When I first started as a “By Application” vendor for entry-level roles three years ago, I didn’t fully grasp how polarizing that label would become. Every week, I get two types of emails: one from a hiring manager frustrated because their applicant tracking system (ATS) can’t parse a “no fixed deadline” posting, and another from a recent grad who’s already burned out on the 100-click process of applying to a standard entry-level job. The question at the heart of this has lingered: Is “By Application” actually a good fit for entry-level positions, or is it just another barrier for people who need a foot in the door? Let’s pull back the curtain on our experience, because we’ve tried both, and there’s nuance here that job boards and HR blogs usually miss. By Application
First, let’s define what “By Application” means for our team, because it’s not the same as the vague “rolling applications” you see on generic job sites. For entry-level roles at the small startup I work with—think junior operations coordinators, entry-level content creators, and part-time customer success associates—we don’t post a closing date. Instead, we leave a simple prompt: “Tell us what you care about, and how you’d contribute, in 300 words or less.” We get about 40 applications a week, which is way fewer than the 200+ we used to get when we listed a specific closing date and salary. That smaller pool isn’t a downside, though—it’s the point. Entry-level candidates often apply to 20+ jobs at once, slapping a generic resume together, tweaking a bullet point or two, and hitting “submit” without a second thought. Our process weeds out that approach almost immediately. When I look at a recent application for a junior admin role, Sarah (not her real name) wrote: “I’ve been organizing my roommates’ weekly grocery runs for a year, and that taught me how to coordinate 6 people’s schedules to save $150 a week. I want to bring that same problem-solving to your team’s inventory tracking.” That’s not a line from a resume template. That’s the kind of specificity you almost never get from a candidate who’s applying to 10 jobs in an hour.
But let’s be honest: it’s not all wins. We had a stretch last year where we posted a “By Application” junior marketing role, and for six weeks, we got nothing. No applications. We panicked—did we ghost the candidate pool? Did the startup name turn people off? We dug into the data from our ATS (the basic one we use, not the expensive enterprise tool) and found that 72% of the people who visited the posting page left without clicking “apply.” When we sent a short follow-up survey to 12 people who left the page open for at least two minutes, the top answer was: “I didn’t know when to expect a response. If I waited too long, would it be too late? If I applied right away, would they get 100 others and ignore me?” That’s a real pain point for entry-level candidates, who are used to clear timelines: “apply by October 15, decision by November 1.” Ambiguity, even if it’s framed as flexibility, can paralyze people who are already nervous about job hunting.
We fixed that gap, and that’s where our experience gets useful for other vendors and hiring teams. We added two small, non-negotiables to our “By Application” process for entry-level roles that changed everything. First, a clear response timeline: “We review all applications within 10 business days, and we’ll email everyone—even if we don’t move forward—with a note that says why.” That cut the “waiting anxiety” by a lot. Last quarter, 91% of applicants told us in post-interview feedback that they appreciated not being left in the dark. Second, we limited the number of applications we’ll accept for an entry-level role. We cap it at 150, and when we hit that number, we take the page down temporarily. That tells candidates: this isn’t a free-for-all, and we’re being thoughtful about who we’re considering. It also prevents us from getting buried under hundreds of generic applications, which means we don’t miss someone like Jake, who wrote a cover letter that linked his college’s sustainability club work to our company’s goal of reducing office waste. If we’d had 500 applications, his note would have gotten lost.
Critics of “By Application” for entry-level roles usually point to two big flaws: it’s unfair to candidates who are used to structured processes, and it can favor people who are better at writing short, compelling notes over people who have the right technical skills but struggle with self-promotion. That’s a valid concern, and early on, we made that exact mistake. In 2021, we hired three people from our first “By Application” batch, and two of them were strong writers who could craft a perfect 300-word note. The third was quiet, good at spreadsheets, but couldn’t make a point concisely. We realized we were filtering for communication style, not core skills. So we added a tiny skills test that’s not scary—for the junior operations role, it’s a 10-minute Google Sheets exercise to track a mock inventory list, and for the customer success role, it’s a 5-minute audio clip where candidates respond to a mock customer email. That keeps the “By Application” flexibility, but it doesn’t penalize people who aren’t natural writers. We hired Mia last year, a grad who told us she hates writing cover letters but aced the spreadsheet test and organized a perfect mock inventory. That’s the kind of hire we would have missed if we’d stuck to a standard application process.
