For thousands of people stumped by their lack of job search success, learning about applicant tracking systems is a major “Aha!” moment. But even after recognizing that they’re slipping through the cracks of these deeply flawed software, it can be tough to do battle against such a vague, nebulous obstacle. So let’s add some context and call these applicant tracking systems out by name. Here’s a rundown of the top applicant tracking systems you’re likely to encounter in your job search.
Read more: What is an applicant tracking system?
Top Applicant Tracking Systems by the Numbers
Ongig runs an annual poll to determine the top applicant tracking systems. In their latest poll, they checked in with 4,218 hiring companies. Below are their top 10 applicant tracking systems compared to the top applicant tracking systems entered by real job seekers into their Jobscan Match Reports as well as our proprietary research into Fortune 500 companies.
Note: Some large corporations utilize multiple applicant tracking systems. For instance, they could use one system for their corporate hiring and another system for their retail locations.
Below is a closer look at three of these top applicant tracking systems.
Taleo
Taleo by Oracle can trace its development back to the 1990s and leads both lists of top applicant tracking systems. According to Ongig’s research, they dominate all applicant tracking systems with a 19.1% market share, although they’ve lost some ground since last year.
Taleo’s customers include big-time corporations that range from groundbreaking tech to retail to healthcare: Tesla, Starbucks, Deloitte, Nike, Kaiser Permanente, Johnson & Johnson, and thousands more.
Job Seeker Tip: Sometimes you can tell that you’re applying through Taleo based on the URL of the job application. Wherever you find the job listing, by the time you get to the application, you’ll probably have been redirected to a site with “taleo.net” in the URL. For example: Tesla (chj.tbe.taleo.net/…), Starbucks (starbucks.taleo.net/…), and Nike (nike.taleo.net/…).
Once you know, check out these additional Taleo tips.
Greenhouse
Greenhouse is relatively new to the applicant tracking system market compared to some of the other heavy-hitters on this list. They got started in 2012 and have been gobbling up market share in recent years, surging to Ongig’s number two spot after being fifth a year ago.
Greenhouse is far and away the fastest-growing applicant tracking system within Ongig’s sample, having attracted clients like Major League Baseball (from Taleo), Taco Bell (from Brassring), and Roku (from Jobvite) in the past year. One reason for Greenhouse’s rise could be the foothold it’s gaining in the tech industry, with high profile clients such as Airbnb, Snapchat, Instacart, Pinterest, Fitbit, and many more.
Job Seeker Tip: When a recruiter searches for a keyword, Greenhouse ATS searches applicants’ entire resumes for the keyword. One of the top factors for how the results are ranked is keyword frequency. For example, if a recruiter searches for “administrative assistant,” an applicant with five mentions of that title in their resume will appear higher in the results than someone with only two mentions.
Because of this, it’s important to ensure that the most important hard skills and keywords for a job are mentioned in your resume multiple times.
iCIMS
Like Taleo, iCIMS has been around since the early days of the online job search, having been founded in 1999. Based on Ongig’s year-over-year research, iCIMS appears to be growing, leapfrogging Jobvite and earning a 7.4% market share.
iCIMS is a highly customizable applicant tracking system with a deep feature set, meaning any two companies could be using it very differently. Their diverse client list includes big names like Amazon, Uber, Goldman Sachs, Samsung, and Southwest Airlines.
Job Seeker Tip: When a recruiter or hiring manager performs a search in iCIMS, candidates are sorted by a match percentage. One of the factors that contribute to a high ranking is keyword frequency. For example, in a search for the term “accounting,” a candidate that has the exact word in their resume 5 times is likely to rank higher than a candidate with only 3 mentions. Job seekers should layer in as many mentions of the most important keywords as possible without blatantly “keyword stuffing.”
If you’re not sure which words to prioritize, paste the job description and your resume below to receive an instant keyword analysis from Jobscan.
Read additional job seeker tips for iCIMS here.
Learn More About Applicant Tracking Systems
- ATS-Specific Tips in the Jobscan Match Report
- What is an Applicant Tracking System?
- 8 Things You Need to Know about Applicant Tracking Systems
