Prerequisites

Matador Jobs Pro has a few prerequisites you should double check before your purchase. Get acquainted with these prerequisites before you purchase Matador as, in some cases, you may need to make upgrades to your website in order to run Matador. Here is what Matador Jobs requires:

• A Bullhorn ATS Account with REST API Access
• A sufficiently powerful, well-configured web host with at least PHP 8.1 and WordPress required PHP modules enabled.
• A WordPress 5.5 or greater website

Bullhorn ATS Account

Matador Jobs currently connects exclusively to the Bullhorn ATS software. While we plan to add support for other ATS services in the future, to use Matador Jobs’ many features you should make sure you have a Bullhorn ATS account.

Further, your Bullhorn ATS account must have access to the Bullhorn REST API. While, at the time of writing, this was included in most Bullhorn plans, you may want to check with your Bullhorn account representative to make sure you can access it, and get access if needed.

A Powerful, Well Configured Web Host

You will need to host your website on a sufficiently powerful and up-to-date web host to support Matador Jobs. In most cases, if your web host can support WordPress, it can support Matador Jobs, however, we have a few tips to keep an eye out for.

Minimum PHP Version

PHP is the programming language that powers Matador Jobs (and WordPress too). We officially require the oldest version of PHP still under long-term support by the PHP team, which is PHP 8.1 until December 31, 2025.

See a list of current and security-supported PHP versions and their end of life schedule.

Matador Jobs 3.9 dropped support for PHP 5.6 and PHP 7.x versions and begun requiring PHP 8.1 and later. A majority of managed WordPress hosts now support PHP 8.1 and above.

We strongly recommend using the most up-to-date PHP version your web hosting provider and WordPress will support. Need a few reasons why?

• Newer versions of PHP are much faster than older versions; PHP 8.0 is 3x faster than PHP 5.6.
• Older versions of PHP are also insecure; the PHP team no longer patches security venerabilities.
• Newer versions of PHP allow you to use more robust programmers’ tools meant to make projects written on PHP, including Matador Jobs, even better. This mean as we feel more confident when our users are using modern PHP, we will be able to make better code for you!

PHP Modules

In most cases, if you have PHP, and especially if you are hosted on a Managed WordPress host, you will have all of these PHP’s modules. That said, sometimes an IT professional will install PHP without the various modules WordPress or Matador Jobs requires. If some of these are not included, Matador Jobs will fail to function as expected.

The following PHP modules are required by WordPress and required by Matador Jobs:

• The json module is required by WordPress and used extensively by Matador to manipulate data received from external sources, like Bullhorn.

The following PHP modules are required by Matador Jobs, but optional for WordPress:

• The cURL extension makes it simple for us to make remote calls to external sources, like the Bullhorn API.
• The fileinfo module lets Matador easily save resume submissions and validate the files are safe to use.
• The mbstring module helps Matador handle utf8 international characters like ñ, é, and ü, among others, common especially on non-English sites and in job applicants’ names.
• The simpleXML module helps Matador generate RSS and other feeds, as well as interface with 3rd-party platforms sending or receiving XML-formatted information.

The following PHP modules are optional, but recommended, for Matador Jobs, and optional for WordPress:

• The intl, simplexml, and libxml modules, since Matador Jobs 3.8.4, are used by Matador Jobs to format salary numbers based on the website locales, using local language settings to put spaces, commas or periods, and currency symbols into salary or pay rate numbers. If not enabled, salary and pay rate numbers will be saved as text in an integer format with no formatting.
• The DOM module, since Matador Jobs 3.9.7, is used by Matador Jobs to manipulated processed HTML from resume/CV processors to ensure valid data is saved to the database.

View information in WordPress documentation about the required, optional, and recommended PHP Modules for WordPress.

Nice to Have Features

Some of the following are “nice to have” features of a web host:

• Extended PHP execution time. Some web hosts install “long process killers” that limit how long a script can run. Matador Jobs can sometimes take several minutes to complete a sync, especially when there are more than several hundred jobs. Some web hosts limit PHP execution time to as little as 30 seconds, which will slow down your sync and even cause Matador to not function as expected. We have work-arounds for “long process killers” if needed, but the problems they cause are often difficult to identify.
• System Cron. Web hosts that give you access to a System Cron scheduler, which is an internal scheduling system for automation, can help you create a more efficient syncing capabilities with Matador. Matador is designed to work efficiently with WP Cron, WordPress’s alternate to system cron, but sites with a system Cron task runner can be faster and more reliable with automation.
• Command Line Interface and WP-CLI. Web hosts that give you access to a command line interface, usually with WP-CLI installed, will allow you to perform some actions using Matador’s WP-CLI commands which will help you, as the site operator, to run some “power user” functions without accessing the slower WP Admin area.

