Behind the scenes, I’ve been spending a few hours a week digging into research on job posts. For years, I’ve been teaching my methodology. For the next few months, I want to be a student again. I want to dig into available research to understand what actually matters, then create a new standard for writing a good job post.
The job post is the most influential data point when recruiting with AI. The job post is the search criteria, matching data, and our definition of good. When done well, it does one thing AI hasn’t mastered (yet): it tries to capture the nuance of a persona, knowledge, and how they function in relationships. Sure, it’s possible that AI can capture this. That is not likely when the machine is not given enough information and is trained on a data set of thousands of average jobs posts.
The current job post template most folks use doesn’t help them be successful in this important task. I don’t know a lot of recruiters who naturally thrive with 1,000 word writing projects. Instead, they write a lot of stuff that doesn’t matter and miss mentioning the skills that are mandatory.
Research Says Three Things Matter Most In A Job Post
Too many people focus on the wrong elements when they try to write a job post. They’ll spend months on an About Us paragraph, but never try to make mandatory requirements clear or disclose salary. Worse, they act like it’s negotiable to include this dealbreaker information.
According to my research and the sheer volume of studies available, I found that the top 3 most important elements in the job post were:
- Salary. No one works for free or wants to take a job without knowing what amount of money they will be paid. Salary also had a direct impact on the quality of applicant. 66% of organizations that list pay ranges on job postings say that doing so has increased the quality of applicants they’re seeing.
- Location. Remote work isn’t just a perk. It drives diversity, quality, and volume. Wharton found that remote flexibility draws significantly higher numbers of female and underrepresented minority applicants who value location and schedule flexibility in this study.
- Mandatory Requirements. If a job seeker reads nothing else in your job post, they will read the mandatory requirements. Keep it concise. Sometimes recruiters think they’re communicating clearly with a laundry list of requirements, when they’re unintentionally convincing qualified candidates not to apply.
More on all that here:
How I Would Change Your Job Post Template
Knowing these influential elements take up such a small word count, that most people have the attention span of a TikTok video, and recruiters hate writing long form, my research is going to recommend a change to the standard job post template. If you want to work with me to create your company’s job post template, let’s talk!
Before I’m done, here’s what I already know should change about your current job post template:
- Salary and location right at the top. Bonus for the teams who actually take a minute to spell out the mandatory requirements aligned with the top of the range. That’s how you pay your best talent instead of the best negotiators.
- Spell out the location. Be specific about how many days if it is hybrid and travel if the job is remote. I promise you, the culture will benefit so much more from transparency and flexibility than it will from being in the office one more day a week.
- Keep the mandatory requirements to 10 or fewer. Set boundaries with your hiring managers. This isn’t a wish list, these are requirements. Be specific. Be concise. Mandatory means mandatory.
- About Us goes at the bottom. Remember how people make decisions. Typically they decide if they can/are qualified, then they determine if they want to do it at your organization. Organize the information accordingly. About Us at the bottom.
Last step? Create a job post audit that ensures your template is used consistently every time. You can see my job post audit template and customize it for your team here.
P.S. I’m hosting a free webinar on September 9 at 12pm CT / 1pm ET called How to Align Hiring Managers, Job Posts, and Interviews. We’ll talk about how to get hiring managers to make consistent hiring decisions. You’ll learn how to turn one intake conversation into a hiring process where every step measures the same thing. Register for it and the other webinars in my Fall 2026 Webinar Series For Recruiters here!