SmartSearch ATS Reviews and Ratings

Rating: 6.6 out of 10

Score

6.6 out of 10

Community insights

TrustRadius Insights for SmartSearch ATS are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, third party data sources.

Pros

Intuitive User Interface: Many users have found SmartSearch's user interface to be intuitive and easy to navigate, making it simple to perform tasks such as building organizational charts and searching for specific locations or employees. This positive sentiment suggests that a significant number of reviewers appreciate the user-friendly design of the software.

Helpful Customer Support: Several users have praised SmartSearch's customer support team for being helpful and reliable. They have highlighted positive interactions with the staff, noting their knowledge and long-term experience in the industry. This indicates that the customer support provided by SmartSearch is highly valued by a considerable number of customers.

Efficiency-Boosting Features: Numerous reviewers have expressed satisfaction with SmartSearch's automated tasks, customizable reporting analytics, and search functions. These features are highly beneficial in streamlining processes, increasing efficiency, and saving time for users. The positive feedback suggests that many users find these functionalities valuable in optimizing their workflow within the software.

Reviews

31 Reviews

Clunky Tool, but Highly Customizable

Rating: 6 out of 10

Incentivized

September 9, 2021

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SmartSearch was used across a 20 person + staffing agency. It is used as a candidate relationship management tool to track candidates, recruiter who owned each candidate, interview notes, [etc.] It held the open requisitions for each job and would track candidate submittals through each req[uisition], tracking hiring managers, billing information, and client information.

Pros

Customizable
Reporting
Analytics

Cons

Clunky
Too many options
Needed to customize to make user friendly

Likelihood to Recommend

I most likely would not recommend SmartSearch. It is a very clunky tool and not overly user friendly. We had to pare it down extensively because it was just overwhelming with options of what you could click through; it needs to be simplified. There was a lot of basic recruiter tools that should have come with the tool, but we had to customize for it.

The developer who developed this was clearly not a recruiter and therefore it was not very intuitive.

Verified User

Employee in Human Resources (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

1 year of experience

SmartSearch RULES!!

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

October 19, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SmartSearch is used across the entire organization. We use it as a sales/new business/client development tool and also as our candidate tracking system. We also use SmartSearch for the onboarding of new hires and ongoing management of our employees. SmartSearch serves all of our needs.

Pros

Captures the activities during the recruiting process such as emailing as notes in the system.
Is integrated to social media such as LinkedIn.
Is integrated with MS Outlook.
provides excellent reports.
customer service is exceptional.
Is a trusted partner.

Cons

I frankly cannot think of any areas of improvement.
I am very pleased with all aspects of the software.

Likelihood to Recommend

The integration with Dice, Monster and LinkedIn is excellent.

David Burchette

Director, Recruiting Services and Delivery in Information Technology at SunTechPros Inc. (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

10 years of experience

View profile

Great Value, Integrated Tool, Key Decision Making Support Application

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

October 19, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SmartSearch is used across our entire business as our applicant tracking system. We do requisition management including: related workflows for approval of all positions for hiring and requisition reporting. We also use it for our offer management and approval for all positions. We are in the process of finalizing data feeds from SMS for use in our Human Capital Analytics capabilities and also for global KPI recruitment performance activities. We are also finalizing the onboarding portal capabilities and front end data feeds to our Oracle HCMS.

Pros

Job posting integration.
Requisition workflow management.
Offer workflow management.
Candidate search usability.
Customer support/partnering.

Cons

Global development support.
Some latency issues in China and India.
User interfaces have improved but can always find ease of use improvements.

Likelihood to Recommend

I think our environment has stretched SmS and their capabilities (positively) but we have grown together and developed an enormously capable system together that is now very well integrated into our business. For doing applicant tracking, requisition management and offer management that has really been strong. I think we can partner together and build some better analytics and reporting capabilities that would be better suited for our business.

EJ Meier

Vice President Human Resources, Global Operations in Human Resources at Gates Corporation (10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

View profile

Good Product but Room for Improvement

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

October 19, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

HR uses SmartSearch as a repository of candidates (candidates apply via our external website and their information is stored in SmartSearch), completing the hiring process (using e-sign and electronic document portal) and capturing offer letters for internal promotions/transfers. In addition, existing employees can apply to a position within our HR intranet and be attached to the position in SmartSearch for further review.

Pros

Electronic signing of offer letters and additional documents.
There is a nice candidate workflow.
Daily imports of our ADP tables for job information.

Cons

Timely response to issues.
More than 1 person at the company who understands the client's configuration.
Additional focus on non-recruiting clients.

Likelihood to Recommend

I believe they have a good product, they just need additional resources to keep in touch with their clients.

Debbie Personette

Sr HRIS Analyst in Human Resources at EOG Resources (1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

2 years of experience

SmartSearch - efficiency, flexibility and features... This does a lot for your business.

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

October 19, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SmartSearch is being used primarily as our candidate intake, recruiting, applicant tracking and onboarding tool. Additionally we use it to track employment and various HR functions and documentation. I solved the problem of obtaining and organizing a lot of information surrounding each candidate. It allowed us to also create a number of procedures in the form of 'traks' to move candidates and customers through our process in a consistent manner.

