CareerBuilder: Using AI to match candidates with their ideal jobs
About CareerBuilder
Founded in 1995, CareerBuilder has evolved from a job search website into a global, end-to-end human capital solutions provider. The company specializes in AI-driven, platform-based solutions to help employers hire and manage the best talent and help consumers find jobs. CareerBuilder operates in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia.
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Contact usCareerBuilder improves job search results on careerbuilder.com and across clients’ talent networks by leveraging Google Cloud Talent Solution and Google machine learning capabilities.
Google Cloud Results
- Motivates 41% more actions to be taken from saved search results
- Lifts number of users viewing jobs sent via automated alerts by 15%
- Increases users viewing jobs across talent networks by 40%
18% improvement in number of qualified job applicants across top job categories
Since the 1995 launch of CareerBuilder, search has been a key enabler of the company’s mission to empower job seekers and employers. Job seekers depend on CareerBuilder to provide search results relevant to their work and location. Businesses rely on CareerBuilder search results to attract the best candidates to their job listings.
Search is a critical feature on CareerBuilder’s platform. Delivering relevant search results creates a first impression and motivates users to engage in key conversion paths, such as registering, signing up for job alerts, uploading resumes, and applying for jobs directly on the platform.
“Google was the ideal choice for us. No other company can offer what Google offers in semantic search and machine learning.”
—Humair Ghauri, Chief Product Officer, CareerBuilderPreviously, the job search technology and infrastructure powering careerbuilder.com and the company’s 4,000 talent networks were managed in-house by multiple dedicated teams. CareerBuilder engineers often focused on tuning the search technology’s algorithms to improve search result relevancy. But this approach was time and resource intensive, taking engineering resources off of other key priorities.
“We needed to find a provider that was an expert in the search space and understood the importance of fine tuning the machine for our specific user base, to allow us capacity to focus on other innovation areas across our platform,” says Humair Ghauri, Chief Product Officer for CareerBuilder. To improve search results and thus increase engagement and conversions, CareerBuilder turned to Google. “Google was the ideal choice for us,” says Humair. “No other company can offer what Google offers in semantic search and machine learning.”
In recent years, CareerBuilder has been investing heavily in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to power its end-to-end human capital management solutions platform. As part of that initiative, CareerBuilder became one of the first alpha testers of Cloud Talent Solution in November 2016.
Cloud Talent Solution, which leverages machine learning to better understand job listing content and job seekers’ intentions, began powering searches on CareerBuilder’s 4,000 talent networks in mid-2017. As of April 2018, Cloud Talent Solution also delivers results for 100% of job searches on careerbuilder.com and mobile apps, as well as email alerts related to saved job searches.
“We’ve seen a 15% lift in users clicking through to view jobs sent through automated job alerts. From users who clicked through, we’ve seen a 41% increase in expression of interest actions generated from saved search alerts. With Cloud Talent Solution, we’ve improved job matching for millions of users.”
—Humair Ghauri, Chief Product Officer, CareerBuilderImproved job matching for millions
As a result of migrating from an in-house search solution to Cloud Talent Solution, CareerBuilder has experienced improvements in several key metrics.
Careerbuilder.com
There’s been an 18% increase in applications submitted in several top job categories on careerbuilder.com. Overall, applications for jobs are up 5% to 7% and growing week over week as machine learning drives improvements. “Based on the huge amount of transactions we have, these are material increases,” says Humair.
Email alerts
Powered by Cloud Talent Solution, the careerbuilder.com site allows users to save job searches and receive alerts when new listings come online matching their saved search criteria. “We’ve seen a 15% lift in users who click through to view jobs sent through automated job alerts,” says Humair. “From users who clicked through, we’ve seen a 41% increase in expression of interest actions generated from saved search alerts. With Cloud Talent Solution, we’ve improved job matching for millions of users.”
Talent Networks
In addition, Cloud Talent Solution has helped spur a 40% increase in the number of people who click through to view jobs across CareerBuilder clients’ talent networks.
Mobile apps
Location has always been a major factor in the job search. Working with Cloud Talent Solution has enabled the CareerBuilder team to test innovative new features such as Commute Search, which allows job seekers to search by commute time and transit type, and gives employers a pool of candidates who are even more fit for their roles.
Job search is key to both companies
Providing powerful job search via Cloud Talent Solution is a strategic focus for Google as well as for CareerBuilder, which is why the two companies are ideal allies. “Through our association with Google, we’re combining expertise to solve problems we’re both passionate about,” says Humair. “What are the unique needs of our users searching on CareerBuilder’s platform based on various occupations, skill-level, and locations? What’s their behavior as they search? What’s their intent? All of that is relevant for us. And with help from Google, we’re continuously learning from our data and evolving to provide the best job matches.”
“Google engineers have, in essence, become an extension of the CareerBuilder engineering team. The level of collaboration and communication we’ve seen from the Google team is amazing. With a company of their size, we just didn’t expect that.”
—Humair Ghauri, Chief Product Officer, CareerBuilderThe Google and CareerBuilder partnership has developed into a meaningful collaboration. In June 2017, CareerBuilder announced it was marking up its job content to be eligible for display in job search. The new feature enables Google users to search millions of jobs aggregated from job boards, career sites, social media networks, and other sources. Google enriches its job search results through the collaboration with CareerBuilder, while CareerBuilder can give its clients’ job listings even wider exposure via the Google Search engine.
Amazing collaboration
“Google engineers have, in essence, become an extension of the CareerBuilder engineering team. The level of collaboration and communication we’ve seen from the Google team is amazing,” explains Humair. “With a company their size, we just didn’t expect that. Early on, we’d have SWAT teams of Google and CareerBuilder engineers working together, going through the query results, looking for ways to make them even better. The Google team was very interested in understanding our business and making Google APIs and technologies capture the essence of what we wanted.”
Focusing on what’s next
By switching to Cloud Talent Solution , CareerBuilder engineers no longer need to spend time trying to improve search result relevancy. Consequently, the team can focus on other projects—such as mobile capabilities—that will help CareerBuilder stay ahead of the game. “Going forward, we’ll be laser-focused on delivering a lot more capabilities for consumers to keep them engaged on our mobile platform,” says Humair. “Cloud Talent Solution frees us up to leverage our engineering resources on strategic areas like mobile.”
Cloud Talent Solution and Cloud Machine Learning Engine provide important machine learning capabilities and are foundational AI elements of the ever-evolving CareerBuilder platform.
“We have years and years of history we’ve accumulated from consumers and enterprise clients,” Humair says. “We want to use that data to be as relevant and engaging to users as possible, and to provide highly personalized user experiences. All of those things, which are critical to our business, are enabled through the machine learning Google has developed.”
Tell us your challenge. We're here to help.
Contact us
About CareerBuilder
Founded in 1995, CareerBuilder has evolved from a job search website into a global, end-to-end human capital solutions provider. The company specializes in AI-driven, platform-based solutions to help employers hire and manage the best talent and help consumers find jobs. CareerBuilder operates in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia.