Search Engines and Open Source, Primed to Take-Over Online
Recruitment Game
Not too long ago, job boards like Monster, CareerBuilder and
HotJobs were primed to put newspapers out of business.
Surprisingly, now it seems that search engines such as Google,
MSN and Yahoo! are set to dethrone both newspapers and job sites.
As revenues and readership for newspapers have been on a
consistent downward spiral since the birth of the Internet,
their grip on classified advertising has been a major
contributor.
Particularly job postings.
Since 1995, job sites have done an effective job of steadily
taking dollars away from a once almighty print monopoly. As a
result, online job classifieds were poised to take down print
listing who could never compete with bargain basement
price-points.
However, another revolution was quietly occuring that today is
poised to put job sites on the defensive.
Search engines and Craigslist happened.
Craigslist is, for the most part, a free service for online
classifeds. By allowing to post jobs for free in all but three
of its local markets, Craigslist has quickly become a site of
choice for local job seekers and employers alike. Even in
markets where employers pay - New York, Los Angeles and San
Francisco - prices remain well under $100 per listing.
Despite its low pricing scheme, Craigslist remains a very
profitable business, generating millions of dollars with only 18
empoyees.
Search engines like Google, likewise, have discovered that
providing free search content pays off as long as you provide
targeted pay-per-click advertising.
In light of this model, vertical search for jobs is taking off.
First, with players like FlipDog and GrassIsGreener, and now
with players like SimplyHired and Indeed.com. Yahoo! - utilizing
its HotJobs offering - is now aggregating job listings from all
over the Net.
As a result, most experts predict Google will soon launch a
similar offering that allows users to access job listings from a
variety of sources, including job sites like Monster and
corporate site listings.
Google will provide the content at no charge, while making money
from its AdWords, pay-per-click model.
Both Craiglist and search engines paint a picture of
commoditized job listings that eventually no company will have
to pay big money to have accessed. Most likely, job postings
will be driven to zero. Additionally, job seekers are primed to
have a central point to access a large number of listings.
As a result, it seems that search engines (Google, Yahoo!) and
low-priced open source solutions (Craigslist) hold the key to
accessing job information in the future.
Where newspapers and job boards fit into this equation is
anyone's guess.
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