Pros

The search functions are outstanding. It is the reason we originally went with SmartSearch many years ago. The ability to do very simple or complex searches gives the recruiting staff great flexibility in how they look for and narrow down candidates.
The hire and onboarding traks allow us to create very specific processes we want our staff to follow to insure a consistent and repeatable result. I can create traks that can be very general or traks that literally provide emails and reminders to all of the players (recruiters, managers, candidates, etc...) every step of the way. This is particularly helpful where we have customers who have extremely stringent contractual guidelines that must be followed.
Support. Their customer support is second to none. We always joke that they are our favorite vendor to deal with.... Anytime we have an issue or question. They are there to walk us through it. The training is on target and the staff has always been friendly and more than eager to help make us successful with the tool.

Cons

Would like to see some additional reporting options. There are some very powerful reporting tools in the software but they are not very intuitive for the basic user.

Likelihood to Recommend

If you have a recruiting organization that needs flexibility and a wide range of options to address an ever changing landscape than this is your system. It does not try to pigeon-hole recruiters into a single recruiting model. It allows you to customize how your organization does things but also allows you to control where you need to control.

We have been using SmartSearch for more than 24 years. We started out on one of the first versions because we liked the company and the direction they were taking. SmartSearch has not always been the tool with the flashiest features.... but it has always had some of the best features. They have always been of the cutting edge of the next technology and have the tools and features that make SmartSearch a complete solution. We have not seen anything else out in the marketplace that has encouraged us to change.

David Stafford

Vice President in Corporate at L. J. Gonzer Associates (51-200 employees)

Vetted Review

24 years of experience

SmartSearch is Great and a True Business Partner

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

October 19, 2020

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We utilize SmartSearch as our applicant tracking system (ATS) and contact/client tracking. SmartSearch integrates with our back office, so the vast majority of the work our business does in housed within the SmartSearch platform.

Pros

Customization - the team at SmartSearch always tries to find a solution that works for our company specifically.
Customer Care - the team actually cares and is concerned about the well-being of our business. They help us solve issues as if they worked for us and this feeling is felt at every level of the organization beginning with their President.
Technology - I have used multiple ATSs and demoed many, many more. SmartSearch has superior technology for staffing firm; the technology that helps us recruit and fill jobs faster.
Listening - the team at SmartSearch actually listens to us and our concerns whether it's regarding a feature for an upgrade or simply solving an issue we are facing.
Common Sense - there have been many times in our relationship when we have asked about a feature and we hear "that makes sense, we will make that change for all of our customers"...listening is rare and they do it well.

Cons

With any upgrade, there can be small bugs or glitches. Whenever these pop up, the team at SmartSearch is quick to attack them and fix the issues as soon as possible.

Likelihood to Recommend

Their technology is great and I have recommended them many, many times and will continue to do so. The emphasis they place on the technology - the core part of their software that helps our company run more smoothly is truly impressive.

Travis Medley

President at TalentZök (51-200 employees)

Vetted Review

7 years of experience

View profile

SmartSearch - Good entry level, but limited capabilities and spotty tech support.

Rating: 1 out of 10

Incentivized

December 6, 2019

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use SmartSearch as our primary applicant, job and client tracking system.

Pros

SmartSearch is affordable. Most other systems like this cost more.
SmartSearch has great staff, knowledgeable and long-term.
SmartSearch automated tasks are very helpful.

Cons

SmartSearch has a steep learning curve if you want to extensively use the features like automated tasks and the report writer
Technical support is spotty and sometimes very frustrating, they don't respond for weeks at a time.
SmartSearch user interface is old and has far less ability to customize the interface than other tracking systems
SmartSearch has virtually no ability to connect directly with other software and allows now other software to connect in - so no Microsoft Flow, no Zapier, no mail parser, etc. and since Smart Search capabilities are limited, not being able to integrate it with other platforms easily is unfortunate.

Likelihood to Recommend

SmartSearch is suitable as a mechanism for collecting candidate information online and managing job orders. The fees are low and reasonable for this limited functionality and, at this low level of use, the system works well.

SmartSearch is less suited for an environment in which robust reporting or tracking is required - the built-in reports are limited, the report writer is difficult to use and there are no real capabilities to interface directly with other applications like Microsoft Flow, Zapier, mailparser, etc. Consequently, one cannot take advantage of external tech capabilities to make up for the lack of capabilities in SmartSearch.

The responsiveness of tech support is spotty. Currently, we have been waiting almost three months to receive a resolution on the integration of Zip Recruiter, our job postings are not getting out to Zip Recruiter which, as a recruiting agency, is a death blow. (Their tech support people are great and most have been there a long time, it is the responsiveness that is the weak link.) Sometimes they respond very quickly and then out of the blue you get nothing.

Verified User

Executive in Corporate (201-500 employees)

Vetted Review

15 years of experience

Great ATS!

