How many freakin job boards do we need?

Allen Stern - September 27th, 2006

3 Comments

Ok – I don't know about all of you, but I am amazed at how many "Web 2.0" and "Developer/Designer" job boards have popped up. Why are there so many? Oh I know, it is because they take maybe a day to get up and if you already have a site that draws a large number of visitors, these job boards can be very popular and even more importantly, lucrative. They are like an ATM machine with the withdraw button always pressed from what I can tell.

So here is a round-up of the latest web related niche boards…

37signals Job Board – US$250/posting – about 80 jobs in the last 30 days
Crunchboard – US$200/posting – this month they have 35 jobs posted
Giga OM Jobs – US$200/posting – about 50 jobs posted
Authentic Jobs – US$200/posting – about 35 jobs posted
Coroflot – $225/post – says 550 jobs but no time length noted
ProBlogger – $100/post – (added 9/29)

Couple more added 9/29 – and the first that I have found outside the tech market!

Another one added 10/1:

http://www.simplyhired.com/ — really an excellent job here!

Are there others that I am not aware of? Let me know and I will add them. I wonder when the first European or Asian niche job boards will appear. I imagine we can't be too far away from this.

Michael Arrington had a post when he launched CrunchBoard (I cannot find it) which spoke to why he created the board and how he had hoped there would be one big board. Of course we all know the reason why there isn't one big board.

So how many of these boards do we need? How many jobs are on multiple boards? So we have 4 that I know of and I am certain there are more on the way. Should CN have one? It sure seems like a quick way to increase the bottom line. I can't fault them for doing it, and naturally companies like Adobe, Microsoft and the other companies can spend $250 a pop without thinking twice, especially considering that a posting on Monster starts at $800. And these sites have the audience that will be interested in these jobs. So while the match works well, I still think eventually we will have more boards than we need. Who will be the first to go? Will they all remain a year from now… two years? The bottom line is that from the appearance, each one was built for cheap, and is clearly profitable. And that is awesome. It shows how important a name is to the success of a new property.

There is a big difference between these niche boards and the mainstream sites (Monster, HotJobs, Careerbuilder). On the big sites you can post a resume and have employers find you. Here, we must find the employer. Push or pull.

Now, let me add even more positive. These boards are all 100x better than using Monster. Have you tried applying for a job on Monster? Everytime I do, I get education advertisements that are for people who have a GED. Can't the system recognize that I have a MBA and offer me something more valuable? Half of the time, I have no idea if the job post went through because of the ads. Monster and the others can learn a thing or two from these niche boards. While 400-500 jobs won't impact Monster and the other big boards, eventually I can see other blog sites (non-tech) that have a following creating a job board. And then, the big boards will take note.

So here is an idea – create a site that brings all the jobs from these niche sites together! Now, I guess you could monetize this with ads, but I would also hope that these niche boards would pay a fee to show their jobs on the main aggregator.

Wisdump has an interesting article on these job boards too. Check it out as it is a good read.

In summation, I guess we need as many job boards as the demand allows for. And with the RSS feeds, it's easy to look at all of the jobs from one location.

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