Indeed have recently shared an announcement and sent communications to clients, announcing some upcoming changes to job sponsorship and visibility across the platform.
This update will require recruitment agencies to sponsor their jobs, if they want them to be visible on the platform.
Here’s everything you need to know about what’s changing.
Currently, many recruitment agencies are receiving organic visibility on Indeed for free. This is where jobs will show up to jobseekers on the platform without the need for the recruitment agency to pay to advertise them.
Indeed are now removing this free visibility for jobs posted by staffing agencies. Instead, they will be required to use their ‘sponsored jobs’ product if they want them to show up to candidates.
Indeed have confirmed that all recruitment agencies will stop receiving organic visibility from 2nd May 2024. This won’t happen in Japan, but will apply to all other global markets including the UK. Indeed already introduced these rules in the USA and Canada back in 2019.
After 2nd May, accounts which are not paying to sponsor jobs at all will stop receiving applications from Indeed channels.
Every staffing agency with jobs appearing on Indeed for free will be impacted by this change.
Many staffing agencies will be getting Indeed applications and traffic to their recruitment website, without ever officially signing up with Indeed or becoming a customer.
This is because Indeed scrapes jobs from across the internet and compiles them onto their platform automatically - a bit like a search engine.
When someone clicks the apply button on the Indeed platform and you haven’t set up Indeed with the ability to process applications for you (using Indeed Apply), candidates are redirected to your company site to finish their application.
This means that even if you haven’t previously engaged with Indeed, this change could still have an impact on the traffic that reaches your website and the number of applications you’re receiving.
Indeed defines recruitment agencies as companies "whose core operations are focused on placing job seekers in specific roles for other businesses or entities.”
It’s up to them to decide whether specific accounts do or don’t fall within this definition. There’s a bit more information about this in their recruitment-based companies policy.
According to the announcement on RecruitmentMarketing.com, the changes “are part of an effort to make the marketplace more transparent and equitable”. Indeed are hoping that by removing access to free visibility, traffic will be distributed more evenly and reliably across the remaining sponsored jobs on the platform.
Indeed is referring to it as a ‘healthy marketplace’ update.
Indeed will be suggesting that staffing agencies opt to replace the free visibility by sponsoring jobs on the platform instead.
We’d recommend reaching out to your points of contact at Indeed to find out more about this and discuss if and how you will be impacted.
This is also a good opportunity to get some advice from a recruitment advertising agency (such as Talent Nexus) who can provide additional support and recommendations.
Feel free to get in touch with Talent Nexus for a free, no-obligation consultation about these changes and our recommendations.
