1. The economy
You’ve got to start here. Uncharted territory? Well we’ve had recessions (and depressions) before but if anyone can think of a time when we’ve had runs on banks, bailouts, interest rates at 2% and the BBC’s economics correspondent becoming more than a bit of a celebrity (take a bow Robert Peston, and quick - write a book!) The widescale evaporation of business confidence has already had a huge impact on recruitment, resulting in -

2. The return of profits warnings and cuts in headcount at recruitment firms.
I think everyone in the industry knows where we stand on this.

3. LinkedIn was everywhere
LI was valued at the magical £1billion in April, with the latest round of VC money invested. As opposed to being held back by the current economy, I would argue that LI’s position with the consumer base was strengthened. Worried about losing your job? You’ll be needing your friends/ colleagues around you then.. Time to update that profile then.

4. Competing with established online brands got very, very expensive

Two examples here:

Did you notice XING advertising in Metro and on the Tube earlier this year? Not content with shelling out significant sums for traditional media, XING have also decided to compete with LI on the applications side. How? Easy -they paid $7.5 million for SocialMedian, a social news site headed up by Jason Goldberg, former CEO of Jobster. 12 months entry to exit for Jason on this, despite the market sentiment.

Jobsite’s £15million campaign - that’s a lot of money. Will it be worth it? Would they have pumped that level of cash into the business if they could have seen a few months into the future? Who knows. Regardless, Jobsite want to shift monster from their perch…. Clearly not being one to give up on a fight, monster will be unveiling their new site early next year… Digital Recruiting have had a peek already.

5. Twitter
It was a heck of a year for Twitter… culminating in them turning down an offer from Facebook no less.
Twitter seems to have achieved the impossible - it is many things to many different (early adopting!) people. Some use it to learn, others to build profile, some businesses even use it as a customer service platform. No matter what you use it for (if you do!) I think few would argue its an addictive little thing. I’ll fess up that I log into it most days… Any twitterers reading can follow me here

6. People got excited about mobile internet
This has happened before… Could this be yet another false start for mobile web? Sure user figures are on the up but (with the exception of a few premium handsets) do you think mobile web usage is user friendly enough to be a daily activity for anyone other than the early adopters?

7. Big recruiters “get” the net?
Have you seen how high Hays rank for a stack of key words these days? That’s some going - and if you add this to the their Candidate Attraction Solutions business it looks like they’ve come a heck of a long way since Google were alleged to have told them they were crap. I tip my cap to Hays on this.

8. DMGT want the world…
Not content with investing heavily in Jobsite, DMGT also purchased Broadbean. No official number on this, but a rather large figure is doing the gossip rounds…
DMGT now have access to rather a lot of info about the online recruitment market. I’ll be interested to see what they do with it all!

OK, so there you go. Some thoughts on 2008. What will you remember about this year?

Job ad side covered, this post deals with the other side of the fence - the now huge amount of candidate CVs sitting on job board CV databases. Monster alone has in excess of 5 million profiles - who would have believed this 10 years ago!?! Anyone that has ever spent time wading through these (and yes boolean searches help..) will tell you it ain’t any fun. Time consuming, yes. Good use of time, I’m not convinced. In today’s market, any time that isn’t either on the phone or meeting face to face doesn’t feel too productive to me… The proof of the pudding in terms of just how time consuming this is? The existence of firms that allow recruiters to outsource “CV mining” from job board databases.

I would challenge anyone who thinks that “only desperate” or “unplaceable” candidates put their CVs on job board databases to cross reference their fees for the last 6 months against the likes of TotalJobs, Monster and a few niche boards in their specific markets. I suspect anyone with that opinion may get a surprise at just how many of those placed candidates are on there.

So why aren’t more clients getting their staff direct? Same reason some recruiters are outsourcing CV mining.

Information overload - it just isn’t particularly easy to manage all those CVs. Who is active, how up to date is the CV, how many other jobs they up for? All the classics that a half decent recruiter will sort out in their sleep.

This part of resourcing is ripe for “shrinking” - and there’s quite a few firms that are offering software to do this. In fact, this part of the market is getting crowded rather quickly.

In the US, it looks like AIRS Sourcepoint and Talent Drive’s TalentFilter dominate the market. Both of these businesses are now looking at the UK market.

