Comments on: Jobster Attacks the Monster

By: Jobster Now Offers Pay Per Applicant Job Listings : Forecast-Blog

Jobster Now Offers Pay Per Applicant Job Listings : Forecast-Blog — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 08:50:10 +0000

[...] were raised when Seattle-based Jobster shredded their business model and moved to free job listings in February. It was a direct assault on Monster, which charges up to $475 per job listing. Many of the [...]

By: Jobster Now Offers Pay Per Applicant Job Listings

Jobster Now Offers Pay Per Applicant Job Listings — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 08:18:52 +0000

By: Dennis Gorelik

Dennis Gorelik — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 19:11:15 +0000

I believe that it’s a good idea to make job posting free.
And I believe that “free job posting” model is a serious threat to Monster.com.

I also decided to build web site which would let recruiters to post jobs for free. These jobs would be also distributed to indeed.com and simplyhired.com.

I started http://www.postjobfree.com at the end of 2006, but it had nothing to do with Jobster

In fact it was inspired by indeed.com (very convenient job search site) and monster.com (I couldn’t believe that Monster is still using annoying ad techniques).

By: Quinn

Quinn — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 06:58:35 +0000

Why won’t Monster die? Because Monster services their clients - and their clients, by and large, are either large corporations, or professional recruitment firms - a very small number of their clients give them the vast majority of their business. I work for one of the latter, and just today Monster flew a rep in from a city on the other side of the country to spend an hour with us ensuring our new staff were up to snuff on the backend of the system. Monster supports recruiters, provides integration with software like HireDesk… I could go on.

As long as the big companies and big recruiters keep going to Monster to post jobs and view resumés, the job seekers will keep going to Monster as well - and the Monster won’t die. Jobster is assuming a better search model will help them, but it won’t - recruiters couldn’t care less how hard it is to use Monster.

By: .dab

.dab — Mon, 12 Feb 2007 16:24:54 +0000

Interesting, as a small biz owner, I have gotten better results with craigslist than Monster. Plus, craigslist is free can’t beat that price.

Monster will not be around in the same format as it is today in x years because it cost to much.

By: .Scott

.Scott — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 17:10:26 +0000

One thing I haven’t heard addressed:

Don’t photos+videos raise EEOC problems?

By: Recruiting Industry Watch

Recruiting Industry Watch — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 19:00:04 +0000

It will be amazing to see how this all unfolds. I think the skeptics have it wrong.

From what I understand, Jobster has plenty of fuel in the tank to last many years and from what I understand has had numerous recent offers to inject even more cash from huge players who are want in on the employment space. Matt Marshall just wrote a piece on VentureBeat as to why there are so many upstarts in the employment space. Simple answer. You’ve got Montster and Careerbuilder out there making a ton of money with very simple products and business models. That is a recipe for upstarts to jump in.

Regarding Jobster. This thing isn’t going anywhere. The model they are building for what comes after free postings could have a big, big lasting impact on our industry for years to come. If you think they are just going to survive on advertising, stop kidding youself. They’ve got Phil Bogle and the GoJobby guys and a bunch of other geniuses over there innovating on business and tech.

Put this in perspective valley waggers. Monster and Careerbuilder spend more than $200M a year on advertising alone. $50M in VC is nothing to play to win in this industry. This one is going to play out for a long while. And even if it’s not Jobster who wins, they are going to shake it up pretty well for the next upstart.

By: Insider

Insider — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 18:06:57 +0000

I find it abit interesting that a CEO has the time to be replying to anonymous posters, when the company he is running is in desperate straits. You would think there were more pressing things you should be taking care of..

-Something to ponder…

By: Martin Snyder

Martin Snyder — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 15:30:13 +0000

Jason, as to your principle #3- the match is an ongoing process- maybe months or years in the making. It seems the best way to enhance the value on both sides would be deep assessment technology- using third party sites or by building/buying the needed expertise with Jobster. Videos are nice (not without problems of course) and user-generated content sounds helpful, but the real guts of a match are job design and validated, measured capabilities of candidates. Make an ongoing, reliable, one-stop shop meeting the high standards of real I/O science, and you might have something unique. I might also add that the feedback system on ebay appears to be one of the world’s most effective credit reporting systems- BountyJobs.com is tickling around the idea in a limited area, but there has to be a way to bring that dynamic to large scale employment transactions.

By: spam king

spam king — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 04:45:36 +0000

Jason- hope you are ready for spam. Your site is going to be the king of it. Monster & CB are rolling over laughing at you - all the way to the bank.

By: Craig Silverman

Craig Silverman — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 22:48:22 +0000

This is exciting news in the recruiting world. The media based model of Jobser is really designed to generate advertising revenue. Nice if people can find a job that was posted but most posters don’t reply to the job seekers that submit resumes on job postings. If you talk to candidates searching for work they tell you that there is a massive black hole that all the resumes must be sitting in because they rarely ever hear back after applying for a position. Many will show you the computer generated auto reply messages they receive with the “don’t call us” directions.

