These are not competing products. Greenhouse is an applicant tracking system: it organises the people already in your pipeline. 100Networks is a hiring marketplace: it produces people who were never going to enter that pipeline on their own. Most teams that use us keep their ATS exactly as it is.
We used to write this comparison as if it were a contest. It was the wrong framing, so here is the honest version.
What an ATS is genuinely good at
An ATS is the system of record for a hiring process. It holds applications, moves candidates through stages, stores scorecards, coordinates interviewers, handles approvals, and gives you a funnel you can report on. Greenhouse does this well, and if you have real applicant volume you should have one.
What it does not do — and does not claim to do — is create candidates. Every ATS metric starts after someone has applied. If nobody good applies, a perfectly configured pipeline reports that fact very clearly and changes nothing about it.
The problem an ATS structurally cannot solve
Roles stay open for one of two reasons.
The first is process: too many rounds, slow feedback, a broken scheduling loop. That is an ATS problem, and an ATS fixes it.
The second is reach: the person who can do the job is employed, well paid, not reading job ads, and would need a real conversation before considering a move. No amount of pipeline configuration reaches them. Neither does a job post, because they are not looking at job posts.
The second kind is what a marketplace is for. Your role goes to specialist recruiters who have already filled that seat at that seniority, they work the passive market with AI agents doing the search behind them, and a shortlist arrives with comp, notice period and location confirmed. You pay a percentage of salary when the person joins.
Where the line sits
| Applicant tracking system | Hiring marketplace | |
|---|---|---|
| Starts working | After someone applies | Before anyone applies |
| Core job | Organise the pipeline | Produce the shortlist |
| Handles passive candidates | No | Yes — that is the point |
| Who does the persuading | Your team | A specialist recruiter |
| Cost model | Per seat, per year | A percentage of salary, on joining |
| What you own afterwards | The system of record | The hire |
Running both
The sensible setup is boring: keep your ATS as the source of truth, and use the marketplace for the roles it cannot source for. Candidates we place enter your normal process, get your normal scorecards, and appear in your normal funnel reporting.
100Networks supports bidirectional sync with Greenhouse (via the Harvest API) and Zoho Recruit (OAuth), so verdicts and status flow back rather than being retyped. Other systems connect through a general-purpose connector.
How to tell which problem you have
Look at one open role and ask where it is stuck.
If you have a full applicant pile and no shortlist, your problem is quality of reach, and buying better tracking will not fix it.
If you have a shortlist that keeps stalling in scheduling or feedback, your problem is process, and a marketplace will not fix that either — sort your loop out first.
If accepted candidates keep not joining, your problem is the notice period, which neither an ATS nor a job board has any view into. That one is worth asking any vendor about directly: what happens between acceptance and joining, and when exactly do they invoice.
The straight answer
If you are evaluating Greenhouse, evaluate it against Lever, Ashby or Workday — real alternatives that do the same job.
Evaluate 100Networks when a role has been open long enough that you have stopped believing the right person is going to apply.