Monster needs a group hug.

We have seen many conversations about Job Boards and what will happen to them in the new world of Social Recruiting. And...well... yesterdays BusinessWeek article, "Recruiting: Enough to Make a Monster Tremble" really clarifies the situation. Please read it and then comment below.

Here are some of the highlights (many have seen this coming for a long time):

-> "...frontrunner Monster is losing ground to LinkedIn, CareerBuilder, and even Twitter."

-> Elisa Bannon, Director of Talent Acquisition for US Cellular (2,500 open reqs) had her job posting and resume screening budget cut from $4 million to $1 million.

-> Even with a One Million Dollar budget, "...the wireless carrier's director of talent acquisition ditched the big job boards and instead inked a deal with social networking site LinkedIn. For an annual fee of $60,000, Bannon's team now has access to the network's 42 million members..."

-> "...site [Monster] saw a 31% drop in revenue last quarter." [Ouch]

-> "...Matt Ferguson, CEO of CareerBuilder, ...saw its North American revenue drop 27% in the first quarter."

-> [not sure about this example, but...] "Twitter is also gaining traction in the realm of job search. [a recruiter] that needed 40 lawyers immediately ... sent a message—or "tweet"—to her 150 followers, which was re-twittered [re-twittered?!?!? oh my] by legal blogs that follow her. [recruiter allegedly] "...filled every post by lunch."

Read the complete article here... there's more interesting info in there.

***Discussion***

So... what do you think about the article?

Where do YOU see it all going?

What competitive business model do you think will set the new recruiting and sourcing tool standard?

Please do read the article and reply below. Be sure to include a short bit about your current position so we all understand your perspective.

Good luck out there!!

P.S.; I'll refrain from adding my personal opinion as I am building a competitive business model and, therefor, my opinion has a high degree of bias. If you recruit in the medical and health care / healthcare sector, join the medical and healthcare recruiters group here on Recruiting... to be informed of my new model when it's ready.

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jerry Albright on June 26, 2009 at 12:34pm

Hi Jim. Glad to see you coming up for air!

The days of just "including" job boards in your budget are over. At least for me it's over. Monster, CB, et al sure were great in their day. There are other ways to get "cleaner" and more targeted resumes and most are free.

I might consider paying for Linkedin. (might) But the big job boards? I just keep picturing a whale lying on the beach somewhere. (and not doing so well in the hot sun)

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Permalink Reply by Jim Canto on June 26, 2009 at 12:44pm

Yeh.. $60K p/year is still a very hefty price to pay for a *baby whale.* ;-)

Jerry Albright said:

Hi Jim. Glad to see you coming up for air!

The days of just "including" job boards in your budget are over. At least for me it's over. Monster, CB, et al sure were great in their day. There are other ways to get "cleaner" and more targeted resumes and most are free.

I might consider paying for Linkedin. (might) But the big job boards? I just keep picturing a whale lying on the beach somewhere. (and not doing so well in the hot sun)

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Permalink Reply by Jerry Albright on June 26, 2009 at 3:54pm

95% of the time I am not targeting job board applicants/candidates. I'm typically tracking down the person I am looking for w/o running ads anywhere.

Jennifer Bowen said:

The days of HUGE job posting contracts are certainly over, but I've got another question to add to this:

Besides the free options (Twitter etc.) and LinkedIn are recruiters still interested in locally targeted pay-to-postjob boards? It seems Jobing is still expanding into new markets on the local levels, all be it not with as much splash as previously. Doesn't this provide targeted applicants as well?

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Permalink Reply by Steven Rothberg on July 3, 2009 at 10:56am

One of the dirty, dark secrets of the job board industry is that virtually all of the boards make about 90% of their revenues from two products: job postings and resume searching. But job postings have become a commodity product and therefore difficult to sell for a premium price and will become increasingly difficult to sell for any price as the race to $0 continues. And resume searching, I hope, will go away as the industry is seeing more and more instances of illegitimate organizations buying access to resume banks with stolen credit cards and then downloading resumes for identity theft purposes and even legitimate organizations buying access with valid credit cards to download resumes for the purposes of selling products and services to candidates. So if job postings and resume searching revenues drop way off, how will old style job boards survive? The answer, unfortunately, is they won't. They will adapt or perish.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Ceccarelli on July 6, 2009 at 4:24pm

HUH????????????? to the following statement you made............40 lawyers filled by lunch off of Twitter......this is an urban myth.........folklore.......come on!!!!!!!!

[not sure about this example, but...] "Twitter is also gaining traction in the realm of job search. [a recruiter] that needed 40 lawyers immediately ... sent a message—or "tweet"—to her 150 followers, which was re-twittered [re-twittered?!?!? oh my] by legal blogs that follow her. [recruiter allegedly] "...filled every post by lunch."

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Permalink Reply by Jim Canto on July 6, 2009 at 5:07pm

Pete.. I scratched my head at that one as well. Did you happen to read the full article?

Peter Ceccarelli said:

HUH????????????? to the following statement you made............40 lawyers filled by lunch off of Twitter......this is an urban myth.........folklore.......come on!!!!!!!!

[not sure about this example, but...] "Twitter is also gaining traction in the realm of job search. [a recruiter] that needed 40 lawyers immediately ... sent a message—or "tweet"—to her 150 followers, which was re-twittered [re-twittered?!?!? oh my] by legal blogs that follow her. [recruiter allegedly] "...filled every post by lunch."

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Permalink Reply by Peter Ceccarelli on July 6, 2009 at 6:06pm

Yes I did read the entire article. That's the reason I pointed out the statement. It feels like fantasy and magic to me. And from what I've experienced thus far in life is that neither of those two elements has anything to do with reality.

Jim - medXcentral said:

Pete.. I scratched my head at that one as well. Did you happen to read the full article?

Peter Ceccarelli said:
HUH????????????? to the following statement you made............40 lawyers filled by lunch off of Twitter......this is an urban myth.........folklore.......come on!!!!!!!!

[not sure about this example, but...] "Twitter is also gaining traction in the realm of job search. [a recruiter] that needed 40 lawyers immediately ... sent a message—or "tweet"—to her 150 followers, which was re-twittered [re-twittered?!?!? oh my] by legal blogs that follow her. [recruiter allegedly] "...filled every post by lunch."

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Permalink Reply by Scotty Mo on July 11, 2009 at 1:49am

Job Boards serve a purpose, for people looking for a jobm they need a plac to post a resume so recruiters can find it...simple...am I missing something here?