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

May 10, 2018

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use SmartSearch as an applicant tracking system. SmartSearch also pushes out our job postings to multiple websites, including CareerBuilder and our company website. SmartSearch allows us to track applicants all the way from application to hire, including adding candidates that have been sourced externally, through platforms such as LinkedIn Talent, Indeed, etc. Once an offer is extended by a client, we are able to use SmartSearch to initiate onboarding and track items such as AWGP, gross margin, and more.

Pros

Great for keeping candidates well organized, especially if you have them submitted to multiple job orders. Each job order will create its own "hire track" which makes it easy to keep an eye on where a candidate is in the hiring process.
Easily identifies duplicate applicants and candidates through comparison of a number of details and not just name - including the phone number, email, and location - but still affords you the opportunity to double check and ensure a candidate is, in fact, a duplicate entry
For larger organizations, SmartSearch is wonderful in helping to identify the appropriate company contacts working on various positions across the US. If I am working with a candidate interested in a posting he saw for a job in Kentucky, I can locate the account manager and recruiter for the position within minutes.

Cons

No ability to "tag" coworkers. My organization tracks certain metrics such as candidate submittals, interviews, and call connects. If I work with another recruiter on a position, there is no way to tag both recruiters to ensure each gets credit for their work.
Job orders can only be assigned to one recruiter, one sourcer, and one account manager. Similar to my other point, this can be very restricting. For example, on my Dashboard, I have a list of "open jobs". If I am not listed as the recruiter or sourcer for the job order, it can be very cumbersome to attach candidates to the hiring track for that position if I do not have the JO# written down elsewhere.
Something I wish SmartSearch (and many other platforms) offered is some pre-set tutorials to go through. SmartSearch seems to have a lot of features that I am not taking advantage of, simply because I do not know they exist or how to use them.

Likelihood to Recommend

Well suited for tracking applicants from start to finish. Being able to use SmartSearch to push job postings out to major job boards is very helpful in attracting active candidates and keeping them well organized.

SmartSearch is less appropriate for sourcing passive candidates. Although it keeps previous applicants and candidates stored internally, their information is typically not current and thus not really ideal for reaching out to passive candidates that would actually be a good fit for any roles you are recruiting on.

Verified User

Manager in Engineering (10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

1 year of experience

SmartSearch is a great ATS!

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

November 6, 2017

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

As a recruitment process outsourcing company, we used SmartSearch for both our internal hires and customer candidate tracking. It was a great ATS and easy to use. User-friendly dashboards. As one of the administrators, adding new users and specifying their access requirements was a smooth process. As the scheduler of all internal interviews, it was an easy way to track when a candidate was ready for scheduling, when the interview was complete and great for sharing notes on the candidates.

Pros

ATS - Tracking applicants across multiple customers and job openings was a piece of cake.
Communication among users was so easy.
Customer Service. The team at SmartSearch was always available for a quick and painless Q&A.

Cons

I don't think I have anything to add here.

Likelihood to Recommend

It's a great ATS!

Meg White

Office Manager in Human Resources at OutboundEngine (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

2 years of experience

View profile

SmartSearch ATS is SMART!

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

June 4, 2015

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

SmartSearch ATS is being used in my company both as an Applicant Tracking System for my RecruiterGuy.com contract recruiter/consulting business and as a Customer Records Management System for my public speaking business SpeakBill.com. It solves my problem of tracking jobs, candidates, managers, posting jobs for Internet Aggregators to scrape, and tracking activity for clients and my businesses.

Pros

When a company is a new client, SmartSearch ATS does an excellent job of bringing functionality to their client very quickly, usually within a couple of weeks. Their training program is designed so even non-technical users may use their SmartSearch ATS quickly.
The Customer Support Team at SmartSearch ATS are off the charts great for jumping on problems quickly and solving them. Sometimes the problems are created by other vendors who link with SmartSearch ATS. Even then SmartSearch resolves the problem. My advice? Expect a happy resolution the rare times you have a problem.
The Development Team at SmartSearch ATS have been around for many years. While the fundamentals of the SmartSearch ATS software are mature, the nature of the ATS software business is constant change. SmartSearch ATS does a wonderful job staying up to date. There is no need to bleed at cutting edge. Give me up to date and stability any day! SmartSearch ATS provides both.

Cons

When you create a new job posting, you are required to pick a field from "miscellaneous export information". Camera Operator and Makeup Artists are choices. Web Developers are not a choice. I don't get that.

Likelihood to Recommend

Of course, as in any product choice, the product needs to match the company requirements. SmartSearch ATS solves tracking problems very well for small to medium sized companies - a nice broad market in itself. SmartSearch ATS would not be a good enterprise ATS choice. It is not designed to be. Based on my experience, a strong enterprise ATS does not currently exist. Most do a better job driving away passive candidates than attracting them.With SmartSearch ATS, it is possible to make it easy for passive candidates to indicate their interest.How many positions will you need to post over the next year?How many candidates will you need to track?How many company employees will need to access SmartSearch ATS to track candidates?What types of reporting do you require?What is your budget?Is the standard SmartSearch ATS fine for your company or will you need to customize?Would you like your ATS to mirror image your website? SmartSearch ATS does.

Bill Humbert

Contract Recruiter/Consultant/Trainer in Human Resources at GCommerceSolutions.com (1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

11 years of experience

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