Fitness Recruiting - Where to Recruit Fitness Professionals Cost-Efficiently?
A Recent Recruiting Experience Worth Reading for Hiring Managers in the Fitness Industry.
In addition
to being the Founder and President of FitnessJobs.com, I also assist fitness
organizations with staffing and recruiting.
During a
recent recruiting assignment to hire a Club Manager for a brand new Anytime
Fitness in Union, NJ, I learned a real-life lesson using a few different job
boards to generate candidates. I have always advocated using several
recruitment sites, as not to put all your eggs in one basket. Plus, the urgency
of filling openings is too critical to lose any kind of time.
I will
outline what I did and things that I found out along the way. My goals were to
use 4 sites: FitnessJobs.com, Glassdoor, LinkedIn and Indeed. As the owner,
FitnessJobs.com was going to be free of course. Glassdoor’s pricing was $249
for one job and $295 for two jobs, for 30 days. Based on that information, I
decided I was going to skip Glassdoor and focus on Indeed and LinkedIn.
I was going
to use the Indeed and LinkedIn cost per click model. I was familiar with
Indeed, as FitnessJobs.com exported jobs to Indeed for years when they first
started. They were a job board, compiled of hundreds of other job boards. Our
clients not only got top quality traffic from FitnessJobs.com, but they got
bonus traffic from Indeed. A true win/win.
Recruiting
directly on Indeed was interesting. The great thing was, they have a slick
admin portal that helps you manage candidates. Several more bells and whistles
than the FitnessJobs.com applicant tracing system. When I
posted the ad, I decided I was going to budget $10 per day at .50 cost per
click, or $300 for the month. I knew if I had a great response, I would stop
the job 12-15 days into it spending about $120-$150.
So, what
happens, true to form, I was getting a bunch of resumes each day for about 7-8
days. 80% were not meeting the requirements listed in the job; most weren’t
even close to meeting basic requirements. But I did get about 6 decent resumes.
What happened next, was UGLY in my mind. Over the weekend, indeed started
doubling my daily spend, from $10 per day to $20 per day. This went on for 3
days and I said enough is enough and reached out to them via chat. I was told
the monthly budget is what they work off. Really what they were saying and
doing is most people stop their job posting, like I was going to do 12-15 days
into it. So, they want to JAM you and make sure they collect as much money as
possible before you stop the ad.
After I
expressed my displeasure with this, the chat woman said there is another
setting (Advanced) where they won’t do this. That setting is not offered up
front or buried somewhere. I was able to find it for a 2nd post.
I told the chat lady; well I want to change my setting. NOPE. Can’t do it once an ad is
already running. I told her, well, I’ll just cancel my ad (Which is what I did)
and create a new post with the CORRECT setting. NOPE. Can’t re-run the same
ad-Confusing to job seekers. Really?
She did offer me an Insiders hint: Just change up your ad title and some copy and you should
be able to re-post it.
Also, indeed
has made it so easy for job seekers to upload resumes and apply for jobs, most
employers I speak to in the fitness industry are saying Indeed is becoming a
waste of time and money. Too many not qualified candidates, wasting way too
much time for hiring managers, sorting through all the garbage resumes. People
can be sitting in a bar and apply for 25-50 jobs before they finish their drink!
No cover letters, no experience. Just ready, aim, apply.
The good news
is I did get 3 good people from Indeed and one was hired as the club manager.
PHEW!
LinkedIn had
related issues. I thought this was going to be a really good experience. NOT.
When I was ready to post the ad, I was going to test the same budget, $10 per
day. I was immediately prompted to set a $17 per day budget. That would project
out to $510 for the month. I said, no, I’ll try my $10 per day. Because I have
done a lot of online marketing with Google AdWords, Bing and others, they always
try to push your budget. I always stand pat, and usually, make out sticking to
my budget. I only got 1 resume from LinkedIn that was not qualified.
I went to
cancel the ad after 14 days and immediately got a reply/warning I will not be
able to post this job again if I cancel it. REALLY? Confusing to job seekers
again?
On
FitnessJobs.com, we got 3 candidates. 1 not qualified, 1 over-qualified, and 1
not willing to relocate. At least with FitnessJobs.com, you pay a set fee for
30-60 day, anywhere from $95-$150. You’ll know what you are spending. Most
candidates on Fitnessjobs.com meet or exceed the requirements, you don’t get
hundreds of junk resumes. You’ll get fewer resumes than Indeed, but almost
always someone that meets your requirements. Also, FitnessJobs.com has an
annual unlimited job posting subscription for just $299, which should be part
of everyone’s recruiting strategy.
The moral of
the story is that as before, don’t put all your eggs in one basket when
recruiting. If you use Indeed, use the Advanced Settings and be patient wading
thru non-qualified resumes. If you choose to use LinkedIn, be prepared to spend
much more then you want. Glassdoor is probably worth a shot too, for $249 for
30 days. And of course, FitnessJobs.com has 20+ year’s experience as a proven
recruitment resource for the fitness and recreation industry.
This recent
experience has inspired me to continue to invest in FitnessJobs.com so hiring
managers in the health and fitness industry won’t have to experience what I
recently went through.
Alan Cohen is a renowned fitness industry expert with more than 30+ years of experience in the
health and fitness industry. He is the president and founder of FitnessJobs.com
He can be reached at 602-334-7898 or by email: alan@fitnessjobs.com.