the majority of job seekers when looking at a job advert. It’s no longer good enough to list a salary as “Competitive”, and a recent study from Adobe Future Workplace Study shows that this trend is only going to increase, as 85% of recent graduates say they are less likely to apply to a job that doesn’t have the salary listed.
An often (criminally) overlooked section is the company benefits. A section for you to show what your future employee gets in return for all their hard work. Because at the end of the day, it’s an advert. And it exists to sell the position and the company, and make someone want to work for you.
Job Advert Example: Company Benefits
A “Company Benefits” section should include things like:
Include Keywords, To Help Your Job Appear on Searches
Include the “keywords” that people use to search for your job. For job adverts, these are fairly simple, and are generally the job name and the location.
For example, if someone was searching for a Network Engineer role, they would likely search for “Network Engineer job London”, or “Network Engineer job remote”. Meaning that by not including these “keywords”, “London”, “Network Engineer”, and “remote”, multiple times, a search engine won’t know to show your job advert to someone who is searching for it.
So take some time when writing your job advert to understand who you want to read your job advert. What are the key details that they will use to search for your job, and write it targeted towards them, and search engines.
The Summary
The hiring process starts with the job advert. And investing the time in researching and writing a well-written job advert doesn’t just get you more, qualified applicants. It saves you time, money and resources further down the line.
Of course, one thing you can always do, is have someone else handle the recruitment for you. If you aren’t sure where to start with hiring, then you might want to speak to the experts.
If you’re looking to hire your next IT professional in the network and infrastructure industry, we’ve got you covered. Reach out to us here and see how we can solve your hiring needs.