Matching is a great concept and getting a referral or seeing a video can help to match. Free is a better price than $475 but only if it fills your open position. The social networking aspect of these sites are fun but job seekers will tell you that they have to visit all the sites, not just one.

Over the past 10 years my recruiting teams have placed over 14,000 candidates into new jobs for placment fees of well over $500M, IMHO the war is on but it is far from over. With $50M in the bank you can do a lot of things but what people want to know is exactly how many candidates have found a new job that can be sourced back to a posting on Jobster or Monster or any other job board. Ask companies (not just the Fortune 500) where they get the best people…

My suggestion to job seekers is to wage a comprehensive job search campaign when looking for a new position. You need to think about yourself as a product being taken to the market. In addition to networking and searching you have to be out there in the market sell yourself. Think about your job as you would a marriage and take your decision of where to work very seriously. Right now the market is very strong and companies are hiring (layoffs are way down) so top candidates have a stronge negociating postion since talent is in high demand. Working with a good talent agent (recruiter) can also be of great assitance. You have to market, advertise, prepare, package and sell.

This is going to be fun to watch…

Craig Silverman
HireAbility - The Recruiter Network

By: jason goldberg

jason goldberg — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 16:14:42 +0000

A bafoon, eh? Must be fun throwing stones.

Yes. We egomaniac CEO’s do read these boards.

To answer some of the more substantive questions, we’re trying to create a whole new economy for job listings. We believe that the value is in the match, not the post. So, we’re starting off with free postings, facilitating better matches, learning from site usage, and going to evolve towards more targeted and match-based models. Stay tuned.

We appreciate the comments and feedback on the site. We’re working around the clock on improving search results, making better matches, etc. Other comments and educated suggestions appreciated. What would make a better career site for you? Our model is to throw stuff out there, listen, learn, adjust, repeat.

We are building the jobster site with 3 principles in mind. Like them, hate them, debate them, do whatever you want with them, but they guide our actions:

1. We believe that career development is a lifestyle, not a transaction. That is why we are creating a service which people will want to use again and again to connect with people, information, and opportunities to further their careers.

2. We believe that the value is in the match, not in the posting. That is why Jobster offers unlimited fee job postings so that anyone and everyone can experience and help shape our new model for career matching. That is also why we are firmly committed to continued technical innovation on our premium hiring tools which hundreds of leading employers pay to use to hone in on better matches for their positions.

3. We believe that people hire people not resumes, and that people go to work for people not for job descriptions. That is why we are embracing digital career profiles which utilize user generated content, tag-based data and navigation models, and video, to help bring the real person behind the resume and the job description to life.

One last thing. I’ve had more than a hundred emails today asking me how long the postings are going to be free? Always.

By: Thomas Barker

Thomas Barker — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 10:34:28 +0000

Why not charge $16 for a listing, which must be from a genuine company or jobseeker, not an agency. Then have the responder pay the lister $2-16 per response. Works for some dating sites. Got to beat the 2-7 job offers I get spammed with every day asking for 11 years solid Java experience. (I’m 25!)

By: Doreen

Doreen — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 09:26:37 +0000

If simplyhired didn’t explode it’s traffic numbers inside MySpace, why would anyone think Facebook will ‘drive’ Jobster. Job postings–free, paid for, bundled, aggregated, scraped—just don’t work. They breed ’subjective resumes posted out of desperation by unemployed, or unhappy people.

This guy at Jobster is a bafoon, and an egomaniac—combine that with the fact that he has VC’s breathing down his neck, a new business model every 3 months, and you can punch this ugly pig’s ticket into the Dead Pool now.

By: carmen

carmen — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 03:40:08 +0000

this site is beyond bad. first it wouldnt even let me sign up since it claimed my email address is invalid (its a .name, and my username is 1 char). so i make up some BS alias to get around their broken validation script, and then get the ultimate insult.

thats right, this ‘web 2.0′ site doesn’t even accept HTML as a valid resume format. thats right. .doc favored over .html - what is this, 1996?

also, a telltale warning sign appears in their own text: “an email address is enough contact information for recruiters to reach you.” .

as anyone knows, the last thing you want is your phone ringing off the hook with recruiters. actual companies are fine, but how do you filter out all the saleseople with no real aim other than driving the revenue of their own ’service’ ?

By: Martin Snyder

Martin Snyder — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 02:52:00 +0000

Regardless of the success or failure of this latest move, Jobster is no threat to Monster and likely will never be. There are literally billions of dollars of delta in the brand investments alone, not considering the habits of tens of millions of people on both sides of the job market and the sheer volume of goodwill (in the accounting sense) involved. Also, the Monster resume search seems to be a big profit center too.

