How InFlight Powered a New Consumer-Grade Career Site for Cox Enterprises in Partnership With SmashFly

If you’re reading this, you likely know that the modern candidate has certain expectations when it comes to a company’s hiring process.

Candidates today anticipate the same type of experience that they have as customers –  a consumer-grade experience – during the recruitment process.

Not surprisingly for a company as successful and ambitious as Cox Enterprises (No. 15 on Forbes 2018 list of Largest Private Companies), bringing a consumer-grade career site experience to life was a priority to maintain their competitive edge in talent attraction.

To build out their new consumer-grade career site, Cox Enterprises partnered with InFlight and SmashFly. Read SmashFly’s press release here. 

InFlight used SmashFly’s Content Management System for Career Sites to design, implement and deliver a world-class career site that showcases Cox Enterprises’ powerful employer brand. Additionally, InFlight improved the talent experience across Cox Enterprises’ apply process in Taleo and in their internal PeopleSoft HR applications.

First off, what makes for a consumer-grade career site experience?

Put simply, great branding and storytelling combined with a smooth apply process.

The beautiful branding and authentic stories attract talent upfront, and the streamlined apply process encourages candidates to start (and actually finish!) an application to join your team.

How does the new Cox Enterprises career site and apply process provide a consumer-grade experience?

The new Cox Enterprises career site and apply process offers candidates a consumer-grade experience in two ways:

1. Firstly, on the career site side, web pages are beautifully branded and full of employee stories that bring Cox Enterprises’ employer brand to life. The site functionality also allows jobs to be featured and recommended and has vastly improved search capabilities.
2. While the career site and enhanced jobs draw people in, the new and improved apply process increases applicant conversion rates by encouraging candidates to actually complete their application. The smooth application experience is a positive brand touchpoint that keeps candidates engaged and excited about the prospect of working with Cox Enterprises.

Here’s more information about how Cox Enterprises’ new career site and apply process was built and what it looks like in action:

Better branding and storytelling

To build a great storytelling platform, the InFlight team used SmashFly’s Content Management System (CMS) for Career Sites.

The challenge and goal that InFlight and SmashFly solved for was to create a platform that the Cox team could easily update and control themselves. Secondly, the aim was to provide a web environment that allowed for separate branding and content for each division of Cox Enterprises, which consists of Cox Communications, Cox Media Group, and Cox Automotive.

Using SmashFly’s CMS, Cox Enterprises’ talent acquisition team can now add and update search-optimized job pages and edit site copy and images for each of their brands in real-time with no coding experience. This allows for the team to create and publish fresh and personalized content on an ongoing basis that speaks to specific talent groups.

Having in-house control over their career site content gives Cox Enterprises the added agility to deliver a consistent recruitment marketing experience for all stakeholders: internal and external candidates, hiring managers and talent acquisition teams.

A streamlined apply process

In addition to designing, building and implementing the career site, InFlight improved the user experience of Cox Enterprises’ overall apply process.

Candidates are no longer tasked with a difficult registration process when they click “Apply.” Instead, candidates are prompted to fill in just the key details on page one so they don’t get deterred by too many fields right off the bat.

After filling out the short form with their name and email, candidates are sent to an application portal where they can fill in or upload all information step by step.

This digestible, easy-to-navigate experience guides candidates through their application. In addition to seeing exactly where they are in the hiring process, candidates also have the choice to save and come back to finish their application later.

The new streamlined experience is mobile-optimized and fully aligned with Cox Enterprises’ brands.

Cox Enterprises did not need to implement a new ATS in order to provide this upgraded apply process. InFlight worked to improve the user experience (UX) within Cox Enterprises’ current ATS, Taleo, to avoid any costly system implementations.

Why build out a consumer-grade careers site?

Because it will help put more candidates in your pipeline for those hard-to-fill roles at your organization.

A well-branded career site attracts candidates, and when outstanding content is combined with InFlight technology to streamline your apply process, it can reduce application drop-off rates – which by industry standards can be as high as 60 percent.

For Cox Enterprises, the simple integration between InFlight and SmashFly has improved Cox’s user experience, resulting in increased adoption, optimized investment and more actionable metrics.

Adam Glassman, Senior Manager, Employment Branding at Cox Enterprises explains, “Cox is a special company, and our partnership with SmashFly and InFlight has given us a better platform to share that story. Simplifying and streamlining our talent acquisition process, while gaining real-time control over our content, were important strategic moves to support our overall hiring objectives.”

How can you build out a consumer-grade career site for your organization?

If you’d like to find out more about how InFlight can help your career site provide a vastly better candidate experience (without having to implement a new ATS or HCM), book a free demo today!

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More About InFlight Corporation

From pre-hire to retire, InFlight delivers candidate and employee experiences that drive your talent strategy, enhance your brand, and maximize your HR efforts and investments. InFlight is the HR user experience platform that works with everything you already have to give you absolute control over end-user behavior and experiences. It’s your technology. InFlight ups the ante on what it can do. InFlight is headquartered in Easthampton, Mass. Learn more at www.inflightintegration.com.

More About SmashFly Technologies

SmashFly is an award-winning company that serves more than 100 customers, including 25 of the Fortune 500. Powered by AI, SmashFly’s enterprise platform combines CRM, career site, events and analytics solutions to create a smarter, seamless experience for talent – and your team. To learn more about SmashFly, visit www.smashfly.com and follow us on Twitter @SmashFly.