Social recruiting company Emply today launched Talentag.com, a new service for creating an online profile and getting professional feedback. Talentag lets people ask feedback that builds up one’s ‘social CV’. Co-workers and friends can tag a user with words or a badge and they can also vouch for a particular role one has had. The service is currently free for all users.
“Crowd-sourced data is becoming more important in a variety of areas from selling a used car to buying professional services. We see professional profiles as one of the many next uses for it,” said Jüri Kaljundi, co-founder and CEO of Emply and Talentag. “We are also big believers in Facebook as the future of career-related professional services. It’s a mistake to think Facebook is just about fun - you have to go where the best candidates are, and they are not visiting job boards anymore.“
Vouching for someone on Talentag is like giving them a thumbs up for working at a position in a company. Its the quickest way for appreciating someone as a colleague. To give someone (or receive) more detailed feedback about a position, one can add verbal tags for each item in someone’s employment history. There are also badges like “Best entrepreneur” or “Driven” as virtual gifts. These three components make up a social game where users can earn earn badges for giving and receiving feedback, for example get a “Generous” badge after giving feedback to at least three others.
The easiest way to get started on Talentag is to import work history and friends from LinkedIn or Facebook. One can then browse friends to see where they have worked, what are the most popular companies and professions. From there on it’s easy to ask for feedback about yourself and give it to others.