On the face of it, these products are great - a real time (and therefore money) saver. Time to go out and buy then? Not so fast, there’s quite a bit to these products - and from what I hear this market is in danger of getting more than a little crowded very quickly…

Before putting pen to paper on any of these, I’d consider a few key areas - how many job boards are covered, how the results are screened and just how easy are they to use (ie do they need complex search strings or can you just upload a job spec and the system does the rest?) Basic stuff really but if the boards that work best for you aren’t there then why bother? Also if the parsing/ screening isn’t up to scratch then you’re in danger of going full circle and just having too many CVs to look thru. If either of these two are the case then I’d steer clear… If they’re right for your business then its worth a look…

Last point on this? AIRS and Talent Drive aren’t going to have the market to themselves for too long…. I hear Broadbean are very close to launching a product in this market. The only product I’ve seen used is the Talent Drive product (and the functionality there is very good…. it includes results from sites like LinkedIn as well as job boards) I’m not best placed to say which is best, that said - given one of the criteria I’d have for selection is coverage of job boards I would hazard a guess that if the Broadbean product gets its parsing right (if/when launched) it could be hard to beat….

Given the last time there was a slowdown, let alone a recession, was back in 2001/2002 the current conditions are uncharted territory for many in the recruitment industry. Not much fun, but hey you’re in good company - given how complex the economic environment is at the moment, the situation Mssrs Brown, Sarkozy, Bush et al find themselves in is just as uncharted waters - I’m no economist but from what I read this set of circumstances is unique (maybe the US Savings and Loans crisis is the closest comparison?) Take a bit of heart - if you’re a recruiter that’s not worked a slowdown or a recession, then its highly likely that your Managers and Directors have. If there was ever a good time to listen, its now…

Pretty clear we’re either in, or entering a job driven market, so client relationships, exclusive business and PSLs are going to be key. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to work out that there is going to be pressure on margins given job volumes are lower. There’s a heck of a lot of variables out there at the moment. I’m looking forward to seeing the results of the next NORAS survey which is due next week. Last time round, they showed that jobseekers were visiting fewer job boards during their search - indication of maturing market, more discerning jobseeker etc. I’ll be intrigued to see if that trend continues… If it does, I don’t think it will in the medium term as people who need to find new roles will be working quite a bit harder to secure them.

From a recruiters’ perspective job flow could not be more crucial. In Ye Olde Days pre web, ad chasing was a great way to track the market and generate jobs. After all, press ads (especially ads placed directly by an employer, who generally didn’t have a searchable database or talent pool to fall back on) will never have a 100% fill rate. Paid for an ad? Ad didn’t pull? You’ll be needing to speak to a recruiter pdq. Its not quite so simple these days with the volume of job ads that are online. A UK search on Google for “jobs” shows 74 million page results. Any idea just how many jobs are on sites like monster, careerbuilder and jobsite? Trying to get a handle on the sheer mass out there is nigh on impossible. And that’s before we get anywhere near a conversation about just how many of these jobs are out of date/ duplicates or the amount of time that can be wasted trying to track down leads from sketchy internet ads (how many times have you seen “Inspector Clouseau” style antics trying to work out which company might be the “£80m turnover services business in Berkshire”) This sort of information overload is a long way from checking the FT, Sunday Times, local press and whatever trade press there is for your market. Those of you around then will remember secretaries cutting out ads from the papers and putting them to the ad chase folder to be distributed to the relevant consultant.

You may or may not have come across a firm called Innovantage. I trialled their Insight product some time ago - in short trying to make sense of the info overload described above. I liked what I saw - I could ask Insight to list all the vacancies in my discipline and in my region. In theory, great. At that stage however, it didn’t quite hit the mark from my perspective - for example, there were some disciplines that weren’t totally covered (including mine.) For me, the product wasn’t quite right but it was worth keeping an eye on.

