Top Programmatic Job Advertising Platforms — 2023

To start, let’s take a closer look at how programmatic job advertising works:

1. You’ll set up a job listing from your ATS, recruiting CRM, or directly via the programmatic platform of choice.
2. You’ll set your total budget for the campaign, including what you want to pay for each click or application.
3. You’ll set ad “rules” that correspond to your ideal candidate for the role in question.
4. You’ll hit the “buy” button and the programmatic software takes over.
5. Once your ad is running, the programmatic platform will find candidates online that meet your “rules” and serve the ad where they are on the web, be it a job board like Indeed, Google, Facebook, or another website.
6. When enough people click on or apply to your ad, the platform will stop running it, so you don’t waste any ad spend.
   

Very simply put, after you post a job, the platform you use will find the right people to show the posting to, at the right time. Compare this to more traditional methods of advertising for your vacancies: uploading individual job postings to each job board (time-consuming and redundant), using a media buying firm to place job ads for you (expensive and labor-intensive), running separate campaigns across social media — all without real-time feedback or optimization. With programmatic, everything is automated and optimized so you only target the right people, control spend, and hire faster.

There are a variety of reasons why you might use programmatic advertising for your job openings. Companies who are hiring in high volumes or have tough-to-fill roles typically use a job ad platform to make their recruiting efforts more efficient and less expensive overall. 

It might be time to consider a job ad platform if you...

• Want more applicants in your funnel: But not just any applicants — the right applicants. Job ad platforms are designed to only target people who are a good match to your criteria. When you set up a job ad campaign, you’ll specify “rules” for the type of person you’re looking for; the platforms use data and artificial intelligence to find people who match these rules; and your ad is served to them where they spend their time online, whether it’s a job board, Facebook, or other site.
• Want to turn off ads (and stop spending money!) when enough people have applied: You tell the platform how much you want to spend on a given job ad, and it will determine the best pay-per-click/pay-per-apply price then stop running the ad when you’ve reached the right number of applicants. That way you only spend for what you need.
• Support diversity hiring: Most platforms plug in to diversity-focused and other niche job boards (like veteran boards) so you maximize your reach and meet your diversity hiring goals.
• Are opening new campaign channels: If you currently advertise your jobs on a limited number of job boards, you can use a programmatic job ad platform to more efficiently expand to other newer job boards or even social media. 
• Manage large amounts of job boards: Rather than posting the same job description to a handful of job boards individually, use a job ad platform to do it only once. Set up your job ad, and let the platform do the rest.
• Manage non-traditional spend on Facebook and other publishers: If you’re spending across several sites and publishers, you could use a programmatic platform to centralize spending and manage ads from one place.‍
• Manage offline media like billboards: If you’re an agency vendor, you might be able to manage your offline media buys from the same platform that runs your programmatic spend.

Time for some real talk. Programmatic job advertising isn’t for every company. At the end of the day, you need to think about the scale at which you’re hiring and consider who on your team is capable of running point on your job campaigns. So before you invest in programmatic, keep these considerations and common mistakes in mind:

• Not for smaller companies: Programmatic job ad platforms will save you money in the long run, but you should still budget at least six figures annually for job boards/advertising. So if you’re a smaller company with only a few hires a year, you’re better off using traditional job advertising methods.
• Analytical Rigor: In order to get the most out of your campaigns and ensure you’re NOT wasting spend, you need to look at the data to see what’s working and what’s not. Be sure to look at data for the full funnel, too — that means down to actual hires, not just click-throughs or CPMs. Of course most of these platforms will help with that.
• Need someone on staff who understands paid media: These days, there is a huge marketing component to recruiting and hiring. Needless to say, having someone on staff who understands the marketing piece of this (i.e. paid media) will benefit your efforts in the long run. The caveat is that some of these vendors have agency type services where they can manage your spend if you don't have the expertise in house.

