If you ever wondered how the Web helps reduce many things in business to a commodity where you get a whole lot more but pay a whole lot less, look no further.

Paid search marketing, as in paying to have your company's ad come up next to search results in Google and other engines, has become a new way for companies to cut down the cost of placing job openings in print and with large, well-placed job boards and well-known career sites. According to the WSJ, this trend is one way companies are scaling back traditional recruiting costs, and the results are better than expected. A higher number of applicants with cheaper ad rates may have some serious benefits for everyone.

That's what several companies did, including UPS and Baylor Health Care System. While the UPS paid campaign was for winter/holiday truck drivers, Baylor Health Care saw a big jump in the number of applicants by using very targeted search terms. You can get a sense of the savings numbers here that Baylor Health learned (from the WSJ article):

Last March, Baylor Health Care System, a large Dallas-based nonprofit, began purchasing keywords on Google, Yahoo and employment-related search engines SimplyHired.com and Indeed.com. The search-engine ads generated more applicants, at less cost, than the other recruiting methods, says Eileen Bouthillet, director of human resources communications.

In the first six months of the program, Ms. Bouthillet says, the search-engine ads delivered 5,250 applicants, at an average cost of $4. By contrast, Baylor paid an average of $30 for each of the 3,125 applicants who came via job boards, and $750 each for the 215 applicants who replied to a newspaper or magazine ad.

UPS claimed a 70 to 80 percent savings than from traditional print advertising.

So it made me wonder, If businesses can do it, why not you? It might make sense for individuals to start using paid placement in Google to market themselves and see what kind of response is gained. Know anyone who is paying for search placement for jobs?