The local job board space is a very mature one dominated by two things: Craigslist and a variety of independent local sites such as;
* JobsintheUs.com
* JobCircle.com
* AllCountyJobs.com
* Jobing.com
* Localjobs.com
There are literally multiple job boards for every major city and region in the country. For instance New York City is served by the following sites (all of which make money)
newyork.craigslist.org, nycityworks.com, nyjobsource.com, newyorkcity.employmentguide.com, newyorkjobs.com
So if you are thinking about entering this market with a new offering, forget it!
You’ll never make a dent because of the existing sites.
Having said that, there are some ways you can tackle a market like NYC. This is how you do it;
Launch industry specific sites for a location. Sites like;
-NYCitjobs.com
-NYCmarketingjobs.com
-NYCmedicaljobs.com
-NYCfinancejobs.com
-NYCsalesjobs.com
You will need to create a network of sites like this to make any money and you’ll need to offer syndication to the aggregators to provide a “value add” for employers in order to convince them to use your sites.
Hi Chris,
I am/was on the verge of launching a local jobs board for Houston, so your posting is timely. You’re the expert so no argument here, but what about from a marketing perspective. Wouldn’t it just be easier to market the local jobs board to all potential business’s? Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc, I was just hoping to utilize these channels in more aggressive fashion than the sites you mentioned in your posting. I have visited some of these Houston sites, and their UI is terrible or just so 1990’s kinda look and feel.
You mention build a network of sites that are ‘locally’ related, I’m simply wondering from a marketing perspective if this would be difficult due to dilution of efforts.
And when you say ‘dent,’ are you saying $500 – $1,000 per month isn’t even doable? Please note, Houston is the 4th largest city, not sure if this market size changes analysis in anyway.
Thanks,
Masad
Each local market is different depending on the number of competitors. As I look at the houston space youve got houstonjobs.com, chron.com, craigslist and others. Those three themselves are a formidable force to go up against. The companies that use them are already ‘comfortable’ with what they deliver.
Just because a sites UI may suck that doesnt give you much of an advantage. If you want to go into this market I suggest creating a job distribution service that combines a Houston oriented site along with job distribution (see ZipRecruiter.com) and offer that for $99 or less.
Something like that could bring in 500-1000
Hi Chris,
I’ve contacted and looked into ZipRecruiter.com. They seem to only work with the Employers / Hiring Managers directly. They don’t seem to have a White Label offering of sorts.
Or are you recommending having a Job Board via Simply Hired due their API, and offer additional service of Job Distribution where I’d add the info manually? But then I think there’d be duplication with SimplyHired.
Is PartTimeHires.com model feasible? Distribution to SimplyHired & CareerJet for $29 along with posting on GoHoustonJobs itself?
In closing, I understand the idea of the ‘value add’ being the distribution, just not sure if I’m suppose to create an account with ZipRecuiter.
Sorry for the confusion. I just really want to get this right.
copy their biz model and apply it to your site is what i mean, thats basically what i do with pthires