More than a third of respondents (34.5%) across the Middle East and North Africa said that online job sites are the most effective recruitment method, according to the latest online poll series conducted by the Middle East’s number one job site Bayt.com. The results of the ‘Recruitment Methods in the MENA2010/2011’ poll also showed that25.7% of respondents said newspaper jobs ads were the most effective,11.2% said recruitment agencies,10.2% said word of mouth,9% said online job fairs,6.1% said corporate website job ads,1.8% said college alumni clubs and1.6% said traditional job fairs.
When asked what percentage of their friends and family had a resume on an online jobsite,42.7% of respondents said up to10%,12.9% said between10 and20%,8.5% said between20 and30%,5.4% said between30 and40%,6.5% said40% to50%, and as many as24% said more than50% of their friends and family had a resume on an online jobsite.
Participants in the poll were asked why they frequent online job sites;20.2% said it was the fastest, easiest, most effective way to land a job,12.8% said they allowed them to access jobs outside their country, ,8.2% said because most of them are free to jobseekers,5% said because they are rich in facts and information on careers,3.4% said almost all top employers recruit using them today, and44.1 % said all of the above reasons while6.3 % said none of the above. The respondents were then asked whether they were passive or active jobseekers. An overwhelming majority (84.4%) answered that they were active while only13.5% said they were passive. Only2.1% said they were not seeking a job at all.
“As the number one job site in the Middle East, Bayt.com is dedicated to researching and analyzing data that can be useful to both employees and employers,” said Amer Zureikat, VP Sales, Bayt.com. “The results of our most recent poll show that online job sites are today widely seen as the most effective job search tool and a proven and indispensable recruitment solution for today’s professionals for a very wide range of reasons.’’
When asked what career level online job sites catered to in their opinion,27.9% said mid-level,27.3% said senior level,20.3% said entry level,18.4% said all of the above while6.2% were not sure. ‘’Clearly the region’s professionals understand that leading jobsites such as Bayt.com are not the exclusive domain of the technically savvy or highly experienced but rather cater equally to all segments of the population from fresh graduates to mid-management to senior executive management. The Bayt.com database is well proportioned and very rich across all industries and career levels and the system allows different levels of confidentiality and privacy to cater to different segments of professionals and employers’’ continued Zureikat.
When asked if they had any issues with having their resume on a jobsite,51.2 % of respondents said they did not as they were aware it allowed them the most access to employers. Moreover, when asked if their company recruited using a leading job site,39.3% of respondents answered yes, indicating the great penetration online recruitment currently enjoys in the region and its wide popularity with the MENA’s employers. Finally, in a brilliant testimony to the success of online recruitment in the region, more than10% of respondents said they themselves knew more than5 people who had found their jobs online including7.2% of professionals who knew more than10 people who had found their jobs online.
Data for the ‘Recruitment Methods in the MENA2010/2011’ poll series was collected online between October3 and November10, with a total of14,487 respondents from across the Middle East. This and other Middle East research, as well as information on Bayt.com’s classifieds, are available online on www.bayt.com.