Advertising your vacancy across a range of online jobs platforms is the key to maximising the reach of your advertisement and running an effective recruitment campaign. Yeomans Medical offers the following guide to maximising your coverage on the GP jobs platforms most relevant for your surgery and for a minimal cost.

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Before embarking on a marketing campaign for a new GP, practice managers should have a clear understanding of the very tight nature of the GP jobs market and be under no illusions about the length of time it can take to secure a GP. We encourage you to read our article Where have all the doctors gone for an overview of the supply & demand dynamics at play. We prefer to describe the process of advertising for a new GP as a "marketing campaign" because it is a better description of the degree of organisation and sustained effort that is required to ensure success. 

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The best advertising medium is online because they reach the widest possible audience, can be targeted specifically to GPs and offer the best value for money. To be confident that your advertising will work you need to ensure your ad appears on all of the major online platforms where doctors are likely to be looking. This can be achieved for as little as $300 per month. 

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There are several major sectors of the online advertising space that surgeries should consider. Each of them have their pros and cons, depending on your location and individual circumstances. We explore each in more detail below.

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SEARCH ENGINES

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One of the first actions that a lot of doctors will take in their job hunt is a simple Google search for GP vacancies in their local area. It is important that you can be found in the doctor's search results, preferably on the first page.

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 Yeomans Medical  host surgery ads on our website that are carefully written to ensure they feature prominently in Google search results for general practitioner vacancies in specific towns, suburbs, districts or regions. Our search results will link doctors directly to your surgery ad on our website or to the jobs board for your area, depending on the nature of the inquiry. We can further boost your position on Google search results with the use of paid Google Ads to position you as prominently as possible on page 1 of search results. 

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SOCIAL MEDIA

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Social media is more of a passive advertising platform that allows you to reach out to doctors who may not be necessarily looking for a new position but may be aware of someone who is. Its power lies in the word of mouth circulation of your vacancy amongst friends, colleagues and general practice employees in your area. This is particularly useful for getting the attention of local doctors that you may find it difficult to approach directly.

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Yeomans Medical can assist you to market your vacancy on social media in a professional manner. When advertising on our website a summarised version of your ad is posted up to Facebook, Twitter and Linked-In. It is circulated amongst the growing number of doctors following our sites who regularly share our ads with their colleagues. Our social media ads can be further boosted with the use of paid ads, which can be targeted to GPs right across Australia.

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MEDICAL INDUSTRY JOBS BOARDS

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RACGP

The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners has an excellent jobs board on their website.  Advertising is free but available for members only so there are no recruitment agency advertisements. The ads appear to be up to date, full of detail and are searchable by location. Surgeries should consider the RACGP website an important component of their recruitment strategy.

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Medical Journal of Australia

The Medical Journal of Australia hosts an excellent jobs board, and in terms of vacancies listed is a similar size to the RACGP. Advertising costs start at $305 per month but AMA members are eligible for a 50% discount.

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Rural Workforce Agencies

Rural doctors’ networks are primarily setup to support General Practices in rural areas with their administrative, health and recruitment needs. They all contain good quality, free jobs boards on their websites and may be worth advertising with. Follow the links to the agency in your state.

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Primary Health Networks

Primary Health Networks are the old Divisions of General Practice and function as a support organization for medical practices in relation to their administrative, health and sometimes recruitment needs. Some of them may have jobs boards which have the benefit of having a local audience. Surgeries should contact their local Primary Health Network to see if advertising with them is possible.

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MEDICAL PUBLICATIONS

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Medical publications such as Australian Doctor have an online jobs board called AusDocJobs. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have a very large selection of vacancies and a significant proportion of them are agency ads. At last check advertising cost approx. $300 per month.

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COMMERCIAL JOBS BOARDS

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Commercial Jobs Boards such as Seek.com, Indeed.com and Adzuna.com have an enormous number of vacancies on their jobs boards. At last check Seek had 1266 GP vacancies, Adzuna over 1200 vacancies and Indeed have a record 5000 GP jobs listed. As Seek and Adzuna are paid advertising sites we believe that their vacancies are fairly representative of the actual job market in Australia. Indeed.com however does not charge to advertise and we believe that there may be a significant number of duplicated or expired jobs listed. Seek costs approx. $300 per month for advertising and Adzuna $99.

Feedback from surgeries indicates very mixed results from these jobs boards with a significant number of inquiries from overseas based IMGs and also unqualified candidates from other industries.

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SURGERY WEBSITE

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An often overlooked but very important marketing strategy is to include your vacancy on your own surgery website. If a doctor is aware of your surgery they may look at your website for some more general information about you. If they discover you have a vacancy they will almost certainly get in touch.

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