After you’ve decided on the right job board software—depending on your goals, the pricing model, and important features—it’s now time to actually set up and launch the job board for your association.

Creating a job board for your association is a fantastic way to provide value to your members while generating non-dues revenue. A well-designed job board connects job seekers with employers in your industry, making it easier for both parties to find what they need.

In this blog post, we’ll walk you through the exact steps to set up an effective job board tailored specifically to your association.

If you haven’t already chosen association job board software, we recommend you read the detailed guide above. Niceboard is an excellent option that provides customizable job board software designed specifically for associations. With Niceboard, you can easily set up a job board without extensive technical knowledge.

1. Benefits of a job board

Before diving into the technical aspects of stetting up a job board, it’s important to understand the benefits of a job board for your association—so you don’t lose focus of the most important goals you want to achieve with it.

Membership value: Helping your members find job opportunities and advance their careers, hence driving member acquisition and retention.
Non-dues revenue: Creating a new income stream through job postings, resume databanks, sponsorships, and more.
Community and industry connections: Fostering not only connections between employers and job seekers within your industry, but also your association’s relationships with key industry players and top talent.

2. Design your job board

Once you’ve chosen your job board platform, software or plug-in, it’s time to populate your career center with your information and brand assets. A well-organized layout is essential for providing a positive user experience. Here are some key design elements to consider, in addition to essential UX elements such as loading speed (40% of visitors will leave a website if it takes longer than three seconds to load), simple navigation, minimal distractions, and accessibility:

a. Relevant job filters

First and foremost, your job board should be easy to navigate—duh! And it should be blatantly obvious to job seekers how to find the jobs that match their criteria.

In order to do this, you want to provide relevant job filters, such as keywords, job type, location, and salary range. Also make sure that your filters align with your association’s industry. For example, if your job board focuses on higher ed jobs, filters for educational departments or faculty positions would be particularly useful.

b. Comprehensive job listings

Each job posting should provide detailed information to help job seekers understand the role and the company better. When employers list jobs, ensure they include details such as:

Job responsibilities and qualifications: Clearly outline what the role entails and what skills/certifications are required.
Salary range: Providing this information can help set expectations and attract more serious candidates, while filtering out those that might be over- or underqualified.
Company culture and benefits: Work environment and benefits are becoming increasingly important for Gen Z and younger millennial employees.
Remote work options: In today’s market, many job seekers prioritize flexibility. Including a “remote-only” filter can greatly enhance user experience for the section of your audience for which this is a major decision-making factor.

Another idea to make jobs stand out: Encourage employers to include videos in their job postings. Short clips that describe the role and showcase the company culture will provide a personal touch that helps candidates feel more connected to potential employers.

c. Mobile optimization

Ensure that your job board is set up mobile-friendly. Many users will access the site from their smartphones or tablets, so it’s crucial that they can easily browse and apply for jobs on any device.

d. Profile creation for job seekers (& employers)

Allow job seekers to create profiles where they can store their application data, such as resumes and job preferences. This makes it faster for them to apply to jobs and positions your job site as the obvious choice to return for future work opportunities.

To make this process even easier, consider offering social login options via Google or LinkedIn. This reduces friction for job seekers during registration and makes for a smoother onboarding experience.

e. Automatic job alerts

Implement a system where job seekers can subscribe to automatic email alerts for new jobs. This keeps them informed about new postings without requiring them to constantly check your site.

Bonus points if you can send personalized job recommendations based on their preferences!

The first step is to create an email signup form, like the one below, and displaying it prominently on your job board.

f. Category landing pages

Take a moment to think about the overarching structure of your job site. While this is usually managed by your job board provider, you should pay special attention to one element: category landing pages

These pages can help job seekers find relevant jobs more easily while also improving your job board’s ranking in search engines (we’ll get into this topic later). Category landing pages should be well-optimized with relevant keywords and clear navigation paths.

3. Set pricing to drive non-dues revenue

Since generating revenue is probably one of the reasons you’ve decided for a job board in the first place, setting up a pricing structure, payment processing, and exploring possible revenue streams is quite important. Here are the key steps you can’t forget about:

a. Pricing structure

While some job boards offer free job posting, it is common for most career centers to charge employers for posting their roles. A popular setup is providing free postings to your member organizations while charging non-members—but you should decide on a pricing structure that makes sense for your association.

Yet another option is charging for premium listings, packages or other upsells, while keeping standard posts free. For example:

Priority job placement at the top of your board
Increased reach of a job by posting it on your social media platforms
Increased duration of the job listing
Actively advertising the job on your website with a job widget

Niceboard lets you set separate pricing plans for featured job postings and other premium offers. You can also decide to give a rebate to your members via job plans or discount codes.

b. Initial job listings

Before you share your newly created association job board with the world, you'll want to populate it with a selection of initial jobs.

You can source these jobs from:

Existing sponsors or members: Your member companies should be your first resource, but don’t forget to offer increased reach to your advertisers or donors via the job board.
Local employers: Reach out to other companies in your industry and encourage them to post their open positions. Offer them a free or discounted trial to get them started.
Backfill or curation: Most cloud based job board solutions also offer the option to "backfill" your job board with jobs from partner networks, such as Indeed, Talroo or Appcast. Enabling this feature is a good way to make your board look active and provide value to job seekers from day one.

c. Payment processing

Integrate a secure payment processing system into your job board to facilitate easy transactions for employers.

