Problem
The majority of candidates spend less than 10 seconds reading through a job description before submitting a job application. As a team, we wanted to try and simplify the application process for a returning candidate.
Solution
The application experience for an existing Reed user was redesigned to allow candidates to apply to a job through ‘easy apply’, which led to an 18% increase in applications.
Role
Product Designer and User Researcher
Team
Project Manager, Product Analyst, Architects, Development Team
Design process
Discovery
Analytics
Competitor research
Qualitative usability testing
Exploration
User flows and requirements
Concept ideation
Sketches/wireframes
Lo-Fidelity Prototype
Solution
Hi-fidelity designs
Handoff for development
Quantitative testing
Analytics
The analytics team ran some research to investigate the average amount of time a user spends on a job description page before applying to a job. Quantitative analysis via tags, analytics showed the time spent on the job details page before a successful application:
25% of applications come from less than 4.5 seconds spent on the job details page
50% of applications come from less than 12.3 seconds on the job details page
From these analytics, it seems that candidates spend little time reading the job description, rarely reading the full thing. It is likely candidates are looking for key pieces of information, in order to help them decide if they should apply to the role or not.
Research objective
A research study was conducted to help us to understand if providing candidates with the relevant job information will help them to submit job applications from the job search results and spend less time clicking into and reading through job descriptions. Additionally, the study would help us to understand:
If the summarised information on the job card provides the candidate with enough information for them to apply to a role. This will help us determine the size/character count for the summary, and if this is useful to them when navigating between different job role descriptions.
If they interact with the apply now button behind the see more link.
To understand if candidates open and read the full job description.
I conducted a research study to explore a new idea and concept of providing the user with a job summary on the job card (generated by AI) including an apply now button on the card.
User research
The research consisted of moderated usability testing, where I set up a conceptual prototype test asking 5 participants to compare the current job card experience which includes the first few lines of the job description behind the see more accordion and our concept of hiding an AI-generated job summary and an apply now button.
Key user insights
Participants said the job card summary useful and would help save them time when looking through jobs
‘Apply now’ is helpful for candidates who want to send a larger volume of applications
Participants said applying from the job card would depend on how much quality information they get from the job card
Different Reed personas and candidate urgencies saw different behaviors whilst interacting with the job cards
Goal
Although this research showed an AI job summary could be a helpful feature for candidates, this piece of work would not align with the team’s roadmap timeline targets. However, research has shown there is real potential in implementing an ‘easy apply’ experience for candidates, which would help to improve the application process for returning candidates. Additionally, there seems to be great business value for increasing job applications submitted on Reed.co.uk.
I created how might we statements which would help me to find solutions to the problem.
How might we allow the user to submit job applications faster?
How might we allow the user to submit more job applications?
From this, I compiled all the feedback and insights and grouped similar ones. This helped me brainstorm and develop potential ideas and gave me a clearer view of what is important to the user.
After discussions with the product manager, we decided to explore a way for candidates to submit job applications from the search results page, that would prioritise both the business strategy and user needs.
Currently, candidates have to apply from the job description where they are taken to a separate page to begin their application.
Designing the MVP
A simple journey needed to be provided to allow candidates to submit their job application.
I worked with the Architects and the team Software Development Management to map out a user flow for all job applications types. We then collaborated with the product manager, where we scaled back to focus on an MVP for the first release. The requirements for the MVP were to show candidates the CV they are applying with to make sure candidates could review their CV before submitting their application.
Further requirements included
Only showing this test to candidates who have a CV uploaded and have completed all the required profile information.
This test would not include jobs that require a cover letter or screening questions.
Concept exploration
After defining where to focus our efforts first, an apply now button needed to be designed and added on the job card as well as the application experience that follows.
Firstly, I looked into how we could show the button to the user on the cards. I ran an audit to understand how other job sites show application buttons on their job cards, which allowed me to then focus on exploring ways of exposing the button on the card and others where the button would be hidden behind the ‘see more’ accordion. With this, I also looked into the different styles of buttons we have in our design system and how this would look on the job cards. These button styles included the pink primary CTA and the secondary style blue outline CTA.
I then explored how the button could be positioned on the card. I tried it full width below the job information, as well as a smaller button size, positioned to the right-hand side. With this, I also explored having the button permanently visible as well as hidden behind the ‘see more’ accordion.
I mocked up the cards on the search results, which gave me a better idea of which ones visually worked better. Having the full-width button was preferred so there was a greater emphasis on applying to the role for the candidate. Placing the button on the card or behind the accordion were both preferred options but testing would help determine which would convert the most applications.
I landed on two designs to test:
A full-width secondary style blue outline button, which would always be exposed on the job card
A full-width primary style pink button, hidden behind the ‘see more’ accordion.
The application experience
In this test, upon landing on the search results and seeing the ‘easy apply’ feature for the first time, a tooltip would be shown to bring feature awareness to the user and encourage them to apply to jobs via easy apply.
To keep the user within the search experience, I explored how we could show a modal on the search results page once the user clicks ‘easy apply’, where they would see a modal with the CV they have uploaded in their profile, following this they would click ‘submit application’ and see a confirmation modal. With two clicks, the user can apply for a job quickly and efficiently. When they close the confirmation modal, they will see the same job results, with the job card marked as ‘applied’. The job card would disappear from their search results on refresh.
Further research
The team delivered a multi-variant ABC test exploring the addition of an “easy apply” button on job cards on the search results page for signed-in candidates:
Control = No “easy apply” button on the search results page
Variant A = Add “easy apply” button within the “see more” section of easy apply job cards (hidden variant)
Variant B = Add “easy apply” button directly on the job card itself (exposed variant)
The hypothesis is that this test will increase total applications overall, by increasing:
Session to application conversion
Applications per applicant
To ensure whether an increase in applications is beneficial to Reed and its customers, the quality of job applications was measured by comparing candidates’ current job title and desired job title with the jobs they apply to at scale. This will produce a “matching” score that we can track over time.
Handoff
The impact
The results from this test were extremely positive, where variant B group saw the greatest impact.
18% increase in applications per user
No change in application similarity score
Using our newly created ‘similarity score’ created by the AI team, we saw no change in the perceived quality of applications by comparing the candidate profile with the jobs they’ve applied for.
Conclusion and learning
This project was a good example of how research can provide guidance on what to focus on, steering the team strategy in a slightly different direction. An idea of AI Summaries on job cards although beneficial, helped us to focus on something that would help bring immediate benefit to users as well as help the business meet its goals.
Next steps
Due to the success of the test, the exposed CTA will move into production for all candidates to interact with. The team recognises there is a great opportunity to build on this feature. Beyond this first iteration, we want to allow more users to experience easy apply. This means surfacing the feature to candidates who don’t have a Reed account or who are signed out, as well as candidates who don’t have all the necessary information uploaded on their profile.
We will then consider how this easy apply experience can be used for applications that require more information, including screening questions and cover letters.
