Job Board Jungle

ìLions and tigers and bears. Oh myî

Have you seen or heard the advertising recently? Millions of dollars are being spent by job boards with flashy and catchy advertising, in an attempt to grab your attention and stand out from the crowd. Billboards, buses, tv, radio, drink cups, scoreboards and trams just to name a few. A few months ago, The Age relaunched their print edition of MyCareer, with the co-branding of their website. Today , the long awaited much improved, News Ltd ñ CareerOne website and job board has been updated with a refreshed, vibrant new logo and website. An advertising blitz and public relaunch is expected over the next coming months.

Have you heard the advertising on the radio? Talk about deja vu! First of all it was Hippo, JobsLive then FandBconnected.com

Over the past 2 years, the online market has changed dramatically, with the rise and fall of some of the major playerís in online recruitment. Of note was Jobs.com.auís large integrated advertising campaign failing to penetrate the market, leading to its demise in April 2007. Shortly after, another new entrant CareerSites (which launched a collection of niche sites) crashed late June 2007.

Hippo launched in April 2007 with a national radio campaign, attracting over 5000 job adverts online as well as millions of visitors ñ Today it is estimated that Hippo has witnessed a decline in online advertising to a mere 360 jobs.

A New entrant into the field of online recruitment, JobsJobsJobs has started to capture market share, and have recently announced a new ìPay Per Applicationî (PPA) costing model ñ The industry is still undecided if a PPA will work for job boards. The PPA promotes a ìquantity over qualityî approach, and is untried in the Australian market place.

Hints for Choosing Job Boards

ï Be selective, use more than one job board (and remember to always advertise on your own careers website)

ï Ask for a few free trial adverts

ï Use free job boards ñ eg. nowhiring.com.au

ï $$ Negotiate! There is no harm in playing off one board against the other with advertising costs

ï General vs Niche. Niche boards work very well, and have access to passive job seekers. Although the number of applications might be low, the quality is very high. Most are linked with Industry Associations

ï Consult with peers. Ask industry colleagues or friends, to see if they have heard the job board and have used it

ï Critique the website design/layout ñ If you cant work out how to use it, prospective candidates wont know either

ï Ask the Account Manager for their site statistics, (number of unique visitors, job adverts, applications, registered users) and most importantly ñ verified by a 3rd party such as Nielsenís Net Ratings

The Australian online job board market is, viewed on an international scale, still in its growth phase, when you consider there are over 500 job boards across the UK, and 1000 estimated in the USA. We are starting to see these boards open in Australia, with UKís largest free online job board ñ Reed (reedjobs.com.au) launching an office in Sydney last month and other sites such as Gumtree (gumtree.com.au)

New General and Niche Job Boards 2007

ï JobsJobsJobs.com.au
ï FandBconnected.com
ï JustBe.com.au
ï CareerMums.com.au
ï JobPortals (collection of 11 niche industry sites so far)
ï SupplyChainJobz.com
ï Hippo.com.au
ï Industryjobs.com.au
ï Jobslive.com.au
ï LocalCouncilJobs.com
ï Jobx.com.au
ï TheBigChair.com.au
ï APSjobs.gov.au (Australian Public Service)
ï ChristianJobs.com.au
ï werjobs.com.au
ï JobMap.com.au

RIP List 2007

ï CareerSites ñ a collection of 20 or more, specialist niche jobboards
ï Jobs.com.au
ï BlueCollar.com.au

2008 is already shaping up to be a competitive year for job boards. There will be many new entrants, all trying to prove that they are different ñ same functions but using different ìbuzz wordsî to confuse you. The online job board market is certainly one to watch over the next 12 months.