eStrategy Articles

Online Job Sites Battle for Share

Not so long ago, there were four pillars of the distribution channels for jobs

• Placement agencies – the middleman who connected the job seeker with the hiring company for a fee usually paid by the latter.
• There were career management companies – whatever happened to Haldane? – that charged the candidate to get them placed. Agencies focused on permanent or contract positions contingency or retained searches
• HR Recruiting department – in house recruiters who received unsolicited resumes. If you had a well known brand, people sent resumes to your HR Recruiting department. But the flood of resumes meant that each resume seldom got the attention to deserve the expense on paper and stamp.
• Networking - the good old network has always been and always will be a reliable distribution channel. You know someone who knows someone who knows of an opening or a candidate.
• Print advertising - this was the primary means of getting the information about a job to the candidate and getting a resume in response. These help wanted ads appeared in local and national newspapers/magazines/rags. Both hiring companies and placement agencies used them to get candidates to apply to their job opening

Each of these pillars has been shaken and molded by the internet. This article focuses on the last one – job advertising.

Monster.com – followed by Hotjobs and Careerbuilder and tens of thousands of others – changed the way people got jobs. Hiring companies posted their jobs online and candidates responded with resumes through email. Alternatively, candidates posted their resumes online and companies could search the database to get to the right candidate and contact them.

This business model has worked well for over a decade. It has its limitations that are being exposed and exploited by others. Primarily, the issue is ease of search. But the bigger issue of “making the connection” has always been dominated by networking and always will be.
Monster.com – and other mega job sites - has millions of jobs. It has done a good job providing ease of search using categorizing. But the search technology’s limitations are evident:

1) Hiring companies’ jobs got lost in the millions posted online. They are either buried in a pile or appear in the wrong one
2) Candidates have difficulty getting to a suitable job opening having to sift through thousands of jobs

Mega sites have also made progress on putting “lipstick on the pig” – alerts, video resumes etc. have made the user experience better but only incrementally.

Google and Yahoo had stepped in combining search with job search.

Another internet phenomenon, namely, personalization has caught up to these sites. Specialized sites catering to specific demographic – artists, writers, programmers etc. – have cropped up and according to the attached article have a whopping 64% of the market.

But that is not the big story. The granddaddy of placement i.e. networking has gone digital. People live online and find work there. The big idea is social networking sites such as LinkedIn. They have become relevant to this industry now.

Read On>>

Remember Napster?

Napster will go down in history as one of the most disruptive “things” for businesses in the old economy. The music and video sharing and downloading site gave users across the globe the ability to “share” each others’ collections. The music industry bore the brunt of Napster there was a time when we thought that it will change it forever. Countless copycats and lawsuits later, things seem to have settled down a bit.

A couple of “legitimate” business models emerged in this space. Where legitimate means: music download is OK as long as you pay for it. The two most prevalent business models are – “pay by the sip” as in Apple’s iTunes or monthly subscription as in Real’s Rhapsody. Napster itself morphed into dopted the subscription model.

This music industry saga is far from over. It will take a few twists and turns before all is said and done. But there is a much more important story emerging thanks to Napster.

Well, forget Napster. Also forget what it did to the music industry. That was nothing compared to what is going to happen thanks to what Napster started. Or arguably, was the first one to tap into or prove. This phenomenon is not going to be restricted to an industry. It will fundamentally affect all industries – especially those that have a customer!

Are you going to be affected? Is there opportunity for you? Read on…

Do All Travel Agents go to Heaven?

When was the last time you went to a travel agent? Chances are, you have not been to one in years.

Where did they all go? I am told, they all became real estate agents!

Kidding aside, the story of the apparent demise of the travel agents has a key lesson for intermediaries in this new world order. Let me explain.

The travel agency network was the distribution channel for the travel industry – airlines, hotels etc. used them to sell their “products” to the end customer. The business model was that of the classic retail intermediary: a fee – built into the price - for each product sold. Customers bought from the travel agents because of convenience, service and choice. Over time, relationships developed that are hard, if not impossible to break. Airlines and hotels – the “product manufacturers” - preferred using travel agents because they did not have the relationship with the customers and to avoid getting into a high transaction business that was outside their core competency.

For decades, this model worked. Along came the internet. It was ubiquitous. It provided the capability for transaction processing, including buying tickets etc. Customers loved it because they had unprecedented choice and convenience.

Has the internet made travel agents irrelevant?

What is e-Strategy?

First came the boom. Then came the bust?

Not exactly.

It turns out that the euphoria over e-Business was well justified. e-Business has changed our lives. It has changed the face of business. Ask Barnes and Noble and Blockbuster, what e-Business has done to their businesses. Been to a travel agent lately? Heard about all those people making all that money on e-Bay?

After over a decade, now, there is still confusion on what is e-Business!!

So, what is e-Business? Some think that putting up a website is e-Business. Some others think that unless you sell online you are not an e-Business. It turns out that there is truth in both views but it is much broader than they suggest.

e-Business is the use of the internet to create value

This value can be created by selling online. But it can also be created by servicing online. It can also be created by partnering online. e-Business is the interaction of a business with the online ecosystem. You are in the living rooms - or wherever the "computer" is these days - of people. It is up to you as to how you use that access to create value for your business.

What is e-Strategy? e-Strategy is identifying how you will create value for your business online. Every business is not suited to sell online. Imagine Boeing having a shopping cart! But Boeing could use the net to build its brand. Create a positive buzz about its planes or fight the negative headlines about its defense business.

e-Strategy is not about the functions and features of your website. It is about changing your business model to take advantage of the net!