How to send and then follow up an online nursing job application

Get some insight into how an online nursing job board works, how to apply and where your application is sent.

When you apply for nursing vacancies through an online job board, it’s often hard to know where your application has gone and who has received it.

Firstly, and because many people have asked for a simple explanation, the jobs posted on this site are from recruiters and employers that have vacancies to advertise.

That means the vacancies are not within our company, and we don’t have any further details about the role than those posted on the site. Recruiters and employers post as many as details as they chose to, it’s entirely at their discretion how much information they release before you apply. 

Obviously we try and encourage them to be really clear and provide all the relevant information prior to candidates applying, but that doesn’t always happen. The vacancy will have been posted by either the recruitment agency appointed by the employer or by the employer themselves.

You can usually tell which of these it is by looking at the company name included in the job title.

First things first – login or register

You’ll find that you get much more from the site if you’re logged in while searching for jobs. If you haven’t done so already, register with the site. If you have, simply enter your login details.

Then go into the jobs section of the site and click search. Select a job sector that’s relevant to your experience, and if nothing else, the location that you want to work in. This will return all the jobs available in that career sector and part of the country.

As you’re looking through the jobs, you can click “shortlist job” at the bottom of each job description. This saves all your selected jobs into one list in your account area.

To view your list simply look to the left of your screen and in the Nurses Sign In box there is a link called “Shortlisted jobs”.

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Make sure your details are up to date

You can look at your career profile and the CV you have uploaded at any time by clicking on the “Career profile” link in the Nurses Sign in box. You can view our guide for completing the perfect profile here.

It’s worth keeping this open in a separate window when you’re updating your profile so you can follow each guideline as you’re going through the page.

All of this information is automatically attached with your application when click apply now at the bottom of any job advert on the site. So it’s crucial to check all the information is accurate and fully updated.

Go to your shortlist, and apply

Click on the highlighted link from the shortlist to go straight to the job. You’ll see there is a box for a cover note just below the job description. Write or copy your cover letter into there and click “submit” once you’re happy with it.

As we’ve already said, this will automatically include your CV and all the details you entered earlier in your career profile. The recruiter who posted that job will receive all of your details by email almost immediately.

Check your email accountYou will also get a copy of this email to the email address you used when you registered. Make sure you check your junk folder if you haven’t received it.

You will see from the recipient’s email address what the recruiter’s name is and the company that the email has gone to. This is the person you need to email directly should you need to follow up the application.

If you’ve applied for a role that suits your experience and your application has been well put together, then you definitely deserve to be in the potentials pile.

So if you’ve not heard back within a couple of days, you should follow up to the email address that received your application to check everything is in order and your application is being considered.