Sufficient Security

Matador Jobs will collect sensitive user data on your applicants, including Personally Identifiable Information (PII). Budget web hosts, in addition to lacking power, will also delegate data security to you. Using a more robust web server plan will add additional security for your site should you be attacked.

Powerful Hosting for a Resource-intensive Website

Your web host should have some power behind it.

We regularly encounter users running WordPress with Matador Jobs on budget web hosting plan and who are upset that Matador Jobs struggles to handle their jobs and application volume.

When considered in isolation, a default WordPress installation is lightweight and can run sufficiently on a budget, low-power web hosting plan, but when you add a number of plugins including ones that are regularly communicating with outside services like Matador Jobs, you need more resources than the budget web host offers.

Bottom line, if your business counts on website uptime, invest in a quality web hosting plan with sufficient power.

Verdict: Try Managed WordPress Hosting

Within the web hosting industry, there is a product offered by most providers called “managed WordPress hosting”. In general, Managed WordPress hosting starts around $25 per month and goes up to $250 per month for the highest performance options.

Managed WordPress hosting is a specialized product that provides a web hosting environment fully optimized for a WordPress site. Optimizations include configuring a server for maximum security, maximum speed, and maximum performance. This often includes automatic updates to web host software and such things as PHP. Some managed WordPress hosts even automate common maintenance tasks, like WordPress core updates and WordPress theme and plugin updates. They provide robust caching as a feature, so you don’t need to set up complicated caching plugins. They often have significantly more power than the budget hosting plans that cause our users the most grief.

We strongly recommend that you utilize a managed WordPress host when possible. If on a managed WordPress host, in most cases, you can ignore everything you just read.

Not all Managed WordPress hosting is built the same. Over the years we’ve identified some quirks of various web hosts, including some you cannot use with Matador Jobs. Read more on Web Host Known Issues.

WordPress

Matador Jobs is a WordPress plugin. That means it requires a WordPress to run.

What is WordPress?

WordPress is the world’s most popular CMS, or content management software, for maintaining website content. WordPress powers over 35% of unique websites on the internet and over 60% of global CMS market-share. During an informal survey at the Bullhorn 2018 Engage Boston conference, the Matador team found that at least 80% of recruiting firms use WordPress for their online presence. There is a great chance that your company already uses WordPress.

What if You Don’t Use WordPress?

If your website is currently powered by another platform, for example SquareSpace, Wix, Drupal, HubSpot, or others, you will need to either migrate your website to WordPress or set up a “job board”-only secondary website powered by WordPress to host Matador Jobs. If you need help with this, let us know and either a member of our team or someone from our trusted referral network can assist!

Which WordPress Version?

Matador Software strongly suggests you keep your WordPress version up to date with the most recent major release. This is to ensure you keep your website healthy with every security update and optimization as well as giving you access to new features that give you the best tools for your business.

If you run an older version of WordPress, that does not mean Matador will break. In fact, we at Matador Software commit to maintaining backward compatibility for all major versions released in the past two years. Matador Jobs Pro will support WordPress 5.8 and greater until January 24th, 2024, and thereafter WordPress 5.9 and greater until May 23rd, 2024, and so on.

Matador Jobs version 4.0 will drop support for WordPress versions before 6.5. We will support security fixes and Bullhorn API connectivity for the latest Matador Jobs 3.x version for one year following that release.

That said, Matador Jobs 3.8.x and below recommends WordPress 5.9 and requires at least WordPress 4.9.6. Some features requiring WordPress 5.9 or later will degrade gracefully. Optimizations written for WordPress 6.0 and below were removed from Matador Jobs 3.8.7 due to changes in WordPress 6.1, so to get the fastest Matador Jobs experience, please use at least WordPress 6.1.

See a list of WordPress releases by date

Not Sure? Need Help?

If you aren’t sure if your business, Bullhorn account, web site, or web host can support Matador Jobs’ prerequisites and need one of our friendly support team to assist you, feel free to reach out. We’ll be happy to help you judge if you are ready for Matador.

What’s Next?

Now that you know you meet the prerequisites, let’s Purchase Matador Jobs Pro (or download Matador Jobs Lite).