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Recently, I’ve been getting some requests for
recommendations on applicant tracking systems (ATS). Now, before I get into the specifics of
ExactHire, I do want to say that with some research, you may be able to find
other similar products that work well for you.
The applicant tracking system was a revolutionary HR product in the
early 2000’s, but has since become somewhat of a commodity, with nearly endless
options available. There are a lot of
really good options on the market, at all price points. Before buying, just make sure you’re getting
the features you think you’re getting, and make sure you’re getting a fair
price. Make sure you see a demo, ask to
use the system on a trial basis to check it out, and speak to other firms
who’ve used the product and get a fair assessment before signing.
Now, on to ExactHire!
A note – I’ve not used ExactHire on a daily basis for nearly 2 years,
and I understand there have been some upgrades to the system – which I will not
be able to speak to. The product I’m
familiar with is called MyExactHire. I’m
reviewing this product, specifically for small to mid-market sized firms. If you work for a large firm, or have a very
high volume of job applicants, you may want to look at options more
specifically designed for enterprise sized firms.
Background:
ExactHire is an Indiana-based firm, which I believe was founded sometime
in the mid 2000’s, prior to the economic downturn. They have a small, but consistent team. I don’t believe anyone at the firm actually
developed the ATS software that they sell, but they do know the product well,
and I believe they have a strong relationship with their developers – I never
noticed an issue with the fact they didn’t create the software themselves. You will actually notice a lot of similarities
to the ExactHire ATS product and another mid-market ATS product called
iApplicants – I believe they use the same, or a similar development team.
The key staff have
experience in selling HR software and as HR practitioners. This means that they understand the HR
software market, as well as pain points that you may have as an HR pro or as a
small business leader.
Implementation:
As with most SAAS products these days, ExactHire does most of the heavy
lifting during implementation, which is a big benefit, especially if time and
resources are limited. Typically, HR and
internal IT teams have relatively little time to dedicate to initiatives like
applicant tracking. Also, if you have a
lot of jobs, getting those jobs into the system can be a pain. ExactHire handles the initial uploads of
current jobs which can be a big time saver, or just a nice added benefit. Additionally, the cost of hosting on premise
is known to be an outdated business model, so the benefits of SAAS from an
implementation standpoint, as well as a maintenance standpoint are really ideal
for most small and mid-size businesses.
Last point on implementation is that it doesn’t take long. They will work within your timeline, but it
doesn’t take long at all to get the software up and running.
Configuration/Customization: From my understanding, ExactHire’s new
product, called “HireCentric” allows for a lot of configuration and
customization. The MyExactHire product
also allows for some configuration and customization. The job landing page can be uniquely targeted
and matched to your regular website, so as to align to your branding and online
messaging, as well as to create a professional candidate experience. There is also the ability to configure the
online application to ensure you are able to get the information from
candidates you are seeking.
Customer Service:
Since ExactHire is a smaller provider, you tend to get better service
than you do with larger market providers.
For example, with Taleo’s ATS, you have to submit a ticket through the
Oracle customer service portal, and response time is dismal at best. ExactHire has a support email address you can
use when you have issues or questions, and the response time was always under
24 hours when I had an issue.
Pitfalls: So
far, this has been a pretty good review, but this wouldn’t be valuable if I
didn’t disclose some of the pitfalls, as there are always some when it comes to
HR software.
- High Volume of Applicants – ExactHire is not the best solution if or when you have a very high volume of job applicants. When you have a high volume of applicants, you need ways to sort, search and rank applicants in order to maximize your time and ensure you’re recruiting as efficiently as possible. While you can ask questions as part of the process, the ability to rank or rate applicants based on responses does not exist. You still have to go in and open and read all of them in order to form judgment. Additionally, the ability to search the system is not great. Let’s say you wanted to search all job applicants within the last year that included the term “SEO” on the application or resume. You can’t do it in ExactHire. Searching applicants for key terms, company names, job titles, etc. is important when your applicant volume is high, and unfortunately, this system falls down here. However, to be fair, I didn’t find this to be problematic, until the daily applicant volume exceeded the 30-50 applicant per day mark.
- Integration with other HR systems – I don’t believe that ExactHire was created with the intention of integration with other systems. That’s not to say that something probably can’t be built, but integration was and is an afterthought with this product. Again, when applicant volume is lower, this isn’t so important. However, for organizational efficiency, this becomes increasingly important, the more open jobs, and the more applicants you have.
- Reporting – the system does offer some powerful reports, particularly if you’re unaccustomed to having reporting mechanisms. For example, it makes EEO reporting a breeze. It also provides some reporting for applicant sources, and other general fields that applicants are asked. However, if you want deeper analytical insight into your recruiting process such as time to hire, applicant flow, quality of applicant, etc., there’s really nothing there to help you. There’s a focus on analytics in the world of human capital, and I imagine their newer product addresses some of these shortcomings, but having data insight capabilities is important to a lot of businesses, so be sure the reporting meets your level of expectation in this regard.
Perks: I
usually prefer to end on a positive note, so I want to list a few additional
perks that I found with this system:
- You can create an entire career page using their software. If your IT team is unable to commit the time or resources to building out a career page, you can do it yourself using this system. In addition to the page which lists job openings, you have the ability to create other pages on your MyExactHire page that might outline employee benefits, the company culture, the application process, what it’s like to work at the company, etc. It’s also relatively easy for non-tech savvy people to create these pages using their templates and page builders.
- You get to have a slightly closer relationship with the vendor than you might with other larger providers. You’ll get to know the staff well, and they’ll remember your questions, challenges, and what’s important to you. It’s hard to place value on this, but trust me, it comes in handy.
- The system automatically posts jobs to several job boards for you including Indeed.com, SimplyHired, Oodle, etc. While not quite as high profile as CareerBuilder or Monster, and not as niche as Dice.com, these are great job boards and will secure a lot of leads for you, and help spread the word about your openings.
- The cost of this ATS is very reasonable. For Cadillac systems, you will pay a high price tag. And while this system doesn’t have all of the bells and whistles that the top market leaders possess, it does have a lot of great features and unlike those systems, it won’t break the bank. In fact, for most companies, I imagine it would be pretty easy to establish a business case for this software saving budget dollars.
If you have additional specific questions about this software, or my experience with it, please contact me at CatapultHRSolutions@gmail.com.
*I am not affiliated with ExactHire, and was not asked (or compensated) to write this product review.
