Your career site is the shining star of your recruitment marketing initiatives. It’s what draws in candidates and gets them excited about working for you. You put so much energy and resources into it – spending hours planning, researching, programming and finalizing your budget. But what happens when you need to make a change quickly?

For example, what if the employee featured on your homepage leaves your organization? What if you’re opening a new facility and you want to prominently feature those jobs? What if there’s a quickly approaching recruitment event you want to highlight?

If only you could make the updates yourself it would be easy, right? Well, maybe and maybe not.

• Do you know how to update the CSS (cascading style sheets) without adversely affecting your column width or other page attributes?
• Do you know the Hex color code to drop in for your corporate branded color schema? 
• What exactly is the code to create a rectangular button for a redirect link?
• Do you know the optimal image size for the space you are putting it in? 
• Is what you’re doing going to affect how the site reacts responsively or for accessibility features? 
• Are you overwriting any tracking you added for metrics?

For all these things and more, who would you ask to get the answers you need?  Are they available to answer your questions in real-time or would it just be easier to send them what you want changed and have them do it for you?

Self service – a tool that enables recruiters to edit their company’s career site – can be both a blessing and a challenge. On one hand, you have the power at your fingertips to make changes on the fly, when you want them done. You don’t need to rely on anyone else, it’s cost effective and it lets you control what’s appearing on your site at all times.

On the other hand, what happens when a change breaks your site navigation or messes with your SEO? Many companies don’t have dedicated web resources for their career site, which means troubleshooting can fall on you. If you’re not proficient in the editing tool you’re using, you stand a chance of making changes that could be detrimental (even if it’s just a minor update). Who is there to support you? Do you have someone to call? What’s the fallback plan?

When considering a career site self-service offering, make sure it’s right for your needs. If you have a simple editing tool or access to programmers, self service is likely not a problem. But if you don’t, you might want to pause before you jump on the self-service bandwagon. If you don’t have access to programmers (and you aren’t one yourself), consider something more limited in scope – something with the ability to restrict access so users can only change smaller things like swapping photos or quotes.

Self service is a great fit for a lot of companies, and a beneficial tool when you’ve planned properly. Make sure you have a clear and defined editing process in place, know how much control to give each user, and have someone on standby who can help if you get in a jam. This way, your updates will run smoothly and your site will be just how you want it in no time.

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About Jennifer Bartus

Jennifer Bartus has been working in HR technology for more than 20 years. In her role at Radancy she is teamed with clients, sales, and account service, along with product development and engineering to help ensure Radancy's solutions are meeting the needs of customers. When not working on the future of Radancy's products, she enjoys living in and doing all things Boston. As a Massachusetts native she does not pahk her cah in Hahvahd Yahd, she knows you’d likely incur a hefty fine if you tried.

• Sleuthing Out Better Candidates Via CRM - September 25, 2019
• Is Self Service a Good Option for My Career Site? - March 22, 2019