I caught up with Matthew Dewstowe, the MD at Innovantage, recently and had a look at the latest version of Insight which is currently in beta. In short, they’ve come a heck of a long way since the trial I had in 2005…. I think they’re very, very close to bringing a sensible solution for recruiters to track the market and generate leads…. A few things stood out for me:

• Track an employers digital footprint - is Apple your client? Wouldn’t it be great to be able to see what jobs they have online, split between their careers site, direct ads on job boards and ads through agencies on their behalf. I wonder if many employers will use this sort of approach to track their competitors, or if recruiters will see the opportunity to integrate this sort of info into their key account management.
• Tracking all vacancies for a specific discipline. For example, if you’re recruiting into sales in the Thames Valley region, the system will search for all job ads and mail a list to you - split as required.. Want it split between direct ads and agency ads? That’s a couple of clicks away
• LinkedIn integration - the ubiquitous LI now gets into the Insight product, see how many people the firm that is advertising has on LI, and how far you are from being connected to them
• Database integration - the product can now be adapted to a number of the more popular recruitment databases (Adapt springs to mind.) I’ve not seen this up and running but I understand that a lot of the reports/ leads/ workflow etc can be tailored to suit a specific team or individual consultant. Basically this means as soon as there is a lead for that desk, it can show up in both the consultant’s inbox and appear as an entry on the database - making the whole system/ process much more manageable and trackable.

The last bullet point there I think is key - it makes measuring the ROI a lot easier, and as much I think this product is well worth looking into, its not going to get anywhere unless firms can see a significant return on their investment.

I’m sure you can guess I like the latest version of this product (a lot.) Having been in touch with them when they first started out, I’m delighted at the sort of inroads Innovantage have made in product development - this whole concept of shrinking the web (or a specific part of it) is great in principle but a heck of a lot harder to do. I think they might just get this part of it sorted….

If you’ve not seen it already, have a click on the Broadbean blog.

Congratulations to all involved. A british business doing the business!

Broadbean have got themselves into a market leading position. Don’t think many in the industry would doubt that - how did they get there? They got the mix right - technology, delivery and service. Nice work.

Dan’s blog covers the lot, have a read.

http://www.xing.com/ the professional networking site had a fairly big ad in there yesterday morning. Anyone who’s ever looked into advertising in Metro will know these ads ain’t cheap. Also noticed poster advertising at one of the tube stations I was at. This sort of campaign isn’t uncharted territory for xing - a couple of clicks from google will show there are comments on tube station advertising in Vienna and a Flickr pic of an xing ad in Barcelona’s Metro - see above. Clearly xing are getting a return on this type of approach.

While this advertising is small change to Jobsite’s £15million campaign , it is another sign of both just how quickly the market is maturing and also that any new entrants into the market are going to need some pretty deep pockets.

While they’re not 100% like for like in terms of features, I don’t think xing would be offended if I were to say they were going head to head with LinkedIn. In fact, their ad seems to take a bit of delight in this - the strap line is “Start Networking, Not Just Linkin’” I wonder how much their marekting guys would have loved to added “ed” to “Linkin.” The rest of the text makes a pretty clear play on the benefits of getting onto xing - Digital identity, advance your career, effective contact management, business opportunities etc. I’m a little surprised that there was no mention of “managing your reputation online” or “building your personal/ professional online brand.” I’ll post a pic of the ad later….

One thing I would suggest xing consider is looking at the actual graphic. Might have been nice if there had been people in the xing network in the UK as opposed to Continental Europe! Maybe I’m being pernickety but you don’t need to look to far from a Google search on xing to see comments about it having much more of a region specific feel/ reputation. I don’t think that’s the case but I do think they could have got a little more from their ad with a very small change!

This business networking market is becoming more and more crowded, I shudder to think of how many variants are currently in development - I can think of quite a few, and I would suspect you probably can too. Those looking to enter the market are going to need more than a great site - deep pockets also required! I’d love to hear how much it is costing someone like xing to acquire a new user. Some of the figures I’ve heard from other sites are shockingly high… In fact, if the guys at xing are feeling friendly, I’d love to see the cost per acquisition before and after the latest ad campaign.

There is also a small article on how the current banking crisis is having an effect on LinkedIn new profile stats. It claims that “twice the usual number of bankers have signed up over the past 15 days. There has also been a 10% increase in invitations sent out by existing members of which there are nearly 2m in Britain.” Bearing in mind LinkedIn is a networking platform as opposed to a job board, this strikes me as a great example of how online characteristics have and are continuing to change.

Clearly the banking sector sits at the epicentre of the current economic woes that are circling at the moment. If there is one group of people that is likely to show how the level of uncertainty (or certainty in cases like Lehman’s) is affecting candidate behaviour its these guys.

