Everything You Need to Know About the Upcoming Google Jobs Release

What is the Google Jobs feature?

Google wants to help you find ‘the one’…

…the right job, that is.

In late-June this year at its annual I/O developer conference, Google announced the aptly-named Google for Jobs feature. By implementing job posting structured data across relevant pages, employers and recruiters can now have their job listings appear for searches with a clear intent (e.g. “seo account manager in brisbane”*).

How does it work?

Similar to other job aggregation sites, users have the ability to filter by industry, date of posting, contract type (full-time/part-time/temp, etc), seniority/title, location, and employer responsible for posting. Jobs are shown as a list of previews, with click/tap-to-expand functionality that reviews an in-depth description of each listing. Google expects that the feature will work for jobs across every skill level and area of profession.

The benefits of the new feature are immediately obvious, with the more prominent position in the search results being perhaps the most important, along with increased chances of discovery and ease-of-use compared to independent job listings sites.

Websites with either >100,000 job openings listed or >10,000 jobs being processed can apply to be able to use the “High Change Rate” feature, which includes added support from Google and faster indexing of newly-listed jobs.

To complement the new Google for Jobs functionality, a new filter to the Search Analytics report in Google Search Console has been added to allow webmasters to track how well job listings are performing in the search results.

How do I start using it?

Good news comes in the form of direct integration between third-party sites (such as LinkedIn, Glassdoor, Indeed, Jora, etc) and the Google for Jobs feature, meaning that once integration has been set up correctly, any new jobs posted on these sites are eligible to appear in the search results with no additional input (apart from ensuring the XML sitemap is being updated as often as needed, depending on how frequently new jobs are being posted on the site). This means that employers/recruiters who have traditionally used these services for finding new talent can take full advantage of Google for Jobs without changing processes (although they may want to engage a digital marketing specialist to track performance of their results in Google Search Console).

*As with every exciting new Google release, Google for Jobs is currently only available in the US, with an expected Australian rollout of Q3/Q4 2017. Once the functionality is introduced locally, it’s expected that Australian-based job aggregation sites like Seek will become early adopters, with other independent sites easily being able to follow suit through the straightforward integration.