The Right Mariner for the Job
Filling skilled positions with properly trained mariners is an increasingly difficult task. Hiring managers don’t always get the response they’re looking for from job postings and many experienced mariners don’t ever find the job posting that will meets their experience and pay grade. There are however a few job boards that have emerged in recent years that fulfill the staffing needs of this unique industry. They’re all have a similar goal- connect maritime organizations with mariners and vice versa – but some do it better than others with added features that drive exceptional results.
What’s making the best job boards successful? Speed, performance, efficiency, and global reach are factors setting the leading boards apart from the rest.
Again, maritime niche job boards are becoming increasingly popular and have been proven to provide results. They generally focus on: crewing, international scouting, marketing, branding of fleets, and most importantly, current and future job openings. With maritime job boards growing in efficiency, companies now have the opportunity to handle human resources on a global scale. They make it easier to strategically plan and solve crewing issues before they happen.
In the maritime industry, the development of job boards is now stronger than ever. Companies look for a ways to save on expenses, but keep efficiency and performance at maximum levels.
There are numerous maritime job boards available today. Some of the most noted include Maritime-Connector, Job2Sea, ShiptalkJobs, atlas4jobs and Jobships. These job boards focus solely on the maritime industry, creating a space for maritime organizations and job seekers to find each other.
They all have their differences though. With technology expanding and new features continuously being introduced to job portals, some maritime job boards are more prevalent than others.
We found that most employers and job-seekers use the following criteria to evaluate which sites to use:
1. Ranking on Google – based on programming, search engine optimization, social media, content, etc. You can easily compare rankings on several systems at www.alexa.com .
2. Relevant traffic - the audience is specific for any crewing and marketing manager.
3. Professional pool of users - having the largest pool means that for a single job posted, a company can expect the largest response. As a result, finding that perfect match are much higher than with smaller pool of candidates.
4. References!
5. Quality of the system itself: in-house professional programming, successful campaigns, a well-structured system based on market feedback, standardized CV for applicants, up-to-date information, and following the newest trends.
For example, Maritime-Connector ranks extremely high on Google and has over 56,000 registered users. Their number of relevant visits has passed 170,000 on a monthly basis and their systems had a major upgrade in 2011. Major companies like Maersk, Teekay, CMA-CGM, and V. Ships, CSM, BSM, Thome reported having successful campaigns with Maritime-Connector.
MarEx had the chance to speak with Eric Superina, the entrepreneur behind Maritime-Connector, about their results.
Eric pointed out some notable feats that Maritime-Connector has achieved:
• 50 CV applicants to vacancy posted within 12 hours of site publishing
• 79 people employed after just 15 days advertising with one of our major clients
• 80% of all people employed for another industry major in 2010 applied to them through maritime-connector
• 100% increase of clients corporate Internet pages ranking on Google after just 3 months of campaign
• 600% increase in number of visitors to clients corporate Internet pages after just 3 months of campaign
• Close to 6,000 CV applicants to clients adverts and profile as a result of annual campaign
• Decrease in time of searching for candidates by 50% from any known method to one client
• Decrease of advertising and recruitment costs by 45% with increase of performance by 120% to one client
In the shipping world, Mr. Superina believes he offers the best tools to solve crewing issues in an international market, and his results back that statement. “Our CV system is developed with detailed care so managers can easily evaluate applicants within seconds, select the best matches and start the recruitment process immediately.”
For more information on Maritime-Connector and their services, visit www.maritime-connector.com.