September 1999 Column

MORE REVIEWS YOU CAN USE 

With the deluge of Internet related products for the recruiting industry, we spend another few minutes on a couple of Internet Recruiting resources. Hope this helps. 

Jealously-Guarded Recruiting Secrets – by Judy West (Wade) 

Introduction: Judy West, a Dallas recruiter and trainer, recently introduced an Internet Recruiting training book and accompanying seminar called Jealously-Guarded Recruiting Secrets.  ComputerWorld Magazine is sponsoring the seminar on a national tour that will soon begin.  This review looks at the book, not the seminar.   

The book at first glance: The text is a large 3-ring binder that looks like it contains about a ream of paper.  The book is broken into 20 tabbed sections that include: Introduction, History & Statistics, Website Strategies, Search Tools, Net Lingo, About Email, Search 101, Search Engines, Domain Search, Advanced Search, ISP Search, Lookups, Usenet, Discussion Forums, Virtual Communities, Career Sites, Posting & Resume Sites, Classifieds & Publications, and Human Resources.  It is filled with “how to” discussions and specific examples.  Below is a brief description of the contents of each section… 

Website Strategies: Discusses the benefits of having a recruiting web site.  It includes sections on how to make an “Applicant Friendly” website, things your site should include, Top 10 Internet Marketing Blunders, How to Publicize your Website, How to Register your Website with Search Engines, How to Track Website Traffic, How to Increase Website Traffic, Maintaining Website Links, Firewall Security, Pros & Cons of Banner Advertising on Search Engines, Banner Ads on Specialized Sites, Banner ads on Full-Service Career Sites, and Banner Ads on High-Traffic Industry Related Sites. 

Search Tools: Covers keyboard shortcuts – a great time saver for the serious Internet recruiter.  Also covered in this section are: Bookmarks, using the Find feature on Internet Explorer and Netscape, Speeding up your search by clearing cache, Excel Spreadsheet Tips, Shortcuts and Time-Savers, Robots, Bots, Spiders, and Intelligent Agents, Web Utilities, and Recruiting Tools. 

About Email: discusses the use of email in recruiting on the Internet, Netiquette (proper Internet etiquette), Spam, Emoticons, and email privacy. 

Search Tips: Covers Navigation, understanding URLs (user names, host names, and URLs), Helper Software, Tips, Shortcuts, and Time-Savers, Search Tutorials, a review of the Top 10 Search Engines, and a Search Engine Tutorial. 

Domain Search: Covers Domain and Country Code Definitions, How to read a domain, Domain search commands, Domain search definitions, Country code and Title searches, Press Release search, How to target a competitor and recruit a specified skill, How to target major corporation employees, Host search, How to target a college or university, Link domain search, Flip and search using link domain. 

Advanced Search: Covers Title search, Boolean title search, Text search, URL search, How to find employee directories, Anchor search, and Feature Script search. 

ISP Search: Reviews the Anatomy of the Internet, Judy’s Top 4 ISP Sources, How to do an ISP country code search, and How to do an ISP/USA by State search. 

Lookups:  Covers Reverse Lookups (How to find the name behind any phone number, Top 10 Business Lookups, Top 10 email Lookups, How to Find People’s email addresses), Domain Lookups (Top 10 Domain Lookups, How to verify a Domain Name and How You can Benefit from this as a Recruiter, How to Penetrate the Corporate Firewall using Internic – Whois, How to Penetrate the Corporate Firewall Using Yahoo! People Search, How to get past the “200” Cap, and How to Scale the Corporate Firewall using Yahoo! People Search), Area Code Lookups, Name Lookups, Phone Number Lookups, Member Lookups, Finding Member Profiles, and Zip Code Lookups. 

Usenet: Covers the Top 10 Newsgroups, All About Newsgroups (searching, subscribing, starting your own), Listserve and Newsletters (what is the difference between them, Top 10 Mailing Lists, Newsgroups vs. Mailing Lists – what’s the difference?, Internet Code of Conduct, More Sources of Newsgroups, Mailing Lists, and Listservs, a Usenet Tutorial (How to Target Corporate Employees in Newsgroups using the from: search, How to Find Thousands More Resumes Using the Newsgroup: GroupName Search Feature in Alta Vista, Newsgroup Country Code search, Free Usenet Job Postings, How to Target Newsgroups Resume Search, How to Target “Techie” Candidates Using Alta Vista’s USENET summary: search, How to Target “Techie” Candidates Using Alta Vista’s USENET subject: search, USENET resume search, and DejaNews, Job related newsgroups). 

Discussion Forums: Reviews Chat Tips, Sources of Discussion Groups, Bulletin Boards (How to Find, How to Use for Recruitment). 

Virtual Communities: (Definition, How to Find Candidates on Geocities, How to Find Candidates on WBS, How to Find Candidates on Earthlink’s Member Directory, More Virtual Communities), Webrings (Defined, Sources, How to Find Candidates on Webrings). 