There are a lot of benefits to using programmatic job advertising. As we’ve mentioned, it’s more cost-effective, less labor-intensive, and more efficient overall — you’re getting more for each advertising dollar you spend. Let’s break it down:

• Smarter Ad Spend: You’ll be smarter with your ad spend and ultimately save your company money. This is because you only pay what you want to spend for the right candidates, and can reallocate leftover budget from one job to another as needed.
• Precision Targeting: You can more accurately target your ideal candidate, which means you’re only getting quality applicants. In addition, your search will be continuously optimized so you only get the right number of applications per role (in other words: you’re reducing the number of jobs with too many applications AND too few applications). 
• Recruiters’ time used more efficiently: Your people power will be used more efficiently. Since programmatic automates the majority of the job ad process, your recruiters can focus their time on what really matters: vetting and hiring candidates.
  

To calculate ROI, you’ll want to compare your cost per hire from before you started using programmatic to after. When you do this, you should see a decrease in your hiring costs (from both a financial and time perspective). This is because you’re relying less on outside agencies that charge a lot of money, you’re controlling your spend for each role (i.e. when you have enough applicants, ads stop running), and the time-to-fill decreases because you control how many applicants make it into your pipeline.

Check out some of our ROI calculators here to build your own business case.

Most programmatic job advertising platforms will charge a percentage of the spend you deploy ranging from 10-20%. So, if you spend $1 million on job boards and have a 15% fee from your programmatic vendor, then you're looking at a $150k/yr charge. Many of these offerings will also come with an annual SaaS fee for using the product.

While these expenses can get large, they more than make up for it when you look at your overall cost per hire before and after using one of these platforms. If you're spending significant (>$100k) amounts of money per year on job boards and not using one of these vendors, you are either concentrating it all in one place that you've highly optimized, have a very sophisticated internal mechanism for understanding where to deploy job ad spend, or are wasting a lot of money by not having a programmatic vendor.

As we’ve mentioned, job ad platforms are great tools to improve your overall efficiency when it comes to recruiting and hiring. These platforms offer a host of other features that will keep your job campaigns running smoothly. Here are some of those features:

• Landing Page Builder: Many of these platforms, let you build your own landing pages for your job openings. You can include your employer branding and still direct candidates to a unique email address or ATS so the process remains seamless for the applicants.
• Performance-Based Model: You only pay when someone interacts with your job ad. Some platforms charge by clicks, while others charge by applicants. 
• Spend Tracking: Only pay for what you need. You can set your budget to a specific amount, typically a pay-per-click or pay-per-application. When your ad gets the max number of applies according to your budget, the ads will stop. Not only that, you can specify which jobs to apply spend to, so easier-to-fill roles can run without spend while you invest your budget where it’s really needed.
• Campaign Analytics: Keep track of how your campaign is performing with analytics that look at the number of views, clicks, applications and spend for each job ad across the web. You’ll be able to see, in real time, what’s performing well and what isn’t, allowing you to make any necessary changes to improve performance.‍
• ATS integration: Connect to your ATS or other CRM so applicants are automatically delivered to your recruiters in their normal workflow.‍
• Social Recruiting: Extend the reach of your job ads to the social media platforms your ideal candidates are using. This is particularly helpful if a job ad isn’t performing well on job boards.‍
• Recruiter Usage: Your recruiters can plug in to your job ad platform and designate spend for their requisitions as well.

As you’re booking demos to see which vendor is right for you, prepare a list of questions that cover more general topics like features and integration capabilities as well as specific questions about the platform itself. Here are some examples:

Job Distribution and Reach:

• How many job boards and online channels does your platform have access to for distributing job ads?
• Can you target specific demographics or industries with the job ads?
• Do you support both national and local job advertising?

Ad Campaign Management:

• How easy is it to create and manage multiple ad campaigns simultaneously?
• Can we customize the ad creative and branding to match our company's identity?
• What tools do you offer to optimize ad performance and budgets?

Data and Analytics:

• What kind of data and insights do you provide about ad performance, candidate interactions, and application rates?
• How can we track the effectiveness of different job ads and channels?
• Is there real-time analytics available to monitor campaign progress?

Candidate Targeting:

• Can we define specific criteria for targeting candidates, such as location, skills, experience, and education?
• Is there an option for retargeting candidates who have previously engaged with our job ads?
• How do you ensure that our job ads reach the most relevant candidates?

