PCRecruiter WordPress Plugin 2.0

The PCRecruiter Job Board is in use on hundreds of websites, and the vast majority are built on WordPress. This week we’re excited to announce the release of PCRecruiter Extensions 2.0, a major upgrade that transforms how PCR’s job board interacts with WordPress, and by extension with search engines and candidates. We think it’s the most comprehensive WordPress job board integration offered by any recruitment CRM or ATS.

• Native Search Engine Optimization: Clean URLs and structured data help search engines understand your jobs and display them properly in results, and all job traffic routes to your site’s pages.
• Faster Performance: Native WordPress integration with caching means your job board loads instantly, improving user experience and search.
• Employer Branding: Jobs display on your domain with your branding, fonts, and design, all controlled by your WordPress themes and plugins, while the ‘apply’ process continues within a seamless PCR frame for security and control.

If you’ve been using the v1.x plugin, this new version offers you powerful new options. If you’re a PCRecruiter user with a WordPress website that is not using our job board, the upgraded plugin warrants your consideration.

New in v2.0: Full Job Sync

The biggest addition in v2.0 is Full Job Sync. While v1.x used an innovative combination of JavaScript with an inline frame to create a seamless a window for PCR to appear in, the new version offers a true API-based integration. Your PCRecruiter jobs are added directly to WordPress as native, fully-searchable job posts. This comes with many advantages:

Native WordPress Posts for Speed & Control

v2.0 automatically syncs live job postings directly into WordPress as custom post types. Your job listings become real WordPress content, giving you full control over their appearance, metadata, and behavior. They integrate seamlessly with your site’s theme and design system. All of this happens in real-time, so your changes are sent to the website securely within minutes of clicking ‘save’.

All searching is handled right on your site for optimal speed. Combined with smart caching, your job board gives candidates quick results regardless of how many positions you’ve got. Any field you have in your PCR Positions can be searched right in your site, including zip code radius and keyword searches.

SEO and Social Friendly

• Simple URLs
  • Job links start with your domain, followed by the /job/ path, and then the title, e.g. mysite.com/job/senior-software-engineer.
  • URLs for your jobs and searches are easy to share and bookmark.
  • URLs are search engine friendly, human-readable, and easily shortened with plugins.
  • Your URLs are automatically added to the WordPress sitemap features.
• Clear Page Titles
  • Automatic control over page titles and meta descriptions.
  • You decide what appears in the browser tab or share title, including location, position ID, or company details.
• Share Images
  • Set the share image within WordPress itself to apply to all jobs, or use your SEO plugin.
  • If you wish, push a Position Logo or Company Logo from PCR as the image for per-job control from PCR.
• Social Links
  • The native social sharing widget lets visitors email or share the job on popular social networks.
  • If you wish, you can implement third-party sharing plugins.

Structured Data for Schema.org JobPosting

Full sync includes fully controllable structured data markup for every job posting. This means better control of how jobs appear in search results, LinkedIn job shares, and other aggregators.

The plugin’s Schema Mapper lets you map fields to generate proper Schema.org JobPosting markup for Google Jobs and others to pick up. The control panel will alert you to jobs that are missing required fields, and can preview the schema for you to verify or adjust as needed.

Filtering & Merging

For even more control and support for special cases, PCRecruiter Extensions 2.0 also offers:

• Filtered Result Pages: Create a “Job_Category” custom field in PCR and use shortcode filters to put different jobs on different pages in the site by category.
• Combine Databases: If you have more than one PCR database or account, v2.0 can pull them all into a single website for combined display.
• Internal Jobs: Using a special shortcode, create a page that includes ‘Internal’ positions along with the ‘Available’ ones.
• Expired Jobs: While the plugin automatically removes closed, filled, or deleted jobs in real time, you can set it to allow them to remain on the site. These jobs are identified by special styling and have no apply button, but are visible to candidates and search engines for visibility into your past opportunities.

Native WordPress Design Control

Having the jobs right in WordPress means they automatically follow the templates and styles defined by your website’s theme. You can create a custom template for the /job/ post type in your theme to manage the layout so that individual positions carry the site’s design through.

For users on modern WordPress versions, the new Block Bindings feature lets you bind Gutenberg blocks directly to job fields without writing code. Edit your job template in the Site Editor and drag blocks to display job titles, descriptions, company info, and custom fields directly from your PCRecruiter data.

The plugin also offers an option to strip out inline styles in descriptions so that they pick up only the fonts and colors defined by your site’s stylesheet.

Your Site, Your Analytics

Having the jobs directly in your site means traffic and source for views on your positions will be trackable with your site’s existing Google Analytics or other on-site tracking functions, allowing you to see your job marketing performance as part of your website’s overall visitor picture.

The plugin attempts to capture the applicant’s source by looking at Google Ads tags, &src= tags, or the browser’s own domain referrer tracking, storing all of it in custom fields on the new applicant’s name record for reporting.

Upgrade Your Job Board

Ready to take your WordPress-based job listings to the next level? We’re here to help.

Because the new version creates data directly in the WordPress site and relies on the specific theme and architecture of the site, the setup process is more complex than the simpler copy/paste of the v1.x iframe. If you have a web designer who handles the site, our team can work with them to get the ball rolling. If you don’t have any website support, we can help with the complete soup-to-nuts setup as well.

If you decide to migrate to the new full sync from the iframe method, you can run both simultaneously during the transition period for minimal downtime. Plus, v2.0 automatically redirects legacy PCRecruiter iframe URLs to your new clean permalinks, so you won’t lose traffic when you switch.

If you’re running v1.x and want to continue as you are, you don’t need to do a thing. All of the features you’ve been using in the previous version, such as seamless iframe embedding, custom forms, and RSS XML/JSON feed imports will carry on working as normal in when you install the new version. Aside from a new ‘manual refresh’ button for the feed, a revised admin panel, and a cleaner uninstall process, you’ll notice no changes or interruptions. In fact, if your site is set to auto-update plugins, you may already have it!

For brand new users, full job sync is now your recommended starting point. The setup is straightforward when you work with a PCRecruiter consultant, and the long-term benefits for SEO and user experience are substantial.

To discuss your upgrade process or get answers to your questions, email support@mainsequence.net