Online employment market cools

The latest analysis of jobs advertised on the Internet shows that while the online employment market is still at record highs, the pace is slowing.

The Olivier Internet Job Index rose just over 1 per cent in January.

The director of the Olivier group, Robert Olivier, says that is a subdued result after the growth in December of 5.5 per cent.

Very hard to read too much into January because of the volatility of the season, that December and January are quiet times, but it is obviously not quite the strength that we enjoyed through 2006, he said.

The index has revealed that information technology (IT) job advertisements now outnumber those in sales and marketing for the first time since the technology boom in 2000.

Mr Olivier says multimedia jobs have recorded the greatest growth of any sector.

There’s obviously some replacement there where sales that were previously done on a face-to-face basis are now being done online, so I think that’s reflective of not just of retail and recruitment, he said.

In a lot of other sectors the IT is becoming front office not the back office online.

Distributed by ABC News Online