Career Sites: Judy’s Top 10 Full Service Career Sites, Career Sites A-Z (a huge section that reviews tons of career sites on their specialization and whether job postings and resume viewing are free or fee), Judy’s Top 5 Diversity Career Sites – (Hispanic, African American, Asian, Women), Judy’s Top 5 Career-Related Link Sites (and a huge review of other Career Related Link Sites), Specialized Technical Sites (and a giant review of other I.T. Related Sites), Colleges and Universities (Where to Find Colleges and Universities, How to Find Resumes on University Sites, Where to Find More Sources of Colleges and Universities, More Sources of Alumni Associations (a huge list of College and University sites that includes specialization and whether you can post jobs/view resumes for free or for fee), Applicant Career Sites (Target Sites that Promote Application Career Tips and Resume posting Services (and the associated huge list).  

Posting and Resume Sites: Starts out with Judy’s Top 10 Job Posting Sites, then her Top 10 Free Trial Posting Sites (and a large listing of other Free Trial Job Posting sites and Free Job Posting Sites).  Judy summarizes with her Top 10 Job Posting Sites For a Fee and another giant list of sites where you can Post Jobs for a Fee, broken out by specialization.  Also covered in this section are Job Posting Services, a very important service for companies having large volumes of job postings across many sites.  She also reviews the Top 5 Free Resume Databases and other Sources of Resume Databases.   

Classifieds & Publications: Reviews where to find free classified ads to post your job openings (includes a huge list of sites). 

Human Resources: Discusses where to find information on Human Resources issues.  Topics include: SHRM, HR and the Law, Human Resource Information (and a large list of sites), 1999 Career Fair Schedule, Staffing Solutions (Where to Find Employment Agencies, Temp Agencies, and Executive Search Firms on the “Net”, Government Regulating Agencies, Useful sites like Relocation Services, Moving Companies, Maps and Travel Maps, Moving / Distance Calculator, Currency Converter, Travel Agencies, Hotels, Airlines, Cost of Living Calculators, Salary Surveys, Where to Find a Contract Recruiter, Where to Find the Top Outplacement Services on the “Net”, Judy’s Top 5 Recruiter Training Sources, and Training Sites. 

Conclusion: The book’s content is excellent, and filled with examples to help both the novice and the experienced Internet recruiter get results.   While there are many parallels to the Intelligent Search AIRS I and AIRS II material in terms of search techniques covered, Judy does a fine job of documenting the techniques. At a cost of $900, Jealously-Guarded Recruiting Secrets is a good investment for a search firm that is serious about Internet Recruiting. 

Lingstar’s The Internet Recruiting Edge by Barbara Ling (Mark) 

Forwarded to me recently by our publisher for comment, I was skeptical what $197.00 would buy these days. Worked my way through this comprehensive, 388 page, two volume set chapter by chapter. Read on…  

Chapter 1 – How to Find Candidates on the Internet 

I am happy to see Barbara starts out by stating up-front that the Internet is simply ‘another great tool’ to add to our repertoire of recruiting methodologies. She starts out slowly with a few pages on Internet culture, etiquette and ethics and a few other items that every Internet book or article seems obligated to share with us readers. I wish we cared. To Barbara and other would-be Internet writers – all we want to know is how to recruit good candidates or post good ads on the Internet. 

Chapter 2 – Becoming the Recruiter of Choice – Part 1 

She talks about becoming a ‘solution provider’ and ‘resource provider’ offering services from our web-sites to keep people coming back again and again. I am not sure I agree with that strategy. I have always used my web-site to lure candidates into sending me a resume. Once I have the resume, I do not care if they ever come back again as they are then in my database. I don’t care if they refer their pals to my website because I will get their pals names directly from them, the old fashioned way. Starts the instruction process – explains searching sites including universities, user groups, professional organizations, newspaper sites, community sites. Talks about the basics of search engines and browser bookmarks.  Tells you how to write emails and conduct an Internet publicity campaign.  Where is there any time to make placements? 

Whew! I had to get that off my chest. 

DID I MENTION THIS IS A GREAT BOOK ?

One thing I really like about this book is that it is as much reference-desk material as it is training manual. She spends little time on the expensive Internet services and concentrates on the wealth of FREE resources available to the Internet recruiter. You won’t even believe how much. 

Chapter 3 – Specifics on Search Engines 

This chapter dives right in headfirst in pointing you to recruiting success on the major search engines. You can tell she has taken much time to research the proper syntax for specialized resume searches. Want to search for resume sites – go to Alta Vista and type in… 

+title:search +title:resumes 

… and you are on your way. You don’t even have to remember the syntax. Just look it up. 77 pages of easy-to-read search engine syntax. This is a great chapter. Alone worth the price of admission. 

Chapter 4 – The Art of Job Posting 

A subject dear to my heart as readers of this column already know. In my opinion, there is no better way to develop a regular flow of Internet candidates than to place the right ad in the right place. She talks mainly about locating and posting to newsgroups in this chapter. A very useful, free and often overlooked resource for Internet recruiters. Makes a number of helpful suggestions in this chapter, one of which I will begin using right away in my own Internet ads. 

