4 Costly Job Description Mistakes Trucking Companies Make and How to Fix Them

Last updated 6 July 2022. About 4 min read.

Written by Rick Acosta

If you’re looking to attract truck drivers to your position you need a job offering that looks and sounds right. Here are some costly mistakes that trucking companies make when presenting their job to the public, as well as some advice on how to avoid them!

How you present your trucking job to the public is everything. You could have a perfectly good job, but its value might not shine through when it’s being advertised to the public.

I want to show you a few ways that you can get better hiring results by adjusting how you present your job - without actually changing a thing about the job itself. You ready?

How we know what works and what doesn’t

At YouCruit, at the time of writing this blog, we have around 1,000 trucking companies using our system to post their jobs. Every job they post to YouCruit is automatically listed on the Lanefinder app, where drivers that live in the company’s hiring area and match their hiring requirements can apply to their jobs.

Since we have a large pool of companies and a large amount of data to draw from, we can make observations that suggest what features of a job make it more desirable in the eyes of drivers, and which features don’t.

I mentioned that you can get better hiring results and attract more drivers without changing anything about the job itself, but how? We’ll find the solutions as we look into the common mistakes many trucking companies make.

Here are the mistakes many trucking companies make

1. Their hiring area is too small

I’ve spoken to many trucking companies that have jobs with hiring ranges that are smaller than they should be. Having a small hiring radius for a local job is one thing, but a small radius for a regional or even OTR position isn’t always the right choice.

If you have a regional or OTR position and only hire 50 miles around the terminal, then ask yourself: “Why?” and "Will broadening this area have a negative impact?"

Our customer success representatives have spoken to many regional and OTR employers who agreed to broaden their hiring range after being advised that it might help them attract more drivers.

Naturally, if you have a local job that gets drivers home daily, then set the right expectations and keep your area small. A good local job should have no issue finding people that are interested.

2. They don’t list their salary as a range

In YouCruit, and on the Lanefinder app, all jobs represent pay with a low - high range. The average salary, then, is what you would find between the two ranges, with some variance.

We’ve found that many companies misunderstand what is meant by an average salary range, and don't enter the higher end of their pay in the job description.

When trying to stand out on job boards and even in the Lanefinder app, it’s important to keep your offer competitive. *The Lanefinder app *filters jobs that do not meet a driver’s pay expectations, so it’s good to be optimistic with how you represent your pay ranges.

For instance, if drivers average 1200 a week, but can occasionally make more, make sure the upper end represents that.

3. They get the route type wrong

This is a tricky one simply because the trucking industry can’t seem to unanimously agree on what is to be classified as regional, and what is to be classed as OTR.

Even if official definitions exist, every company and every recruiter has their own way of thinking about it.

The most common mistake I see is companies classifying regional, home weekends jobs as OTR.

That’s right, if your job gets drivers home on a weekly basis, or even gets them home as often as once every three to four days, then it’s best to classify your lane as a regional.

Why? Because many drivers associate the famous three letter acronym “OTR” with endless stints on the road, and expect to be out for 3-4 weeks at a time.

Even if your job gets drivers out of state, exceeds a thousand mile radius, but still gets drivers home weekly, call it a regional and you’ll see that you might start getting more applications in no time.

4. They mix up what’s mandatory with what's preferred

This usually concerns drivers that require something additional for the job. For instance, a TWIC card or a particular endorsement.

For best results, and to maximize the amount of applications, do not mention what is preferred in your job ad.

If the driver can obtain an endorsement or TWIC card after hire, don’t mention it in the job description or be perfectly clear.

When setting up jobs in YouCruit, some of our users tick boxes that they shouldn’t, and as a result end up losing the interest of otherwise perfectly good drivers in the Lanefinder app.

Surprisingly, this also concerns driving experience! Many carriers will select their minimum preferred experience when setting up jobs, when they should be entering their minimum required experience. These are two very different fields, and simply being clear about them can help increase your driver application numbers.

Conclusion

You are likely to see an improvement in your hiring results just by addressing those four common problems. I understand that not every issue listed above concerns all carriers, but I hope you found some of the bits above valuable anyway.

If you feel like you’re doing everything correctly and are still unsatisfied with the quantity of organic applications you’re getting, we’d suggest that you consider paid job advertising. With paid job advertising, you can reach drivers far more efficiently and fill your trucks in a fraction of the time.

To read more about whether you’re spending enough on job advertising, check out this blog: Are You Spending Enough on Job Advertising? Find out With This Simple Calculation

As always, reach out to us at sales@youcruit.com for a free recruitment consultation with our experienced representatives. Happy hiring!