Looking for a job using Google? You need to know this.
Now Google basically owns the internet, it is inevitable that you will use it in one way or another when searching for a job. If you are going to get the best from your search, you need to understand how Google works, and how to find what you are looking for.
Google assumes you want to work in your current location.
Search for ‘aircraft maintenance jobs’ from our office location in Chandler’s Ford, Hampshire, UK.
Unless you tell it not to, Google always tracks your current location when you logon. This is really useful when you are looking for local services, but can seriously hinder you when you are looking for a job. In an industry like aviation where many people are willing to move for work, it can mean you miss out on lots of suitable opportunities.
What is the answer?
There are a few ways you can get around Google’s location bias.
Narrow your search - If you have only a few locations where you are willing to work, search specifically for them. “aircraft maintenance jobs paris”, “aircraft maintenance jobs bordeaux”, etc.
Widen your search - Use a wider search location, but use specific job titles. “b1 licensed engineer jobs europe”, “aircraft mechanic jobs europe”. The main issue with this is that you are going to get a larger number of results, so you need to be willing to go through many pages of search results.
Use aggregator websites - Some websites bring together job adverts from lots of different sources. Locker Aero is specifically focused on the aircraft maintenance industry, but you can also set-up job alerts for whole countries on LinkedIn and Indeed. For example, you can ask LinkedIn to send you an email every day with all the newly added jobs in the UK with the job title ‘Aircraft Mechanic’. Guidance on how to do this is here.
2. Not all recruiters write adverts the same way.
One of the biggest problems you will encounter when using Google to search for jobs is that recruiters write adverts different to each other. For example, one might write ‘Airbus A320 Licensed Engineer’ and another might write ‘B1 Licensed Engineer - Airbus A318/319/320’. Some will not proofread their adverts, so there will be typos. Some don’t really understand what they are advertising so they will use vague terms rather than specifics.
Google will prioritise exact matches to your search before listing similar ones, so what you write in the search box will dictate what comes back.
What is the answer?
Try some different searches. ‘Aircraft Mechanic jobs’, ‘Aircraft Fitter Jobs”, “aircraft maintenance jobs’, “careers as aircraft mechanic’
Use Google Autocomplete to help you. When you start typing something into the search box, Google suggests the most common terms that people search for. Try several of these and keep a list of the most successful ones to try again at regular intervals.
3. The first page of Google can be bought.
If you search ‘aircraft maintenance jobs’ on Google, the first page is taken up with websites that have either spent time/money on search engine optimisation (SEO), or who have actually paid for adverts. Companies that are not as ‘savvy’ with SEO will never get on the first page of the search.
Just because they are not high up on Google, it doesn’t mean they aren’t worth working for!
What is the answer?
Set aside some time to ‘go deeper’ on your search. Try some different search terms and search through 5, 10 or more pages to make sure you’re not missing anything.
4. Get Google to work for you!
Google is constantly scanning websites to see what has changed, so you can automate part of your job search and get Google’s spiders to do it for you. Google wants to have the most up-to-date version of the web as possible, so it deploys huge amounts of resources to track what is changing.
What is the answer?
You can ask Google to notify you every time it finds new content that matches your search term. You want to keep your searches quite narrow for this, otherwise you will end with too many links to deal with.
For example: -
“aircraft engineer” AND southampton
“licensed engineer” AND airbus
You might need to learn a bit about Boolean searching for this, so here is a link with some information about that - or feel free to contact us and we will help you.
This is the link for the Google UK alerts system, but there is one for each country.
5. Use a change notification system.
Websites get updated regularly. You could check a careers page today, only for a new vacancy to be advertised tomorrow. This means you could miss out on jobs just through unlucky timing.
What is the answer?
You can register for free or cheap page change notification system. Follow That Page is really good and has a free version where you can monitor up to 20 pages every day.
Find 20 companies that you are interested in working for and enter their careers page URL into Follow That Page. You will then be notified every time they make a change to their careers page.
There are other systems that offer a limited number of page change notifications for free, so you could easily follow hundreds of careers pages for free. Or you can upgrade to the paid version of Follow That Page for just $20 a year and can track hundreds of sites every day.
Conclusion
Google doesn’t make it easy to find the job adverts you are looking for, but with a bit of knowledge and experimentation, you can get it working for you. Try lots of different searches to see what brings you the best results. Then automate the checking so that you are the first to know when new vacancies are advertised.