Chapter 5 – What is the Solution you are trying to Create? 

More talk on providing solutions and web content to your clients and candidates. Maybe the Internet can help here but an area best not left to the Internet. This is where the real person needs to step in and make a difference.  

Chapter 6 – Finding Candidates Before Anyone Else 

Another subject very dear to my heart. Why do this at all if every candidate you contact has already been contacted by all your competition and already sent to the client site you wanted to send that candidate to. Happens all the time. Have you ever been asked to search for a candidate from a specific company? Now it is a breeze with one of the tips in this chapter. Try for an online company directory while you are at it. This is a great chapter in that you get 55 pages of search engine syntax and web-site addresses to assist you in locating those candidates that are out on the Internet but not actively seeking employment. Posting ads and searching resumes boards is easy. Barbara actually teaches you how to actually source, contact and recruit people for very specific client searches. A novelty of sorts when it comes to Internet recruiting. Superb reference material. 

Chapter 7 – Your Own Recruiter Website 

Barbara talks about goals and content, more about becoming ‘The Place To Be’ or ‘The Place To Come Back To’. Although she and I differ somewhat on our approach to web-site strategy, I am sure her suggestions would be helpful to that agency owner just starting to think about a web-site for his or her agency. Barbara’s web-site strategy is not bad at all; I think a little overkill for you average agency trying to bring candidates in the door. Barbara is at her best when she is sharing with us all the tips and tricks she has learned. She does a great job of this again in her explanation of keywords, meta tags, title descriptions, header text, side door pages, image tag keywords, page aging and other excellent search engine visibility techniques. This is information we can use and take to the bank today. 

Chapter 8 – Becoming the Recruiter of Choice – Part 2 

Starts to wrap it up in this chapter. “Where do you go from here?” she asks. Offers more ideas, suggestions, tidbits and helpful FYI’s. More information on web-page hits, search engines, linking your web-site, as well as other interesting information. 

Chapter 9 – Your own Internet Specialist 

A short chapter that sells you on hiring an Internet Specialist of your very own. Frankly, early on in reading this book I had decided that in order to take full advantage of all of Barbara’s information, you would need to be a full time Internet Specialist. The best use for this book would be to hire an Internet Specialist, hand them this book, a PC, an Internet connection, a few hard-to-fill job orders and let them loose. Unfortunately, this is not an option for most. The rest of us will have to settle for using this book as a reference manual, referring to it when we see the need for one her great tips. 

In Conclusion 

Put this on your ‘BUY’ list today. Anyone interested at all in FREE Internet recruiting resources, and tons of them at that, cannot pass up this book.  Although it started out a little slowly, was hard to follow at times, and she sometimes wrote about things I had no interest in; she has put together a veritable ‘almanac’ of Internet recruiting resources. I can think of at least three of her ideas that I will start using in my own recruiting agency right away.  There is an order form in the back of the two volume set stating a single copy price of $197.00 per copy…a steal. I visited Barbara’s Lingstar’s Internet Recruiting Edge (http://www.lingstar.com/recruiting.html) web-site. She is evidently a woman of many talents as she has written a number of books on the Internet and other topics, not all related to recruiting. The set I reviewed had a 1998-1999 copyright date, which was comforting. You can reach Barbara for more information at 732-203-1194 or email her at btl@barbaraling.com. 

MORE TIPS 

link:name  command TIP

 The Link command finds pages with a link to a domain.  For example, in AltaVisa (www.altavista.com), type link:sun.com and resume to find resumes of people who have linked their resume page to Sun’s domain.  As you can imagine, many of these are Java programmers. I recently ran this search and got 21,041hits.  The same search on Netdynamics.com (link:netdynamics.com, yielded 34 hits). In addition to searching for links based on the product development companies, try it on a source company you are trying to recruit from for your client.  For example, I recently ran “link:monsanto.com and resume” and got 202 hits. 

BOOLEAN PRIMER 

Something I think is very important for the Internet recruiter is some basic knowledge of Boolean. It is the language you need to use to type your search strings into the search engines. Almost everyone knows the AND technique. A few more for you are below. Take five minutes and learn something new today. 

AND and OR

AND = only documents that contain both words. OR = documents that contain either word.  

Example:

georgia and peaches = search for both keywords in each result.

georgia or peaches = search for either keyword in each result. 

Parenthesis ( )

Used when AND and OR in the same search string. If you do not use parenthesis under this condition your AND’s will be processed first, then your OR’s. Probably not what you were looking for. 

Example:

(georgia OR florida) AND peaches = search for all peach documents that contain either georgia or florida.

NEAR

Use sparingly, not an exact science and results vary with each search engine. You can also get many unrelated search results and end up chasing your tail.  

Example:

georgia NEAR peaches = many results returned with georgia AND peaches but many documents will not have anything to do with georgia or peaches, per se. 

NOT

Tells the search engine to reject pages with this word. Usually will reject too many, many you wish you had.  

Example:

Georgia NOT peaches = documents all will contain georgia but none will contain peaches.