It all comes down to the different levels of motivation - if you’re in a good, secure job your motivation to look is minimal - and you need to be “tempted” by great prospects. The internet (ideally in conjunction with a good, or great, recruiter) is ideal for this. In this set of circumstance its about getting the right opportunity in front of a top quality candidate. If you’ve got the mix right in terms of your attraction strategy as well as a great recruiter handling the assignment then you’ve got a chance of at least engaging with this type of individual. The online recruitment market has, so far, been all about this sort of scenario. Tempting people onto the market in a job rich, candidate short market. In a market like that, recruitment consultancies thrive. Employers need more of a scarce resource and are willing to pay accordingly.

When the market turns, and we see a real drop in the number of vacancies coupled with an increase in supply of candidates - things get trickier for recruitment companies. The most basic of economics will tell you that there is pressure on their pricing and that there is much more competition for each assignment. To cut a long(ish) story short, employers are in a much stronger bargaining position and can choose who they work with. In a very candidate short market he who has the most suitable candidate(s) is holding the cards. So far so gloomy for recruiters? Sure, if the rest of the market follows suit with FS then it ain’t going to be easy, but (and its a big but) recruiters and recruitment firms with a good reputation and great client relationships have got opportunities in front of them in a tighter market. If their clients consistently choose them to work with them, and they maintain their infrastructure thru the “down” market then when the worm turns (again) they will be in a great position to mop up market share from competitors who have not fared quite so well. Think about it. In a buoyant market, the biggest constraint on growth for recruitment firms is how many good recruiters they employ. If your firm maintains and develops its own internal talent pool then when the upturn comes, you’re in the box seat to get a far bigger chunk of the upturn pie. Firms in that position aren’t in that position by chance, I suspect many of them will be planning for just this set of circumstances.

So what about online then?

You could argue that online has almost mirrored the recruitment consultant market over the buoyant market in the last few years. Its been about tempting those candidates onto the market so both online and agency recruiters have been in the same boat. The market is much more mature - and like any mature market there are examples of the good, the bad and the ugly. My view is that there are now more examples of the “good” than there ever has been. Online is now the norm.

Just as the good recruiters will be looking at how they adapt their approach to suit the current and emerging market conditions, I suspect firms evaluating their online approach will be doing the same. Employer brand has been on the tip of many tongues in the last few years, and so far its been about promoting the business as an “employer of choice” (bet whoever coined that phrase wishes they had patented it) In a competitive market for talent, finding a route to promote your business and the opportunities within it is key. What happens if instead of tempting applications, there is an oversupply of job seekers?

I think this employer brand aspect is an example of where perhaps employers (and dare I say it, online marketeers) could learn a trick or two from some of the recruitment consultancies who will fare well if we do indeed go into an acutely job short market. Senior management within these firms have worked thru tough markets before and no doubt they will be working to juggle the commercial reality of fewer assignments with the requirement to ensure that jobseekers, perhaps in particular the candidates that are not likely to be easily placed, do get a good quality of service. When the market turns again, the client who was ignored as a job seeker has a long memory. On the flipside, if that same person received good quality advice and guidance on how they can make the best of their search, despite the tougher market, it is more than likely that individual is going to become an advocate of that recruiter when the boot is on the other foot.

The internet has resulted in a much more fragmented market for employers, job seekers and recruiters alike. Those that have made the most of the opportunities are more than aware of this. The change in market conditions changes the status quo. Think of the amount of ways a job seeker can connect/ contact a recruiter or employer these days. I received a LinkedIn connection from a very pro active (and from the looks of his profile a very high calibre jobseeker) in Australia. Newly available, and not willing to let the market come to him. What does he do? A search on LinkedIn for anyone with a recruitment background in the countries he’d consider working. I did get in touch with him to see if he’d be willing to share his “jobseeker experience” on the blog, sadly he declined - the reason? I’m working all out to secure my next role. I’m sure there’s quite a lot more in his job search mix than LinkedIn. Quite right too… Currently this approch is the exception as opposed to the rule with online jobseekers. If you take a sec to consider the impact on candidate registration of characteristics like this, the amount of people on sites like LinkedIn as well as the stats offered at the top of this post by Prufrock I suspect you’ll see I’m finally cutting to the chase on this long post!

So is it yet more grey areas in the online market for recruiters and employers?

No.

