Where to Post Jobs Online for Free | Glassdoor for Employers

Where to Post Jobs Online for Free

In an effort to stretch recruiting budgets these days without sacrificing candidate quality, employers of all sizes are going online to look for places where they can take advantage of a free job posting. From social networking sites to niche job boards and online communities, there are plenty of ways to get your jobs advertised at no cost.

Advantages to free online job postings include no out-of-pocket costs, exposure to new audiences and a potentially lower cost per hire. When evaluating the effectiveness of free online job postings, however, it's important to consider the time spent listing, managing and tracking success, the size of the audience, and the type of job seekers and potential candidates they attract. At the end of the day, no one wants to waste time promoting jobs - free or not - to the wrong talent pool and sifting through a sea of resumes from unqualified candidates. High applicant-to-hire ratios don't help anyone!

Here are a few ideas on where you can go online to post jobs for free.

Where to Post Jobs Online for Free

On Your Career Site

Clean house first before advertising your jobs outside of your own career site. Work with hiring managers to update the content, and then make sure you're leveraging tips to optimize your job descriptions for online search. If your job descriptions aren't up-to-date or SEO optimized, listing them on different free job posting sites is a waste of your time.

On Social Media

Use the power of social media to spread the word about your job openings. Post job opportunities anywhere your company has a social presence. That way, people can apply on desktop or on their mobile device. Just remember to keep your posts fresh and frequently updated or risk your social presence looking stale.

[Related: Social Media and the HR Professional]

University and Alumni Community Job Boards

Most four-year colleges and universities offer students and alumni the opportunity to post jobs for free. If you're looking for a summer marketing intern, a newly minted MBA or a scientist, this might be a great place to advertise your open positions. The alumni networks of larger institutions offer an additional talent pool which typically extends far beyond the city or region where the campus is located. Know of a few local schools where you'd love to advertise your jobs but you're not alumni? Not to worry! Reach out to career services and request guest access if you don't see it promoted on the site.

Craigslist

From its earliest days, Craigslist has offered an easy way to post a job online. Depending on the city, you might be able to post a job for free on Craigslist although most markets will run you $25-$75 per job listing for 30 days, which is still significantly cheaper than most online job posting sites available. Remember, however, that if something seems too good to be true, it probably is. Due to the ease through which candidates can apply for jobs posted and the wide net audience it attracts, many employers have found that the cheap or free cost to post jobs on Craigslist isn't worth the time required to screen the massive flood of resumes from often-unqualified applicants.

Even though it doesn't involve any out-of-pocket costs, it's up to you to determine if using free online job posting sites is a worthy use of your time, depending on how easy it is to list your jobs, the size of the audience and the candidate quality and fit.

Pros and Cons of Free Job Boards

So if all of these unpaid avenues are available, why should anyone pay for a listing? What are the pros and cons of free job sites?

If you're not paying for a job to be specifically targeted to qualified candidates, you may not be reaching anyone of value or quality. This means that the time you've spent crafting a recruiting message has gone to waste if there is a meager response or wave of unqualified candidates bombarding you with applications.

You also have no way of tracking your metrics - making your money work for you using real-time data - so you'd have no way of knowing which avenues and regions are the most fruitful for your efforts. Lastly, while you do not spend money, you spend time, energy and creativity on a post that does not promise any positive results that can be measured or replicated. 

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Glassdoor has recently launched a partnership with Indeed, which means employers can now tell their brand story across two industry-leading platforms to help you more effectively find, hire and retain the right talent. Sponsoring a job on Indeed will now get your job posted on Glassdoor too, and, as of September 2020, companies will no longer have the ability to resubscribe to Glassdoor Job Slots subscriptions. We're thrilled to be officially rolling out this partnership between Glassdoor and Indeed, which will bring you the best of both worlds - world-class employer branding and insights along with unrivaled candidate reach.  For more details, please visit our FAQs on our Employer Help Center.

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1. Data analysis of 12M applications 7/1/16-12/31/17 from leading ATS provider Greenhouse comparing application-to-hire ratios for Glassdoor vs. other job sites.

2. Glassdoor EMI Research, November 2017

3. Glassdoor Internal Data, February 2019

4. Glassdoor.com U.S. Site Survey, August 2018

5. Glassdoor Internal Data, January-June 2018