fish4jobs is the UKís most popular online recruitment website according to (NORAS) research

fish4jobs, part of fish4 - the UKís online classified business covering jobs, homes and cars ñ has emerged for the second year in succession as the UKís most popular online recruitment website. According to the NORAS 2006 survey released on 6th March 2006 and independent traffic auditors ABC Electronic, fish4jobs attracts over 1.6 million job seekers a month. This is a 22 per cent increase in users since fish4jobsí 2005 audit.

The NORAS research reveals that fish4jobs has a user-base that is evenly spread across the whole of the UK, including London, unlike other job websites that tend to be adversely weighted towards the South-East.

Interestingly, the NORAS research also reveals the growing popularity of the internet as a medium of choice for everyday people that are job-hunting. This is indicated by the characteristics of the people that are using the fish4jobs website who come from all over the country, and who work within a broad range of job sectors and job types. For example, reflecting the changing employment landscape in the UK, 19 per cent of job seekers are using fish4jobs to find a part-time job. When it comes to earnings 63 per cent of job seekers on the fish4jobs website take home up to 20k per annum. Sixty per cent of those on fish4jobs are female and sixtyñone per cent of users are aged between 16 and 34 years old. All candidates are big readers of the local press, as well as the Sun and the Daily Mail. Finally, NORAS found that over 48 per cent of fish4job users have successfully found a job on the website.

The main reason for fish4jobsí UK-wide popularity and the broad demographic range of job seekers who access it, is due to its ownership by four leading regional newspaper groups - Newsquest Media Group, Northcliffe Newspapers, Trinity Mirror, and Guardian Media Group Regional Newspapers. This allows fish4jobs to be promoted across 650 local newspapers, reaching 30 million people and 175 local newspaper websites that are accessed by eight million users.

Another key factor in fish4jobsí popularity amongst the UK population is that 27 per cent of job seekers claimed that ëease of useí was the main reason why they use website ñ the highest figure when compared with all the other websites NORAS surveyed.

Corresponding with the increase in the number of candidates visiting their site, fish4jobs has been building a raft of products and services designed to bring advertisers and jobseekers together quickly and efficiently. These include a CV database with over 110k registrations in the last six months alone, and highly targeted advertiser e-mail solutions to their 600k ëmyfish4í registered candidate base.

The popularity of fish4jobs amongst job seekers, combined with the range of products and services it provides to advertisers, means that fish4jobsí blue-chip client base includes the biggest high-street recruitment consultants: Adecco, Blue Arrow and Manpower, and direct recruiters who include: Network Rail, Orange, Siemans and The Royal Navy, amongst others.

fish4 CEO, Joe Slavin, commented:

ëWeíre delighted that more and more jobseekers are using fish4jobs every year and finding jobs that work for them.

ìInterestingly, the NORAS survey reveals that out of all the general interest job boards, fish4jobs stands out as having a really unique demographic audience. This stems from our local footprint in the marketplace stamped through local newspapers that are read by over 30million people and local newspaper websites that generate an amazing eight million unique users per month.

ìOther generalist recruitment websites like Monster will generate interest in vacancies, but candidates may be just as likely to apply from Birmingham, Alabama (USA) as from Birmingham, West Midlands.

ìfish4jobs clearly has a unique local audience that can be leveraged by local employers up and down the UK.î

Sean Mahon, fish4ís Group Marketing Director, said:

ìItís great news that weíre still the UKís biggest audited siteí but thatís not the whole story as far as weíre concerned. Delivering quality responses to our recruitment advertisers is what weíre in business to do. Weíre essentially a marketplace, and itís only through real understanding of the profile of our job seekers and our client requirements that we can successfully bring the two together.

ìOur strength is in delivering quality, local responses for our recruiters from real people in real towns and cities up and down the UK. If you need local retail, sales, secretarial or call centre staff in Newcastle, Newquay or Norfolk you wonít find a better solution than fish4jobs.î