Online recruitment, a niche perspective

The online recruitment industry is booming. Sometimes referred to as 'employment post Internet', the industry is growing at an astonishing rate. Sean Miles talks to the CEO of xpandedcareers.com, an up and coming job board solutions developer.

As with all sciences, growth tends to lead to development and development leads to change. The changes in the online recruitment industry have an acute reflection of the the direction of online commerce as a whole. While the big 3 job boards still maintain a huge grip hold on the market, the trend that is making people take notice is that of 'niche job boards' springing up all over the place, from cities and towns around the globe, to industry and skill specific job boards.

While the market for this grows, so too does the competition for job board software providers, who develop and provide online platforms for budding online businesses around the globe. we recently managed to speak to the CEO of a large online recruitment platform (or job board provider) 'Benjamin Hurley' from xpandedMedia.com who's company developed and runs the job board service company http://www.xpandedcareers.com

The trend nowadays is for custom built tailored recruitment solutions that provide job content for a specific niche. Internet users are becoming more inclined for targeted content, rather having to troll through thousands of jobs via agregated feeds, because lets face it, people want substance.

xpandedcareers.com develops sites for a pool of niche clients around the globe, they are not industry specific, each site is customized to fit a particular industry or skill set. What is consistent is the platform they use.

we spent around 3 years researching and developing our system. This consisted of researching the market, the competition and the end users. The end users in this industry consist of 3 profiles. The job seekers, or candidates who are looking for jobs, he companies who are looking for candidates and the providers who run the job boards. Sometimes these 3 profiles tend to merge into 1 during the sales process, but a couple of consistent factors remain throughout. Firstly, job seekers want a streamlined experience. They want to register once on a site and be able to apply for new positions quickly and effectively, they also want to be able to track the status of these applications. Much in the same way, employers want to be able to manage their online recruitment drive through one management console. Where we come in, is providing a platform for both job board owners employers and candidates to interact and manage the recruitment process all in one platform

Competition is fierce for a grip on the online recruitment industry. Aggregated feed sites are becoming increasingly popular, much in the way the big search engines monopolized the industry with advanced algorithms to provide relevant content to their audiences, job feed sites, based on XML are following suit.

While the aggregated sites are doing extremely well, we don't see this as a direct threat. we provide a custom service, much like when you go to the tailor to get a fitted suit, we are providing a personalized style and product that represents you, your target market and industry

One thing thats for sure is that post .com burst, one industry thats providing a service centric business model is the online recruitment industry. While social networking sites continue to draw interest through sheer volume, some exerts question the logic behind huge investment into such platforms.

Traffic is one thing, while every site owner wants high traffic, you have to look at the nuts and bolts of any business be it online or offline. You need a service, you need to be offering your customers a solution that assists their business needs; and online recruitment does just that. Our platforms connect businesses with talent, reducing the recruitment costs associated with offline mediums and we also generate an online medium for advertising. While its not our core business, its part and parcel of the online market place today and no .com business owner will tell you they are not aware of this. But the bottom line is if the bubble bursts again, we will still be standing, people need jobs, no matter what the economic landscape looks like.