Payment platforms like Stripe allow employers to pay via credit card, PayPal, or other methods and can automatically invoice your employers for recurring payments. This is especially useful if you offer subscription models or bulk packages.

4. Additional revenue streams

In addition to charging for job postings, there are many more ways to generate non-dues revenue from your career center:

Access to a resume database: Employers will pay to access your database of candidates and corresponding resumes once you have enough of your members' profiles on your career center site.
Advertising opportunities: Offer your existing advertisers the option to have their ads displayed on the job board’s site, in job newsletters or during career events.
Career fairs: Companies can connect with qualified candidates in-person; and you can generate additional revenue through an attendance fee or sponsorships.
Educational content: If you create educational content—like webinars, workshops or even simple articles—consider allowing companies to sponsor these assets.
Recruitment guides: By analyzing how job seekers and employers interact with your platform and your jobs, you can create valuable guides that provide insights into industry trends—and employers will pay for them. For example, you could sell reports highlighting job seeker preferences, desired salary ranges, and local employment trends.

4. Plug the job board on your association’s website

Now that your job board is ready for business, it's time to promote it! The very first thing to do is integrating your job board into your association's main website. Having the job board easily accessible when members visit your site encourages them to explore available job opportunities right away.

Ideally, you have a responsive job widget—like a live preview to your job board—leading members to click and explore your actual career center. Alternatively, you can use a static banner ad, with a similar effect.

Other ways you can incorporate your job board into your association marketing:

Association events: Showcase your expertise in the industry by advertising your career center during your next event—for example by sponsoring a job fair or by offering career advancement resources.
Jobs in association newsletters: Include the newest active job listings or highlight specific resources in your regular emails going out to members. This helps create yet another touch point with your career center, leading more members to utilize it when they need it.
Cross-promotion: You can easily advertise related career resources alongside the job board, such as career development articles, upcoming events, or webinars that might interest users actively seeking employment. This keep your promotion interesting and non-repetitive.

"What I like about our job board is that for our members it looks and feels like AIA Colorado but we’re not hosting it. It takes a lot of technical work off my hands."

—Jon Bell, AIA Colorado

5. Promote your job board to job seekers

Once your job board is up and running, driving job seeker traffic is crucial for its success. Here are some ideas to drive traffic to your job board:

Existing channels: Use your association's email newsletters and social media platforms to announce the launch of your job board. Share regular updates about new job postings, success stories from members who found jobs through the board, and tips for job seekers.
Valuable career content: Develop blog posts or articles that address common career-related questions or challenges faced by your members—be specific to your industry. Topics could include resume writing tips, interview preparation, or industry trends.
Search engine optimization (SEO): Optimize your job board for search engines by using relevant keywords in job postings and content that your audience might be searching for on Google. Also look into using category landing pages and building backlinks from related sites in your industry to increase the chances of your jobs being found via Google search.
Local universities and colleges: Educational institutions in your industry are great partners to promote your job board with. Ask whether a link to your job board can be placed in the career resources section of their platform. A real win-win (plus, a backlink for you).
Social proof: Have you considered showing testimonials from satisfied job seekers who found jobs through your career center? To get more of your members to engage with your career center—whether it’s posting or applying for jobs—seeing positive opinions from others can be very influential.

6. Promote your job board to employers

Attracting employers to post jobs on your board is equally as important as catering to job seekers. Here are some strategies to find those hiring companies and encourage them to go with you (instead of the many other job board available to them):

Your competitive advantage: Highlight your job board’s competitive edge over other job boards. Namely, your ability to connect employers with a very specific audience of engaged professionals, and facilitate access to passive job seekers—typically high-performing industry employees who may not be actively searching for new roles but are always open to better opportunities.
Industry events: Attend industry conferences, trade shows, or networking events where you can connect with potential employers in person. Bring promotional materials about your job board and be prepared to discuss its benefits directly with hiring managers.
Networking on LinkedIn: LinkedIn is a wonderful tool for researching companies that are currently hiring and for outreach to HR professionals and decision-makers in relevant companies—they are likely quite active on LinkedIn.
Cold outreach: You can also reach out directly to potential employers through personalized emails or phone calls. The key here? A concise pitch that focuses on the value your job board offers THEM.
Additional incentives: If getting employers to move from big job boards to yours proves to be difficult, offer some incentives to your first employers to build your reputation as a job hub in your niche. This could be free trials for job postings, help sourcing candidates, or free promotional add-ons.

7. Monitor performance and improve

Now that you’ve designed your job board, set up a way to generate revenue, and a promotional plan, your job board is ready to go live. But don’t just set it and forget it. It's important to monitor your career center’s performance regularly.

For example by looking at these key metrics:

Number of job postings: Keep an eye on how many jobs are being posted over time. You also want to look at which types of roles, employers or job titles attract most views—and encourage well-performing job listings.
User engagement: A rather broad term that helps you understand how many users visit the site, how long they stay, and what actions they take. Analyzing this can point you towards areas that need improvement, such as optimizing search filters or providing more niche-specific content.
Application rates: Track how many applications are submitted through the site. Looking at trends in application volume and applicant quality over time can help evaluate the relevance of your job board to your market. Do you need to shift you focus to driving job seeker or employer traffic?

You made it! With this guide, you’re well-equipped to get your job board set up and launched—just in time for your next annual conference, board meeting, or career fair.

How to Create an Association Job Board