Advertising the job

Learn about advertising your job, what should be in the advertisement, and where and how to attract the best applicants.

Attracting and advertising for suitable applicants

How you decide to attract the best applicants depends on the job, your budget (eg for advertising or recruitment agencies) and how much time you have.

You advertise so that the greatest number of people suited to your job vacancy will apply for the job. This means advertising in the right places, and making sure your advertisement will attract their attention. Think about this group of people and where they are likely to be going and what media they are likely to be reading, or listening to, when you’re choosing where to advertise.

The advertisement

When you’ve decided where to advertise, you need to decide what your advertisement will look like/sound like. You need to hook the reader/listener in, and then keep their focus by having clear and relevant information about the job so suitable people can see it as a good opportunity. Put in enough information to spark interest and curiosity, but not too much as this will make the advertisement harder to read.

You can look at other employers’ job advertisements for similar jobs to get some ideas. You might want to take a new approach or stress unique aspects of the job or of you as an employer as your point of difference. You need to make sure that the information you include is accurate, don’t oversell or undersell the job as you will mislead and won’t get the most suitable applicants.

If you, as an employer, are a known and popular brand, this in itself may be enough to provide the ‘hook’.

Content of the advertisement

Make sure your advertisement is clear, easy to read for your target audience, focuses on the job and job requirements, and is interesting. You must make sure that your advertisement doesn’t reflect unlawful discrimination.

Include information on:

  • Location
    • Where the job is in larger cities, you may want to be more specific, eg don’t just say ‘Auckland’ if the job is in Takapuna, say ‘North Shore’.
    • If you have flexibility on location, this will expand your applicant pool, so make sure you say so.
  • Job title and outline of work
    • Give the job title, main purpose, challenges, and duties of the job. The job title must accurately reflect the level of the job. Don’t make the job title ‘manager X’ if there is no management, people, or processes etc involved, as this would be misleading; you will not attract the right applicants to the job if the job title is misleading.
    • The whole job description is not required in the advertisement, applicants will get this later; include just enough to outline the sort of job it is and the sort of applicant you’re looking for.
    • Include whether the job is full or part-time or whether you can be flexible about hours (flexibility will expand your applicant pool).
  • Skills and experience
    • Outline the skills and experience needed to do the job.
    • If there are qualifications required put these in so you don’t waste people’s time applying if they don’t have the qualifications needed.
  • Organisation
    • Briefly outline any advantages your organisation has, say why applicants would enjoy working in this organisation. Sometimes you won’t want to reveal the name of your organisation in the advertisement, so will advertise ‘blind’. This can be effective because it may lead to people who would not otherwise apply to you, ringing up to find out who you are and you then have the opportunity to talk to them about the job.
    • If you are using a recruitment agency, you may want to ensure that your own brand isn't overshadowed by their brand.
  • Contact information
    • Include the relevant contact information so the applicant can contact you if they are interested in the job; this could be the telephone number, email, link to apply online, or physical address.
    • Make sure that whatever contact method you use, you are responsive, that is, someone is available to take the calls, check the emails, or pick up the mail, etc.

Tips for advertisements

  • Keep the advert concise. Give the text some space, this will attract the eye and will help you write more efficiently. You often are paying per character or size of the advertisement, so make sure that every word you include counts..
  • Use bullet points and short sentences and paragraphs.
  • Don’t put words in capitals, they will be harder to read.
  • Use ‘you’ and ‘your’ in the advertisement; this will involve the audience and help them imagine themselves in the job.
  • Stress what is unique. You must try to emphasize what makes your job and organisation special. People want to work for special employers.
  • Put in the challenges of the job, which may put off lazy applicants.

You are responsible for making sure advertisements don’t mislead or discriminate.

Additional legislative or workplace policy requirements

Private sector employers do not have to advertise a vacancy unless they have a specific requirement in employment agreements or workplace policies. Some workplace employment agreements or policies state that the employer has to advertise internally before externally, or will give preference to employees who have recently been made redundant.

Many employers in the public sector are required by the Public Service Act 2020 to notify a vacancy to make sure that suitably qualified applicants are aware of the vacancy, and they must then appoint the applicant best suited to the position.

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Page last revised: 25 May 2021

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