The 40% careers site traffic drop in a candidate-rich market that changed one employer's view of AI

Last week, during an onboarding session with a new BrandScore customer, they shared a statistic I wasn't expecting. Their careers website traffic had fallen by around 40% over the previous 18 months, despite operating in a candidate-rich market.

There was another piece of data that made it even more interesting. Average dwell time on the site had significantly increased. Fewer people were arriving, but those who did were spending longer exploring.

This wasn't happening in a candidate-driven market. It was happening in an employer's market.

Wanting to understand what was driving the change, they spoke with their employer brand agency. The response surprised them. They weren't alone. The agency had observed similar patterns across a number of employers. Their conclusion was that AI was already changing how candidates discover employers.

That creates two possible explanations. The first is positive. AI is helping candidates research employers before they visit a careers site. By the time they click through, they already know they're interested, resulting in fewer visitors but higher engagement.

The second possibility is much more significant. Candidates are increasingly asking AI questions such as: 'Who are the best employers for career growth?', 'Which companies have the best culture?', or 'What are the best places to work in my industry?' The answer they receive usually contains only 3 to 5 recommendations. If your organisation isn't one of them, the candidate may never visit your careers site. They may never even know you were an option.

If that is happening, a drop in traffic isn't simply a website metric. It could be an early signal that AI is influencing which employers make it into a candidate's consideration set. That's a very different challenge.

The problem is that most organisations can't see what's happening. They know how many people arrive on their careers site. They know how long those visitors stay. The bigger question isn't what happened before someone visited the careers site. It's what happened to the people who never visited.

Did they ask AI for employer recommendations? Was your organisation recommended? Or did AI recommend one of your competitors instead? If AI didn't recommend you, what did it say when candidates asked about your organisation? What evidence did it use to reach those conclusions?

Those were the questions this customer wanted answered. That's why they engaged BrandScore from Benchmarcx. They wanted to understand whether AI was putting them into the candidate's consideration set or leaving them out altogether. They wanted to see what AI was saying about their employer brand, which competitors were being recommended instead, and what evidence was shaping those recommendations.

For years we've measured what happens once candidates reach our careers sites. AI is shifting the focus to what happens before they ever get there.

The question is no longer just whether candidates visit your careers site. It's whether AI gives them a reason to visit it in the first place.