As much as job seeker characteristics are changing and are likely to continue to do so til there’s a market upturn, what is happening is just the same as what has happened in every previous downturn. People, when they are faced with uncertainties about their jobs, work far harder to find opportunities. Their motivation level is easy to understand. This is not news. When they don’t (or can’t) find what they are looking for then they look for help and advice. Good recruiters give good advice, and over the course of the downturn no doubt there will be some very familiar conversations taking place in interview rooms. People want to hear about how they can best position themselves, what sort of tips they can get from a professional, how best to present their CV, where the best sites are to find jobs and to network etc.

There is real scope in this for recruiters to integrate more of this type of content into their online presence. For employers, many of whom who have invested in chasing the employer of choice badge, a careful examination of process may be timely. After all, employer of choice is about much more than being able to see some profiles of current employees - its about the experience that job seeker had when they visited the career site, and what happened post application.

Supplying service to job seekers when they need it most has given a number of recruitment firms a real competitive edge over the economic ups and downs. I just wonder if this time round, the firms that include this type of content (or arguably “conversation”) to their online presence may benefit more….

No blog posts for me for a couple of weeks. Been taking some time to think through all of the various pieces of economic doom and gloom and the impact on those of us working in recruitment, on and offline. You really don’t need to be a master economist to clock on that the market ain’t looking too rosy. Noticed an article in the FT covering the impact the Lehman’s news had - you can see that here. No surprises. Lots of candidates needing jobs, looking to register. A comment on there about “the toughest market since 2001.” Looking back to 2001 - there was more than a little going on. Terrorism, dot com bubble bursting, telecoms market had a pretty torrid time - and to top it all off we had the accounting “irregularities” at Enron and WorldCom. Oh, nearly forgot ITV Digital. In short, there was a lot going on… and not too much heralded vintage times for recruiters. There was a real loss of confidence.

The situation now doesn’t strike me as like for like - the drivers behind it this time round are clearly very different. The reason I make the comparison is that if there is one cyclical market in the known universe, its recruitment and there will no doubt be some commonalities between now and then. The market has done this before, and no doubt it’ll do it again.

So what was 2001 like then? Easy stuff first….

Employers still hired, but they did so less often. Fewer jobs.
Given the amount of redundancies (mostly from the tech/telco sector) there were far more candidates chasing the aforementioned fewer jobs.

It is easy to see these market conditions have on a recruiter’s desk. Lots of candidates chasing on one side, and on the other doing whatever they could to get hold of good quality vacancies.

In that sort of market, the client “chooses.” Firms that are recruiting are holding quite a few more cards than they would do in a candidate short market. Who do they choose? Whoever they’ve got a good relationship with, recruiters that have delivered for them in the past. People they trust. Given the importance of picking up the vacancies that are out there it is crucial to make sure the clients that view you or your business in that category are well and truly covered… Get there and your half way, the other half? Get exclusivity. In a downturn, an exclusive vacancy is gold dust. Even if your own personal job flow is quite a bit lighter than you’d be used to, you can still make good (great? discuss..) revenue - if your client relationships are strong and you are able to gain exclusivity, sell a retainer etc. There’s sure to be good candidates out there chasing you for the job so it you get it exclusive…

Speaking of candidate flow. This is where I think it could get tricky. The same candidate that may not be easily placeable in a downturn is highly likely to be a client a little further down the line. If this person does turn up as a client, and they’ve had a shoddy service (be it phone calls not returned, CVs not aknowledged, no feedback on interviews etc) then the only certainty is that they’ll remember - and once they are hiring the boot really will be on the other foot. I’ve had the pleasure of making calls to people in this category. One thing is for sure - its not going to be an easy win.

My view is that how employers and recruiters alike deal with this is key. It is certainly not going to be easy to manage every applicant. If someone is on the market for a new job in the midst of all this gloomy economic news, they will undoubtedly have their concerns - they are going to need open, upfront advice about how best they can get some traction in a tricky market. Clearly the best way to do this is in person, or on the phone. I do however believe that employers and recruiters alike can gain a competitive advantage by adapting their online approach to ensure that many of the areas that job seekers will seek advice on is available on demand via the net. How? There’s a stack of options. A link to request a job seekers guide? A newsletter? Sure both viable. I think perhaps the best medium to get this across is via a blog. There’s a stack of benefits for recruitment firms to integrate a blog into their online offering - if you want some detail drop me a mail. As opposed to recruitment firm blog being a route to promote how great a specific recruitment firm is/ how great it is to work there, I’d love to see firms that do adopt blogs use them to share perhaps a little more market information than they may have previously done. If I were a job seeker, I would certainly appreciate this. In fact as a job seeker, I’d be far more likely to appreciate what a recruiter could (and for that matter could not) do for me.

