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Yelp Expands Tools To Help Businesses With Recruiting As COVID-19 Transforms Hiring

Countless C-level executives have told this journalist of their adventures in recruiting and hiring in the past six months during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Most did not have the ability to meet with employees in-person, face-to-face. The upside is that they learned more about potential prospect by asking the correct questions and getting a glimpse into their personal lives through video-chat platforms like Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, and Zoom.

Asking the correct questions also plays a vital role when hiring an experienced person to do jobs at home or work in a local business that might have recently re-opened. To meet this need, developers at Yelp built an end-to-end hiring platform for home, local, automotive and professional services. Think of it as a lead generation tool.

As part of its available tools, Yelp has expanded on its new guided questionnaires for Request-A-Quote, initially introduced in 2016 -- adding 100 business categories and starting the hiring process by requesting a quote, appointment or consultation.

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People often are unsure about the type of information service providers need to evaluate their job. The expanded feature takes the guesswork out of the equation, giving business owners the information they need to respond with accurate pricing or timing estimates.

The questionnaire will launch in the coming months. New categories available today include auto repair, child and day care, contractors, hair salons, session photography, pet groomers, real estate agents, and more. A tap of the button allows businesses to share the time and day they’re available to schedule a consultation.

Yelp also introduced a paid subscription product called Nearby Jobs that gives professionals a way to grow their business and get in front of more people looking to hire pros in specific services.

The tool is part of Yelp’s modernized design, which makes connecting people with the ideal provider easier.

During early beta tests of Newby Jobs, Orlando Johnson, owner of Mid-Atlantic Movers, said the tool brought the company 180 jobs within five months and as a result, 27 reviews.

The new design has been rolled out across search results and business pages on the web, as well as business pages on mobile.

A new home screen and search experience is coming to mobile devices soon.

And while the company says the new tools that “reinvent” the hiring process take Yelp “beyond discovery and reviews,” that is not entirely true. They actually dig the roots of the company deeper with a modern twist, to overcome many of the challenges consumers face amidst the COVID-19 crisis.

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