We also need to talk about what “By Application” doesn’t mean. It’s not “no structure at all,” and it’s not a way to avoid equal opportunity rules. For our entry-level roles, we still ask for the same baseline: no experience required (we know entry-level candidates are still building skills), we list the range of pay (we used to leave that out, which made people skeptical), and we explicitly state that we don’t care about where you went to college or your GPA. A lot of vendors treat “By Application” as a way to cut corners, but that’s when it stops working. Last year, a competitor in our space posted a “By Application” entry-level role with no pay, no timeline, and only a link to a Google Form that asked for 10 pages of work samples. They got 2 applications, both from people who needed experience for school, and they filled the role with a friend of the founder. That’s not “By Application”—that’s opaque hiring, and it’s bad for candidates and bad for teams.
Let’s look at hard data to back this up, because anecdotes only go so far. A 2022 study from the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) found that 68% of entry-level candidates say they prefer “rolling application” processes over fixed closing dates, because it lets them apply when their materials are ready, not when a random deadline falls. But the same study found that 52% of hiring managers said “By Application” roles take longer to fill than fixed-date roles, because of the ambiguity. That tracks with our experience: our entry-level roles take an average of 22 days to fill, compared to 14 days when we used fixed dates. Is that a problem? For a small startup like ours, it’s worth it. We’ve found that our “By Application” hires stay 18% longer than hires from fixed-date postings, according to our internal turnover data, because they applied voluntarily, not because they were checking a box. That’s a big win for us—training a new entry-level hire costs about $3,000, so lower turnover saves us money and creates more stable teams.
Another angle: what about candidates who don’t have the time or resources to apply to a “By Application” role? A recent grad working two part-time jobs can’t spend hours crafting a perfect note. They need a process that’s quick, but still fair. That’s where our “By Application” process has to be accessible. We don’t require a resume for entry-level roles—just a short note, and we accept applications via text if that’s easier for someone (we’ve had candidates send a 1-minute voice note explaining their experience). We also partner with local community colleges to post our “By Application” roles on their job boards, because a lot of entry-level candidates there aren’t on LinkedIn or the big job sites. If we’d kept our old fixed-date process, we would have missed half of those candidates.
I get why some people hate “By Application” for entry-level roles. It’s unstandardized, it can feel confusing, and it’s not for everyone. But from where we sit, it’s not a question of “is it suitable”—it’s a question of how you do it. If you use “By Application” as an excuse to be vague, unfair, and hard to reach, no, it’s not suitable. But if you pair it with clear timelines, skills-based checks, and accessibility for candidates who might not fit the standard job-seeking mold, it’s one of the best ways to hire entry-level people who actually care about the work, not just a paycheck.
Three years in, we still tweak our process every few months. Last month, we added a note that says “we don’t expect you to have every skill—tell us what you’re excited to learn, and we’ll teach you.” That’s the biggest adjustment we’ve made. Entry-level candidates don’t need to be perfect. They need to be curious. “By Application” lets us see that curiosity in a way that a 500-word resume with generic bullet points never will.
If you’re a hiring manager, a fellow vendor, or a candidate who wants to talk more about how our “By Application” process works for entry-level roles, reach out to connect. We’re always open to refining what we do, and we’ve learned as much from the candidates who apply to us as we have from the people on our team.
IP65 Power Distribution Box References
National Association of Colleges and Employers. (2022). Entry-Level Hiring Trends and Candidate Preferences. Journal of College Recruitment.
Society for Human Resource Management. (2023). Flexible Hiring Models and Retention for Early-Career Employees. SHRM Research Quarterly.
Small Business Administration. (2021). Cost of Turnover for Entry-Level Positions in Small Startups. SBA Office of Advocacy Report.
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E-mail: kevin@apekselectric.com
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