Its just a thought… There are firms out there who are now using blogs to reach prospective customers. They’re clearly getting a benefit (or they wouldn’t continue with them) - I’ll be interested to see if more firms use them, and how many of these blogs are used to take some of the uncertainty out of the equation for job seekers.

Have a click on some of the current recruitment firm blogs - www.ithirewire.com , www.ardentblog.com , www.bltog.co.uk , www.foodjobblog.com

Integrating a blog isn’t expensive. In an uncertain market they could really add some value to today’s job seeker. Oh and if your current client sees you’re adding value there it certainly isn’t going to do your brand any harm at all…

Since this was announced there’s been quite a bit of talk on various blogs, twitter etc as to the rationale behind taking what has so far been a strong online brand onto traditional media like television. Seeing an online business like Jobsite go for TV advertising certainly is extraordinary. After all, isn’t internet advertising supposed to be far more targeted and cost effective? Looking at the performance of traditional media firms (ITV is a great example of this, not seen this, click here) that certainly seems to ring true. £15 million of wasted money then? I don’t think so. Its bold but it definitely isn’t stupid. There’s a lot for Jobsite to gain from this.

To quote Jobsite themselves, the goal is “to become the UK’s most recognizable online recruitment brand and drive client vacancy performance across all sectors and regions, both now and in the future.” OK that’s pretty clear. They want to knock Monster off their perch as the most recognisable online recruitment brand in the UK, and ensure that no young pretenders (of which there are many!) steal a march on them.

Monster is not everyone’s cup of tea. There are few job boards out there that generate as much negative press in the blogosphere as they do. Have a look at Cheezhead or do a search on YouTube for the former CEO of Jobster calling it a “crap product.” Shouldn’t really be too much of a surprise though. The biggest businesses generally get the most stick. Whether you think Monster is the worst or the best product, one thing that can’t be argued is the reach they now have into the UK labour market. They passed the 5 million jobseeker profile mark last month. That’s a healthy chunk of the UK workforce.

If Monster is the target (and it stands to reason that it is) then it makes sense to track the marketing undertaken there, and in short, better it. TV advertising has been a fairly significant part of the mix at Monster. I’m sure at some point we’ve all seen their ads…. Above the line advertising like this has really helped position Monster. As well as the obvious benefit of increasing traffic to the site, another big benefit is that it allowed inexperienced jobseekers and infrequent recruiters to go straight to monster, making it a destination site. These visitors are likely to have either bypassed Google or just typed “monster” into the search engine. This bypasses all of the competition. Lovely. My opinion is that UK internet users are more brand driven than their US counterparts. Look at where your PPC spend is going… I wouldn’t be surprised to see that a lot of the clicks are for your own company name. Making Jobsite a destination site is costly but really positions them well.

Working in recruitment, on or offline, makes it very easy to think that job seekers and employers know/ understand the various routes to market as well as we do. Yes, some clients do. In fact some clients will know more than us I’m sure but it is very unlikely that someone who only recruits once or twice a year will be aware of the latest online trends, or that an internal recruiter or HR person will know every niche job board when their remit includes all head office function. These guys represent a sizeable chunk of the market. Its these people that a TV campaign can really work for.

Taking it a step forward, these same people are the very people that recruitment agencies will look to target. Jobsite being a more recognised brand makes it more likely that recruiters include the site in both their generic candidate generation budget as well as any bundled packages that they sell to clients. Monster was included in the bundle for one leading UK recruiter primarily because of the brand recognition. It was argued that despite the ROI on monster ads not being as good as some other generalist (totaljobs) and specialist (lots) sites that monster should be included as clients who were not quite as web savvy were more likely to buy into the bundle. The result? Lots of sales and lots of revenue for Monster.

On Dragons Den last week, James Caan highlighted that monster were paying $1 million for an ad during the Super Bowl. CareerBuilder have also been paying big bucks for ads during Super Bowl. $1 million for one ad makes Jobsite’s investment seem positively frugal…

You can see the ads themselves here. Some nice ads there - non offensive, general appeal. I like the way they are pushing the concept of upload your CV to “delegate” your job search. Just shows how far the market has come since the initial concerns about people making their CVs openly available online. Now according to Jobsite’s ad, if you don’t upload your CV you’re missing a trick. I had a flick thru some of the CareerBuilder and monster TV ads on YouTube. I think Jobsite’s approach compares favourably to say the least. If you’ve not seen the other ads, have a flick on YouTube and make your own mind up.

