2014 in shaping up to be a great year for Scottish recruitment. At the beginning of the year during the s1 recruitment awards I predicted that the ‘false’ economic starts seen previously would be a thing of the past.
Leading indicators such as consumer and business confidence, stock markets, money supply and construction tells us that there is serious momentum in the Scottish economy. Importantly, employment levels in Scotland have exceeded those of before the 2008 market crash. This is great news for us in recruitment because it gives us the opportunity to look forward without constantly having to look over our shoulders with fear.
At s1jobs we have been looking forward to the future of online recruitment. While we have made advancements in providing customers with integrated social media solutions and stitched in career portals, free of charge, I have most enthusiasm with the leaps we have taken in the mobile space.
Mobile recruitment has grown faster in Scotland than any other UK nation during 2013*. As Scotland’s recruitment marketplace we have seen this mirrored in our own analysis, and mobile traffic now accounts for almost 40% of our overall visits. This compares favourably to other companies in our space outside of Scotland who mainly report around 20-30%.
With 73% of adults now accessing the internet everyday and mobile ownership now surpassing 93% of adults we see a future which is almost exclusively mobile fast approaching, a mobile only era if you will. I am excited to say that we have acted fast on this opportunity. Historically there have been some challenges with mobile recruitment. Candidates often used mobile to investigate the next job but ultimately had to return to desktop later to apply. This challenge existed because simply put, your CV is not always at hand when you’re on the move. At the beginning of 2014 we tasked ourselves with changing candidate behaviour from a job investigation phase on mobile to one where the candidate was comfortable with applying. To solve this we have introduced multiple options to apply. Now on the s1 mobile site candidates can apply for your roles using a plethora of options which include picking their CV directly from cloud storage companies like Dropbox or Google drive. They can also attach their social profile as an alternative or simply remind themselves to apply for the role later. And of course the option is always there to apply with their previously stored s1jobs CV. All these options make s1jobs mobile perfect for when your next employee is on the commute!
Results from these changes have been promising. Applications from the s1 mobile site have increased 86% in the first quarter of this year compared to 2013.
Finally, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you, our customer, for your loyal support. We will work tirelessly to ensure we provide you with the best and most reliable online recruitment tools in Scotland.
*source Ofcom’s communication market report for Scotland 2013