OilCareers.com, one of the world’s largest online dedicated oil and gas job board, has launched an iPhone app in response to a global surge in the number of mobile phone and tablet users who access its site.

In the past year alone, it has seen mobile traffic more than double, a statement from OilCareers said.

This increase is in line with research conducted by the Internet Advertising Bureau UK (IAB), which indicates 69 per cent of UK consumers expect their mobile usage to increase dramatically by 2015.

The same research shows that UK consumers use their mobile phone more frequently to go online than to call or text, with smartphone penetration continuing to increase. Use of tablet devices is also growing with 35 per cent of tablet owners in the UK using the technology on a daily basis.

This is similarly reflected in the US market with 59 per cent using their mobile to go online as opposed to other actions, and 31 per cent of tablet owners using them every day.

The new OilCareers.com app, free to download from the iTunes store, was developed after mobile traffic dramatically increased from seven percent to 17.3 per cent of the organisation’s total traffic, equating to more than 1.6 million visits in the past year.

While the app has been designed for iPhone, it greatly enhances the existing OilCareers.com website which tablet owners and desktop computer users alike already find easy to access and navigate.

Mark Guest, OilCareers.com’s managing director, said: “As the world’s most popular oil and gas recruitment site, we’ve spent years analysing trends in the job hunting process and with the market moving to internet mobile use, this new app comes as a powerful tool for any job seeker.”

“The worldwide demand for skilled and talented people in oil and gas is expected to continue to increase. With a rising proportion of the global population using mobiles and tablets to access the internet, it’s vital that those in the industry respond accordingly and find innovative ways to help match the top talent with job opportunities that help to ensure the sustainability of the energy sector globally.”

“The new app – which can be accessed anywhere – provides job seekers with access to up to 20,000 of the most sought after positions in the oil and gas industry,” said Julie Gellatly, product manager for  OilCareers.com.

“Users will benefit from access to functions such as searching jobs by keywords, location and job type, browsing jobs, reading job descriptions, as well as having the option to save their favoured jobs, then emailing them to their own inbox.” – TradeArabia News Service