Final point on this is that this is a real reflection of just how mature the online recruitment market is becoming. A UK business investing in a £15 million pound advertising campaign? That’s certainly not small change in anyone’s terms (except maybe the guys that have just bought Man City?) There’s clearly a lot of belief at Jobsite in the amount of growth potential they have in their business. Its great to see someone really going for it, despite the seemingly constant bad economic news. Given the knock on effect the recession talk has on the recruitment market, it seems very likely that the overall market will shrink before it’ll grow again. If Jobsite can expand through this there are two certainties:

1. They’ll come out the other side with a far bigger market share and influence
2. Someone else will be losing money. Will that person be another job board, like monster, or will that person be a recruitment company losing out as more clients choose to hire direct thru the likes of Jobsite.

Good luck with it Jobsite.

AS: That pitch didn’t look like too much fun. From what we saw on the TV it lasted less than 2 minutes. How long did the pitch actually last for? Was there any point where you felt it may go well?

OP: We were actually in there for 20mins and it was certainly more fun than what you saw on TV. There was some good friendly banter but we didn’t get an investment offer and I guess to make it worthy of TV the edit made it seem harsher than it was. We always knew it would be a challenge to get support for a website, and a recruitment one at that, which goes against the existing portfolios of key Dragons.

AS: How long ago was the pitch recorded?

OP: We recorded over 5 months ago and before that there was another month of auditions and paperwork to complete. It was strange watching it because everything’s progressed a great deal and so much has happened since then.

AS: OK, so no Dragon funding for TheCareerMole, how did you end up getting funded? How long did this take and what was the process like? I’m assuming a lot longer than your average trip to the Den!

OP: We never intended to take investment from the Dragons’ – as a regular viewer I’m sure you’re aware that you can find much better terms outside of the Den. Prior to the Den we started working with the London Development Agency’s investment readiness programme, ‘Gateway 2 Investment’ and they’ve been a great help introducing us to suitable investors. We’ve had initial funding and are currently talking to investors for the next round.

AS: There’s not a shortage of websites/ services out there promising to be “highly disruptive”, “game changing technology” – you can choose your favourite term. Why do you think employers should use yours?

OP: During the development of the platform we’ve worked closely with corporate recruiters to deliver something that’s truly valuable to them. Employers will use TheCareerMole.com to engage and reward their existing employees, and to open new lines of communications with potential candidates targeting the company. This openness and transparency improves the candidate experience and enables both the candidate and the employer to make more informed decisions about suitability and fit to the company and roles. Our process delivers a superior qualified pipeline of candidates who can then be recruited directly, lowering recruitment costs. Further down the line employee engagement and retention improves too. Being able to bring your employer brand and careers to life is key to the employers we’re working with.

AS: Many of the sites out there make a lot of noise about how much of an impact they are going to have on the market. Very, very few publish anything close to details of just how many people actually end up getting placed through the service. From a client perspective, a track record of successful placements would have me reaching for my cheque book. How many people have actually been placed as a result of the mole?

OP: We know social proof and a track record of placements is key to accessing people’s cheque books! We know we’ve got a great concept on our hand which has helped us develop key relationships with some significant employer brands who share our philosophies. We’ll soon be announcing some partnerships which we are very excited about and helping these employers fill their vacancies. So, statistics, even without job postings on the site currently we are seeing about 30% of our candidates engaging with employers as part of their research in on companies, careers and roles. The number of interactions is growing all the time, and as candidates progress through the application and interview process, we’ll be able to give you more accurate stats on placements. But the response so far has been very encouraging. In fact, we’re so sure of the concept that we offer each employer the opportunity to make their first hire for free.

AS: Who would you say is your closest competitor?

OP: There are several other referral recruitment offerings out there which is great as it proves there is a growing market and focus on referrals. Although not direct competitors, you have JobTonic and Zubka in the UK which seem to be a popular with recruitment agency postings. Globally, models like these are springing up everywhere but we are backing our unique corporate referral model.

