The biggest mistake the first time job seekers make when it comes to using job-search websites such as Monster, Careerbuilder, Dice, CollegeRecruiter.com, or any of the other 100,000 is relying too much on them.
Job boards by conservative measure account for about 12 percent of new hires and by industry measure for about a third of new hires. The share of new hires derived from job boards is increasing regardless of which camp you listen to, so this issue is becoming more and more important despite the increased attention paid to social media sites.
Yet the best job boards in the world cannot accurately match candidates with employers and, I suspect, never will. The reason isn't the technology. The technology is there. The reason is that employers and job seekers are either unwilling or unable to spend the lengthy period of time needed in order to create accurate, detailed profiles that are used by the technology to create matches. Both sides take much less time than needed and then complain about the poor matches. Garbage in, garbage out.
Job seekers should spend at most one full day on the job boards. Search the big general sites, niche sites for your industry, and niche sites for your geographic location. Apply to all of the jobs which are advertised and for which you are interested and qualified and then follow-up with the employers directly. Create job match alerts / agents so the boards will notify you when new, matching jobs are posted. Then only go back to the boards when those matches alert you to a job which appears to be a match for your interests. Spend the rest of your days networking.
