The following guest post comes to us from Mark Cohen, C.O.O., EVP New Business Development JMR Publishing, Equality Magazines, Equality Jobs.

In the beginning there were a few huge general job boards, Monster, CareerBuilder, Hotjobs and they were very important to our industry as they were instrumental in teaching us all about the “JOB BOARD.” In fact, they showed the HR professional that the internet and online job board is a viable way to hire. When they began, everybody from a Wal-Mart hourly employee to someone in the C-suite at IBM looked on the same job board.

Now some two decades later, there have been so many changes to the marketplace. This is normal as markets usually begin with a general theme and then migrate to the specific needs of the consumer. Now, the market is segmented and talent specific, and you have the opportunity to target your message to the specific group of people you are interested in through a targeted job board.

The use of a targeted job board has inherent advantages. These advantages apply to both the ad agency and the corporate employers. Some of these are glaring if not obvious; branding, building your brand within a specific community, pre-established target audience, better at reaching the casual job seeker, where your competition is looking, and they are far more cost efficient.

Most evident is that a targeted job board allows you to actually pay for the applicants you get as a result of targeting your postings. This as opposed to paying for an entire populous – with a general job board the vast majority of candidates are not qualified let alone the candidates you are looking for.

Even though advertising your opportunities in major newspapers and large job boards can still play a role in an employer’s recruitment strategy, the ability to send a targeted message to a specific diverse category’s talent pool is the best and most economical way to accomplish your goal, to attract a diverse slate of candidates for your employment opportunities, and ultimately enhances the diversity of your workforce. If targeted diversity is not reflected in your recruitment advertising, you could be sending a message to the job seeker that he or she is not wanted in your organization.

In addition to increasing and diversifying your pool of applicants, targeted diversity recruitment advertising can enhance diversity in your employment brand. Some employers make the mistake of assuming that a positive image with their product or service translates into a positive image as employers that embrace diversity. Targeted diversity recruitment advertising can be an effective tool for ensuring that diversity is an important part of your organization’s overall brand image. In the form of image advertising, targeted diversity recruitment advertising can also counter the impact of negative events, discrimination lawsuits and rumors of individual incidents, by reinforcing positive perceptions.

Targeted Diversity recruitment is one of the hottest topics in corporate America today. The latest census results firmly established that the ethnic make-up of the U.S. is changing at a rate faster than anyone has anticipated. Corporate America is already aware of the changing demographics; in fact many corporate front-runners established diversity initiatives back in the mid-90s. More than a decade later, the bottom-line results have not been measured in dollars, but rather in the demographics of women and minority recruitment, retention and supplier diversity.

Still, not all niche job boards are successful. Ones that are, are the ones that get their visitors involved, constantly produce fresh material, have current and real jobs and promote potential advertisers. By way of example this has been the philosophy at EqualityMagazines.com for more than twenty years and can be seen on any of the Targeted Minority Recruitment and Community Resource outlets in their family of Diversity on-line web sites and job boards; Veterans Enterprise, Hispanic Today, The Black Perspective, Women in Business & Industry.