Desperate times call for job search engines. That’s how comScore explains today’s news that job search was the fastest growing search category in the U.S. in 2008.

Visits to job search engines grew by more than 51% in 2008 to 18.8 million visitors, comScore says. And as the economy grew worse during the course of the year, job search engines saw more traffic:

“The final months of the year, which typically experience seasonal softness in job searching behavior due to the holidays, were instead some of the most heavily trafficked months of 2008.”

CareerBuilder.com was the leader in the space with 9.1 million visitors, a 78% increase over 2007. Yahoo’s HotJobs was up 146% over 2007, finishing second with 5.6 million visitors. Monster.com was the only site in the Top 10 to see fewer visitors in 2008 than the previous year.

comScore also notes that females, households with no children, and households making at least $75,000 all spent more time on job search engines in 2008 than in 2007.

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Search Engines: Job Search Engines | Stats: comScore

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