Joel Cheesman, the face behind Cheezhead, an award-winning blog focusing on Internet recruiting, was looking for a creative way to garner some industry attention and some extra cash for an upcoming HR conference he was attending. His answer came in the form of an eBay auction.
Starting at 99 cents, Cheesman offered an exclusive sponsorship opportunity to the winning bidder. At stake were T-shirt promotions, podcast features and a variety of other highlights for the winner.
ìThe motivation wasn’t money,î said Cheesman. ìI wanted to try something different, hopefully get people in the recruitment space talking and have some fun.î
Enter JobCentral, an Indianapolis-based online employment network of direct employers and job seekers. The company offered the winning bid at $7,101.
ìI just thought the idea was brilliant,î said Bill Warren, executive director of JobCentral and DirectEmployers Association. ìCompanies are always looking for an edge at SHRM. Sponsoring Cheezhead seemed like a much better idea than sending out a direct mail piece or having a fancier trade show booth. Considering the fact that we’re not exhibiting this year made the auction even more appealing.î
ìI have a lot of respect for Bill and his team,î said Cheesman. ìAside from picking myself up off the floor in reaction to the final bid price, I was excited to find out that they were the winners.î
The auction’s bidders remained anonymous to the public. However, all Cheesman saw was Warren’s user ID, which didn’t give away his identity. ìI only knew one of the bidders from their username. All the others were a mystery,î said Cheesman.
The SHRM conference runs from June 25-28, 2006 in Washington, D.C. It is the largest human resources conference in the U.S. General Colin Powell is this year’s keynote speaker.
JobCentral Bids $7K to Win Blogger’s eBay Auction
JobCentral, an Internet recruitment site, bid $7,101 in an eBay auction to sponsor the Cheezhead blog at the upcoming HR conference