Integration and Compatibility:

• Can your platform integrate with our existing applicant tracking system (ATS) or other HR software?
• What is the specific process to integrate and how long does that take?
• Do you offer APIs or data feeds for seamless data transfer between systems?
• How does your platform handle data privacy and security?

Budget and Cost Management:

• What is your pricing structure? Is it based on impressions, clicks, or other metrics?
• Are there additional costs, such as setup fees or fees for using certain job boards?
• Can you provide an estimate of the total cost of running specific campaigns?

Optimization Strategies:

• How does your platform optimize ad delivery and placement to achieve better results?
• Do you offer A/B testing capabilities to determine the most effective ad variations?
• Can you provide examples of successful campaign optimization strategies?

Mobile and User Experience:

• How do your ads appear on mobile devices, given the importance of mobile job searches?
• Can candidates easily apply to our job openings using their mobile devices?

Customer Support and Training:

• What level of customer support do you offer during and after implementation?
• Do you provide training resources to help our team effectively use the platform?
• Is there a dedicated account manager to assist with our campaigns?

Success Stories and References:

• Can you share case studies or success stories from companies that have used your platform for programmatic job advertising?
• Are you able to provide references from current clients who can share their experiences?

Once you get your account up and running, you should be able to quickly post your job vacancies and start getting quality candidates. But you might have to engage with engineers and/or IT to get fully implemented. 

Here’s what you can expect from the implementation process. 

• Integrating with your ATS usually requires engineer time. Try to get a sense for how much time is required, then give your engineering time a head’s up so you’re all on the same page.
• You might need to share your current contracts with job boards. Platforms might also accept XML or API feeds, ATS or job distributor postings. This can actually take a lot longer than your ATS integration given you need these third parties to cooperate.
• Training your team can also be a key consideration here depending on if recruiters will be using this tool directly to ask for spendfor a given req or not.

If you have more specific implementation questions, be sure to ask them during your demos.

Implementation Pro Tip: Once you’ve made a decision that you’re going to make the switch to programmatic, put together an implementation team that includes any colleagues who will have a hand in the implementation. In this case, that would be recruiting and engineering or IT. Create a timeline and have regular meetings to go over status reports and expectations so everyone is on the same page.

What is programmatic advertising?‍

Programmatic advertising refers to using software to buy digital advertising space. Machines automatically place your advertisements in front of the right consumers. ‍

What is programmatic job advertising? ‍

Programmatic job advertising takes the framework of programmatic advertising and applies it to recruiting. Your open roles will automatically be placed in front of the right candidates at the right time. ‍

How do I use programmatic job advertising platforms?‍

First, you set up a job listing from your ATS, recruiting CRM, or directly on your programmatic job advertising platform. Then, you decide upon your budget for the campaign. This can be paid for per click or per application. Next, you’ll set “rules” that correspond to the ideal candidate for your open role. Finally, you’ll let the software take over to buy ad space in the right places. Then, once you hit your budget, the platform will automatically stop running. ‍

What are some features of programmatic job advertising platforms?‍

Some useful features of programmatic job advertising platforms include:

• Landing page builder
• Spend tracking
• Campaign analytics
• ATS integration
• Social recruiting‍

‍What are the benefits of using programmatic job advertising software?‍

Major benefits of programmatic job advertising tools include:

• Smarter ad spend: You’ll save your company money by only paying what you want to spend to advertise to the right candidates. 
• Precision targeting: You will more accurately target the right candidates and cut down on low quality applicants. You search will also be continuously optimized so you get the right amount of applicants per open role. ‍
• Recruiter’s time: By reducing the time spent advertising to the wrong candidates, recruiters won’t have to wade through piles of resumes. Just the ones that matter.

At the end of the day, programmatic advertising is a great solution for larger companies hiring at scale (or agencies that handle recruitment marketing for such companies). If you’re looking to be more efficient in your recruiting and hiring, and save time and money in finding quality candidates for each role, you should definitely check out one of the platforms we’ve included in this guide. From there, set up a couple of demo calls to learn more and see if there’s a fit.