By: myles

myles — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 00:16:22 +0000

hey - since you do so many comparisons between competing products (like email: http://www.techcrunch.com/2007.....ahoo-mail/) how come you don’t do a comparison of classifieds sites like http://www.edgeio.com or is it cause you own part of this site and don’t want to show the competition

I would be interested in seeing a comparison. I did a search on the posts for Edgeio and could find none where you had done a comparison.

cheers

By: Brad's Rag

Brad's Rag — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 23:00:24 +0000

Jobster: Still Skeptical…

I’ll admit, if you have read my previous comments on Jobster, such as on Techcrunch comments, I regularly bash Jobster on its business model. I have a strong interest in the online career search for one reason: because I know just like everybody else…

By: Scott

Scott — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 23:00:23 +0000

Have you ever tried a free dating site? The profiles are garbage. And since there’s no barrier to contact most of the emails are spam. This is a total desperation move.

By: Brad White

Brad White — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 22:49:59 +0000

I still contend that no past or present employee will post honest information about their employer, unless they truly are a happy-go-lucky individual who just loves everything. To get a honest perspective on what a company and its culture are really like, people need the ability to have some anonymity to protect their own interests. Everybody has qualms about their company, even if they really like working there. Those things will never come out in a social networking atmosphere, because employees want to protect how their employer perceives them.

Nonetheless, the conference call this morning still impressed me. It needs more traction in the market before I’m on board though. Their current numbers aren’t incredibly impressive, despite how colorful Jason Goldberg makes it out to be.

By: hanford

hanford — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 22:32:09 +0000

Yahoo and Craigslist originally had free job listings but had to start charging in many markets because of job spamming and abuses of the system (AKA Herbalife work from home, envelope stuffing, “become a model” porno listings, Google spamming, unpaid AKA work-for-free jobs, etc).

There could very well be ways around it other than charging money, and perhaps Jobster has, but it would seem that with Craigslist’s “for-free” attitude that charging money was a last resort for them.

By: Garth

Garth — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 20:28:00 +0000

I think the PlentyOfFish comparison is a little weak, as Markus does really well for himself with limited costs and staff, but this is company that has collected 50 million in VC money and will need to pay back some multiple of that to be successful.

I would be interested in how may paid listings they had here in seattle before they switched, I suspect despite advertising a ton on busses, they are not very front of mind with job seekers here, and few recruiters / companies paid for listings.

By: Jacques FROISSANT Altaïde

Jacques FROISSANT Altaïde — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 19:33:18 +0000

Jobster attaque le Monstre de l’emploi !…

Jobster Attacks the Monster titre Techcrunch aujourd’hui ! Que se passe t’il ? Jobster un des jobboards nouvelle génération, qui a levé près de 50 Millions de dollars, vient d’annoncer un changement radical de son modèle économique : le gratui…

By: Jason Alba

Jason Alba — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 19:01:51 +0000

I think this is a cool move, and should only help their business move forward (as long as they can keep the spam controlled). The comments here bring up interesting issues… here’s what’s going through my mind (from a job seeker’s perspective):

– job boards are NOT the silver bullet. The traditional model of a job board is based on getting revenue from postings or advertising - not by adding value to a job seeker (this means they’ll take the hundreds of $$s even if the posting sucks).

– social networking is not the silver bullet. There are some great synergies between social networks (specifically LinkedIn and FaceBook) and job search (or, career management). But its confusing to know which sites i need to be on, participate in, etc. to really get to those job leads. LinkedIn is lonely when you have 5 connections!

– we need to think about the job search is a subset of CAREER MANAGEMENT. There are other tools to consider, like Emurse.com for managing your resume, Naymz.com for working towards managing your personal brand, etc.

Its all about pulling together the right resources to get “the job” done. There is not one silver bullet - there are just lots of resources.

I applaud Jobster for this and hope they can sustain their model - I think there is a place for them.

By: Alfred Toh from Payscroll.com

Alfred Toh from Payscroll.com — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 18:26:38 +0000

Rawgutts: True, monster is full of spam now but hey they get paid for those, so good for them and imagine how much more spam it would be if it’s free over at monster.But in Jobster’s case, they DO NOT get paid for any spam listings, so not so good for them

I’ve been keeping track of the job search startups and here’s some charts that I thought might be interesting. The 3 hottest startup now is the job space in my opinion is Indeed.com, Jobster and simplyhired. If you look at the charts, you can see clearly why the move on Jobster’s part.

compete
http://snapshot.compete.com/in.....obster.com
same thing on alexa: http://www.alexa.com/data/deta.....yhired.com

I see a lot of great comments on Jobster’s site and how things should be improved, I would love to have you sign up for our private alpha over at Payscroll, we are planning to start private alpha sometime end of the Feb or early March. Thanks!