AS: What is the difference between a “ mole” and in internal recruiter? How many of your moles are internal recruiters?

OP: There are moles from all departments and roles available to contact, including representatives from HR departments. Employers appreciate the value of candidates contacting a relevant employee for advice. We actively encourage employers to make a broad cross section of employees available.

AS: I registered on your site this morning, one thing that strikes me is that it is not instantly obvious how to search for jobs. I know your proposition is based around getting dialogue with moles but from a job seekers perspective, I’d really like to be able to see who is actively hiring as well as what jobs would suit me. Its quite a few clicks before you get to any type of job search. I suspect that as a jobseeker I may have given up before I got to the jobs. What was your reasoning behind this, and how has this been working out with visitors to your site?

OP: The initial value to job seekers is the opportunity to meet real people who have first hand experience of the companies and careers they are interested in. As the community continues to expand and the number of jobs postings increases, they will take a more prominent position on the site. Another unique selling point with our job postings is that when you click to apply, you are invited to contact a relevant employee from the department or role you are applying to before you application is submitted. This helps improve candidate fit and quality.

AS: So the success of the site depends on people being sufficiently interested in the employers’ brand. Two things spring to mind here. Firstly, if I’m an employer that doesn’t have a huge brand would I get any benefit from using your service and secondly why would a jobseeker visit TheCareerMole over a company careers section?

OP: Yes – small brands do benefit from TheCareerMole.com as it enables them to compete for talent as job seekers have more ways of learning about their company, culture and careers in person. This morning we met with an international charity who was excited about being able to compete for job seekers from the private sector who might not know much about the size, reach and benefits of this particular charity. Confident employers – small and large – can offer careers site visitors the chance to meet and find out what it’s like to work there via TheCareerMole.com. Soon we’ll be launching a white labelled solution so employers can host the interactive employee profiles in their own careers website too.

AS: Who is more important to your business – the moles, job seekers or employers?

OP: All of them – equally! At some point in your life you’ll either be a job seeker or a mole, and some will be employers. We provide a place for these people to meet, learn about each other so they can make informed career and recruitment decisions. As the community continues to grow, its value to everyone increases.

AS: What needs to happen before you send someone an invoice?

OP: We will only send you an invoice once you have successfully recruited two people via TheCareerMole.com; and then we’ll only invoice you for the second candidate as every employer who signs up can recruit their first candidate for free. You’ll either be charged on a pay-per-post basis or an annual contingency recruitment package – whichever best suits your business.

AS: If you could either get more moles or more jobseekers onto your site, what would you go for?

OP: More employers – because employers post jobs and invite their employees to register as moles, and that in turn attracts job seekers who can learn about and apply to jobs directly.

AS: OK, back to the Den… How much of an impact on your web traffic has your appearance had?

OP: A lot – which we were surprised at considering it was such a short slot.

AS: Any regrets?

OP: Only that we weren’t on TV for longer and we didn’t have a healthy holiday tan like the Dragons.

AS: Did you have a strategy as to how you would get the Dragons buy in? If so what was it?

OP: Like TheCareerMole.com, we wanted to be open and transparent. Unfortunately this meant we spent most of the time defending employee referral schemes rather than talking about our business model.

AS: Before you went in did you have a preference as to who you hoped would invest?

OP: Our strategy was to get an offer and turn it down in favour of a better deal elsewhere. That said if Peter and James had been interested their contacts would have made us think twice. Perhaps what we are doing simply does not fit well with their existing recruitment interests?

AS: Any tips for entrepreneurs looking to get onto the Dragons Den? While I’m at it, any messages for the Dragons?

OP: If you are looking for investment, do your research on the Dragons’ existing investments and make sure your offering is complimentary. Products always do better, but that said if you have a good idea and get on TV it’s great for publicity. Crucially – don’t forget it’s a reality TV show which has to be entertaining.

AS: Last question – what is the goal for your business, and where do you see yourselves this time next year?

OP: We want to be the number one website for young professionals who want to network, research companies and apply for jobs directly. Between now and next year, we’ll continue to work with and supply highly qualified candidates to a wide range of innovative and respected companies; the next version of our website and white labelled platform will be launched and we’ll start rolling out country specific sites, initially targeting India.

Thanks guys. Glad to see you’ve emerged from the Den unscathed. Best of luck with the business.
Prospective moles, employers and job seekers can have a looked around http://www.thecareermole.com/