Reed.co.uk
2024-2025
AI-Powered
Carla Llinas
Reed.ai was born as part of the Reed Group. A bold new product vision that combined Reed’s decades of recruitment expertise with the power of cutting-edge AI.
Where Reed.co.uk helped millions of people find jobs, Reed.ai set out to reimagine recruitment for a new era.
As the UI Product Designer, I was responsible for transforming Reed.ai’s ambitious vision into a user-friendly product experience - from shaping the brand identity to delivering the final product interface.
Started by digging into why hiring process. The problem was identified through a combination of workshops with stakeholders, interviews, and behavioural data.
Data showed large drop-offs and slow hiring cycles.
For employer, 58% of job posts were getting applicants that didn’t match what they needed, which meant hours wasted reviewing irrelevant profiles.
For Candidate, 73% were dropping out before completing the process, mostly because they felt like their applications just disappeared into the void.
These metrics led to slow hiring and low marketplace liquidity - which directly impacted revenue.
We used these insights to define two core experience goals:
Make the process more human and transparent
Design for collaboration, not just automation
Defined the hypothesis:
If we match on job requirements first and enable faster feedback, both sides will show higher engagement.
Our goal metric: job posting completion rate.
The core innovation was flipping the typical recruitment interaction:
AI matches candidates to job specs using shared criteria.
Candidates are presented anonymously to reduce bias.
Employers express interest first and request full profile access.
Candidates then choose whether to share their details and engage.
This model reduces noise for employers, empowers candidates, and builds a more respectful, human-centred hiring flow.
Testing & iteration
Once the vision and core principles were established, we moved into rapid, iterative design, validating each major area of the product with real users.
Over 6 months, we ran 30+ moderated user testing sessions with a wide range of participants:
20 employers (HR managers, Heads of People, recruitment leads, and product owners).
10 candidates (both experienced and first-time users of Reed).
The new site positioned Reed.ai as a credible, forward-thinking brand while directly supporting lead generation goals.
+20% increase in job posting completion (from 55% → 75%).
Drop-off in candidate sign-up reduced by 18%.
Navigation success rate reached 90% - most users could find their application status without guidance.
Recruiters reported the process felt “much faster”; average time to post a job decreased by 40%.
