Given the ubiquity of the Internet, it is hardly surprising that recruitment is increasingly conducted over the Web. Indeed, a growing number of companies no longer accept paper applications; applicants are required to apply online for any job in the organization. Internet recruitment, however, is a very broad term, encompassing a number of different approaches to gathering a pool of applicants. In this article, I describe several different approaches to Internet recruitment. In coming months, Part 2 will provide information about employee referral systems, corporate websites, how applicants are using the Internet to find jobs, and what companies can learn from that information.

Let me begin by stating that there is no one "best" Internet recruitment approach. Much will depend on the type of job, the location of the organization, and other factors. It is important, therefore, for employers to track which approaches work best for them in terms of the number of qualified candidates generated, job acceptance rates, and quality of the candidates that are hired.

I focus on four approaches to Internet recruitment here: job boards; niche job boards; vertical job search engines; and e-recruitment. For each approach, I briefly describe the method and emphasize some of the pros and cons.

Job Boards. Job boards represent the earliest use of the Internet for recruitment. The most well-known job board is Monster.com, which provides both a place for applicants to list their resumes, as well as a space for organizations to list their job openings. Other major job boards include CareerBuilder.com and HotJobs.com. By examining their websites, you will see that while their basic approaches are similar, there are some differences among them as well. Some job boards offer additional tools; for example, screening systems, or tests, that will help you choose good candidates. The major advantage of job boards is that they have large numbers of candidates who have posted their resumes and therefore organizations have many choices. This, however, can be a major disadvantage to employers, as they may find themselves overwhelmed with the number of candidates that they locate or that apply for jobs.

Niche Job Boards. Due to the overwhelming nature of the major job boards, some employers have turned to niche job boards, which are simply specialized job boards. Niche job boards may focus on a specific occupation (e.g., IT jobs, such as Dice.com) or a geographic area (e.g., www.craigslist.com). The advantage of niche job boards is that they are much more focused than general job boards and therefore should produce job applicants who are more appropriate for the listed positions. Due to the heavy use of general job boards, some organizations and applicants have switched to niche job boards in the hope of a more focused search. Craigslist.com is a rather unique job board in that it is basically non-commercial and charges little or no money for posting a job. However, it does not focus exclusively on job openings.

Vertical Job Search Engines. Simply put, vertical search engines locate information for one narrow niche of the market place, such as jobs. Examples of this approach include www.simplyhired.com and www.indeed.com. The basic focus of vertical job search engines is to locate and list jobs within a specific occupation and geographic location. A job searcher who clicks on a listing typically goes to the company's job website, thereby simplifying the process. An advantage of vertical job search engines is that one can locate jobs from many different sources, including job boards. From an employer's perspective, there may be little or no charge for having jobs posted, as some of the vertical job search engines companies rely primarily on advertising. The major disadvantage is that some job boards have blocked the vertical job search engines from listing their jobs, so there may be many jobs that are not listed. Different job search engines may therefore produce different jobs. From a job seeker's perspective, vertical job search engines are easy to use.

E-recruitment. So far, I have focused on approaches that use relatively inactive methods to encourage candidates to apply for jobs. The e-recruitment approach, however, involves a proactive effort on the part of organizations to obtain applicants. The focus here is on what are called "passive" candidates; that is, employees who may not have even thought of job searching. The most well-known example of such an approach is provided by www.zoominfo.com, which enables a recruiter to search for candidates who meet a set of specified criteria. Employers can search for people who have a certain number of years of experience in a particular functional area (e.g., Marketing) and a degree from a specific college or university (e.g., Harvard University). Doing this kind of search produces a list of names of people, stored in a database, who meet these criteria. Telephone numbers and addresses of the people are also provided. The major advantage of such systems is that they enable employers to locate people who may not even be job searching, let alone be aware of your job openings. The major disadvantage is that there is no guarantee that they will be interested in job change and thus the e-recruitment approach generally requires much more effort on the part of recruiters.

Clearly, there are several different approaches to Internet recruitment. Some organizations, like AIRS (www.airsdirectory.com), offer seminars on how to use Internet recruitment techniques. Other organizations, such as ERexchange.com, offer a free newsletter as well as bi-annual conferences on Internet recruitment and other products to help recruiters and managers become proficient in Internet recruitment. I recommend that employers learn more about different Internet recruitment approaches, and monitor the success of different sources in attracting high quality applicants.