By Dave Mendoza, Master Cybersleuth
http://www.recruitingblogs.com/group/sixdegrees


You may have heard the news, but I wanted to take this opportunity to share my own perspective on a big announcement:

In the last few months Jason Davis was gracious enough to extend a partnership role with equity in RecruitingBlogs.com (RBC) and I accepted. Jason made the announcement public last week. Personally, as much as I recognize the business opportunity associated with the venture, I valued above all the opportunity to collaborate with someone I admire and whose friendship I hold in high esteem. Moreover, I get to have fun in the most dynamic community building effort I have experienced. Emerging social media trends and technologies are shifting the competitive attributes once stereotyped within our recruitment industry into a more collaborative, knowledge sharing ecosystem. In fact, Jason has built the ultimate, industry water cooler. I can sincerely state that I am doing what I love - giving back to our industry. I have joined Jason to contribute on behalf of a community many depend upon now for their 'good morning' greetings at their desk space and their latest news of big billing achievements among peers.


I still recall the night that Jason and I met. We sat next to one another at a poker charity event where I started my first of many lucky hands oblivious to how I was winning. Unbeknownst to me I was sitting next to the best poker player in our industry and the founder of Recruiting.com and social networking within our industry as we have come to know it. After Jason sold and moved on from Recruiting.com and started RecruitingBlogs.com, I offered on several occasions to help promote the site he was insistent on its organic growth.

I remember fondly the day he was ecstatic hitting 1,000 members. A few days after Jason hit his first milestone, I wanted to do something different, special and impactful to mark my 38th birthday. It was on that day that I first redirected the energies of my SixDegrees group, to inform them about the capabilities and offerings of this nascent site Jason had created with his renown passion. I remember the first few frantic Instant messenger notes from Jason wondering what was happening as visitors streamed in to RBC. It was a fantastic couple of days as nearly instantaneously 1,000 new members joined his site. Folks, rarely have you heard someone so excited and it was infectious. Within a month around 3,500 members of Six Degrees had flocked to RBC. The fun hasn't stopped since. Everyday the SixDegrees group on Linkedin that I moderate grows by a hundred members, organically, - without promotion and everyday I inform those who request to join about the virtues of RecruitingBlogs and many respond.

A lot of people are daily giving of themselves and of their own time for this community. It is an incredible phenomenon. The truth of the matter however is that RecruitingBlogs.com has now reached critical mass as it nears 10,000 members - it's gone viral. Whereas I am glad to have contributed to several thousand new members, the magic of the site is that within three degrees of someone I referred, and with essential contributions of other organizations and individuals, many have taken it upon themselves to refer their colleagues to the site on their own. The organic growth it has established, growing exponentially as it has - is a testament to RecruitingBlogs.com's dynamic content and sense of community. In fact, last Friday RBC had 19,000 pages views without any promotion on what tends to be known as the slowest traffic day of the week. The site lives and breathes on its own, and by the fact it has so many passionate and daily contributors. Like field of dreams Jason built it and they came ..... and they keep coming.

Knowledge is exchanged, deals are made, friendships are cemented, and .... they keep coming. The site is not simply about Jason, nor me for that matter, - the members have become the daily content and it is the source of what makes RecruitingBlogs both truly unique and special.

Our friend Dennis Smith, WirelessJobs.com:

Beyond all of what I described, it truly is a place I wake up to in the morning, log-in with coffee in hand and see and exchange ideas with people I consider my friends. I am confident you will find it to be a similar experience.

With only 200 members to go until the site hits 10,000 in just 5 months, I invite you to refer your friends and colleagues to join our community today.

RBC is simply what you make it, as you walk through a friendly neighborhood where everyone can appreciate what you might be going through on any given day. I like that sense of community and I think you will too.

Best wishes

Dave Mendoza
Partner, RecruitingBlogs.com
http://www.linkedin.com/in/davemendoza



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