The three new auditing metrics introduced by the Joint Industry Committee for Web Standards (JICWEBS) for the online recruitment sector have been welcomed by some of the UK's biggest job boards.

Any measures that increase transparency of the industry are good, said Sophie Relf, head of marketing at totaljobs.com. While Diane Sabey, product director of Monster.co.uk, said that being able to measure and report job application-related activities in a "practical and comparable way" is a positive step in the right direction.

The metrics were ratified by JICWEBS after consultation with parties from across the online recruitment sector, explained Andy Flint, head of client services at ABC Electronic, which works for media buyers, owners and advertisers to provide third party independent verification and certification (it will manage the standards for the industry through JICWEBS). The language of the metrics is already in common use, he said, the only issue was agreeing what to measure given that all websites 'funnel' people into their site slightly differently.

"We had to find a way of measuring something that is common to all. We hope they will be adopted and that site owners will find them useful but it will really tell its own story," he said.

The three metrics are: online job application — the submission to a server of an application form or a CV by a valid user; online job referral — a click on a link within a job listing to a URL specified by a recruiter; email job referral — a click on a mailto link within a job listing intended for the submission of applicant information and/or a CV to a recruiter.

www.jicwebs.org