How Popular Tech Companies Use Search Engines for Headhunting

July 06, 2010

I have been seeing some interesting search queries on Google Analytics for a long time but didn’t have time to dig deeper. Recently, I went through my Apache logs and realized that they were recruiters from tech companies accessing my resume.

Here is the command I used to find the search queries:

gunzip -c other_vhosts_access.log.* | grep cv\.html | grep "google\|bing\|search\|job\|project" | ccze -A

Then, I used whois command on IPs from interesting queries to locate where the queries are originating from.

Search strings are grouped by company name. Search query, search engine, OS, and browser combinations used are listed below.

Google

(inurl:CV | inurl:Vitae | inurl:Resume | intitle:CV | intitle:Vitae | intitle:Resume) AND Computer.Science AND ("Opensource" OR "Open Source") AND (C++ OR Java OR Python) AND (Linux OR Ubuntu OR kernel) -apply -jobs

Search Engine: Google
OS: Macintosh
Browser: Chrome

(Python and c++) ("computer science"|CS) ((inurl:~resume) | (inurl:~vitae) | (intitle:~resume) | (intitle:~vitae)) -job -jobs -Ph.D

Search Engine: Google
OS: Windows
Browser: Firefox

Microsoft

prototyping algorithms games cv resume

Search Engine: Bing
OS: Windows
Browser: Internet Explorer

Amazon

resume 2010 (ca OR wa OR or) java -coffee c++ developer -job (unix OR linux) enterprise distributed (425 OR 415 OR 310 OR 206 OR 503 OR 509)

Search Engine: Bing
OS: Windows
Browser: Firefox

Unknown origin but interesting

-inurl:dir -inurl:sample -inurl:samples -inurl:cvsamples -inurl:example -inurl:examples  scheduling (project OR management) (DoD OR security OR clearance)

Search Engine: Recruiting.com (uses Google)
OS: Windows
Browser: Internet Explorer

(intitle:resume OR intitle:cv OR intitle:vitae OR inurl:resume OR inurl:cv OR inurl:vitae)  "programming competition" javascript

Search Engine: Google
OS: Windows
Browser: Firefox

Conclusions

Google and Amazon used complicated and detailed queries while Microsoft preferred a simpler search string. Furthermore, there isn’t much surprise in OS and browser choices. Google used its own browser Chrome and Microsoft used its own search engine Bing. Of course, these are based on my observations for last few months, they may use many different queries or browsers, I can’t know for sure.

However, there is something very interesting about the usage of search engines for recruiting. Job seekers may apply SEO techniques to their CVs/Resumes. Preferably, optimizing for the company they want to work for, according to the search queries these companies use. RSEO or CVSEO might become popular in the near future.