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The measurement is % of people who click apply. But similar to “buy” I often click “apply” to find out more. After all I know that button isn’t committing me to

The measurement is % of people who click apply. But similar to “buy” I often click “apply” to find out more. After all I know that button isn’t committing me to the job or the purchase until I complete, and many sites gate information after clicking that button.

hourago 4y ago
That seems to be done on purpose but I am not sure why. Do people really buy more stuff because they clicked "buy" to get the info? Or is it just some arbitrary metric that is being improved without having real impact on the business? Maybe to have a separate "get more info" is worse for business. At least for me, the opposite it is true. It makes me hesitate to click in the "buy" button just to find more about the product.
- csunbird 4y ago
  Linkedin and other job advertisement sites get paid per "Apply" click or redirections, so they gate keep the information on purpose.
  - Cthulhu_ 4y ago
    That's exactly it, hitting "apply" is taken as a performance metric, so (and I'm sure there's a 'law' for this) everything is optimized to meet that metric.
    - phh 4y ago
      Yup, that's called Goodhart law
- Frost1x 4y ago
  I think part of it is to separate information to better know that a user was interested in a product and read the information further and perhaps it was price or purchasing conditions that turned them off. When you advertise traditionally you don't get a lot of information back from consumers other than those who start or make a purchase. The more actions you put between discovery and purchase, the more you can refine parts of the process. There are probably other psychological elements at play as well about gradually introducing information so you can strategically present the better aspects of something before you talk about say an ugly cost.
- nfriedly 4y ago
  It's not uncommon for me to 70% of the way through a checkout process because that's the only way to figure out how much shipping is. I'm not trying to buy the product, just get a single number - but pretending to buy it is often the only way to get that number!
c7b 4y ago
> After all I know that button isn’t committing me to the job or the purchase until I complete I used to think that too, until I clicked a similar button on Amazon...
- quickthrower2 4y ago
  I think Amazon patented that so all good! :-) (Yes it expired was contested etc.)
bstpierre 4y ago
I had the same reaction while reading it. It would be interesting to know what the abandonment rate is lower in the funnel, maybe after someone creates an account. Because I have also clicked apply on jobs where I have no real interest but am curious about the position or company. Also, the article is spot on about the tediousness of the online applications. I applied to a position at my kids’ school last year. School websites are awful enough but then they bounce you into a separate portal for the application. And the flow is built around the most complicated job that they might need to hire for. So, to get a job as, say, a p/t middle school soccer coach or night custodian, you have to go through all these steps that really don’t apply. And of course then they moan about how hard it is to fill positions.

hourago 4y ago

That seems to be done on purpose but I am not sure why. Do people really buy more stuff because they clicked "buy" to get the info? Or is it just some arbitrary metric that is being improved without having real impact on the business? Maybe to have a separate "get more info" is worse for business. At least for me, the opposite it is true. It makes me hesitate to click in the "buy" button just to find more about the product.

csunbird 4y ago
Linkedin and other job advertisement sites get paid per "Apply" click or redirections, so they gate keep the information on purpose.
- Cthulhu_ 4y ago
  That's exactly it, hitting "apply" is taken as a performance metric, so (and I'm sure there's a 'law' for this) everything is optimized to meet that metric.
  - phh 4y ago
    Yup, that's called Goodhart law
Frost1x 4y ago
I think part of it is to separate information to better know that a user was interested in a product and read the information further and perhaps it was price or purchasing conditions that turned them off. When you advertise traditionally you don't get a lot of information back from consumers other than those who start or make a purchase. The more actions you put between discovery and purchase, the more you can refine parts of the process. There are probably other psychological elements at play as well about gradually introducing information so you can strategically present the better aspects of something before you talk about say an ugly cost.
nfriedly 4y ago
It's not uncommon for me to 70% of the way through a checkout process because that's the only way to figure out how much shipping is. I'm not trying to buy the product, just get a single number - but pretending to buy it is often the only way to get that number!

c7b 4y ago

> After all I know that button isn’t committing me to the job or the purchase until I complete I used to think that too, until I clicked a similar button on Amazon...

quickthrower2 4y ago
I think Amazon patented that so all good! :-) (Yes it expired was contested etc.)

bstpierre 4y ago

I had the same reaction while reading it. It would be interesting to know what the abandonment rate is lower in the funnel, maybe after someone creates an account. Because I have also clicked apply on jobs where I have no real interest but am curious about the position or company. Also, the article is spot on about the tediousness of the online applications. I applied to a position at my kids’ school last year. School websites are awful enough but then they bounce you into a separate portal for the application. And the flow is built around the most complicated job that they might need to hire for. So, to get a job as, say, a p/t middle school soccer coach or night custodian, you have to go through all these steps that really don’t apply. And of course then they moan about how hard it is to fill positions.