Job Board consolidation

Ok Australian daily email rumor mill Crikey has broken a story that 2nd and 3rd place vendors in the job search market in Australia are looking to merge. Thanks to Brett from the NowHiring Blog here is what is being said:-

Bitter competitors News Limited and Fairfax are believed to be in secret talks to merge their flagship recruitment websites CareerOne and MyCareer to take on PBL’s hugely successful online jobs site Seek.

Sources close to the deal say the two elephants of Australia’s newspaper industry approached competition regulator Graeme Samuel about a month ago and were given an indication that he is prepared to consider the proposed merger. Crikey understands that confidential talks between the parties are believed to have been continuing in recent weeks.

Sources say the collaboration is the brainchild of Fairfax chairman Ron Walker, who is also seen as being extremely close to James Packer and PBL.

Later On:-

Such a move would lock up the most lucrative classified advertising market of all – recruitment – for Australia’s three biggest media companies, creating a cosy Fairfax/News/PBL duopoly. News doesn’t have a big market share in Sydney and Melbourne, but it owns the market in Brisbane, Adelaide and Hobart.

Today the Australian Newsagency Blog speaks (Hat tip Trevor Cook) on the same subject:-

Crikey reported yesterday that News Ltd and Fairfax are believed to be in secret talks to merge their recruitment websites CareerOne and MyCareer to compete with Seek. Based on site traffic, Seek dominates online employment advertising in Australia. This is in part due to features on their site and in part due to poor competition by Fairfax and News over the seven or eight years Seek has been in business. Early on they refused to carry Seek advertising as they were (possibly) in denial about the online opportunity. More recently, they have allowed their commitment to print revenue to treat their online employment plays as the poor cousin. That has clearly changed this year with both sites improving offerings, but not value for the advertiser.

How true! Both have protected their traditional print advertising and just let Seek walk away with the farm. Both CareerOne and MyCareer have lacked both the feature set and marketing muscle to really compete. However regular readers of this blog will know that I personally feel Seek is also really lacking in great features when it comes to job search, case in point.

Where will it all end? Not sure except I can only hope that both job seekers and recruiters benefit NOT just the big media companies.  I have been saying for over a year now that for anyone to take on Seek in a big way will need two things, firstly very good marketing program and secondly great features.  Could a merged job board do this?

Another interesting site to watch is FindIt.com.au, can they shake up the market?

Are you one of the cool kids?

Hey you heard of coComment? A cool tool that allows you to stay in the conversation even on blogs that don’t allow you to subscribe to comments via email (like mine). At a basic level you can track your comments left across the blogosphere so you don’t forget to follow up on the conversation.
Initially coComment launched with a bit of a splash but you had to be an A-list uber-geek to get involved, invitation only a bit like Gmail in 2004. Now anyone can register for the tool that has been called “a gift from the blogging gods” and they have just released a bunch of new features that really rock!

Breaking the service down it is quite simple:-

  1. Register
  2. Setup your browser (Firefox has the best support)
  3. Comment
  4. Track them on your personal coComment page

The tool works seamlessly with Firefox and requires no user input to track your comments. You can also tag your comments (is there anything you can’t tag these days?), even track conversations without commenting! Back on the coComment site you can look at who else is commenting on similar articles, most commented articles, top commenters etc.

Highly recommended.


You’ll find SEO jobs at Oaseo.

links for 2006-07-19

Nortel on Techmeme

This morning I had a few minutes to kill before leaving for the office so I checked the Techmeme website something I don’t normally do (I tend to read the RSS feed).

Well right there on the front page was an article about my employer, Nortel, and a strategic alliance they have just entered into with Microsoft. Personally I think it is a good sign but unexpected as Nortel tends not to be noticed by the tech crowd, Cisco and others have that privilege.

This deal and the previous one from LG-Nortel with Microsoft gets one wondering, what next?


NVJobSearch provides Las Vegas jobs for workers hoping to relocate to Nevada.

links for 2006-07-18

Would you charge a job applicant for an interview??

Sounds rather strange doesn’t it, charging applicants to interview with you.  It is usually the other way around, employers paying for flights, taxis, accomodation to entice employees to work for them.

Well not for low cost Australian Airline Jetstar who are charing applicants $89 for the interview process.  This does not even cover the cost of the medical if the applicant is successful.  According to the article in The Age:-

Airline spokesman Simon Westaway said the $40 fee for a personality test and $49 for a security check for job applicants was “a cost recovery process”.

Maybe they feel that their brand and the attraction of being a flight attendant outways the cost?

Jobster launches a brand new interface

Over the last couple of days Jobster has released a brand new interface and in the process redefined job search, tags and social networking all at once. The only thing missing is freshly brewed coffee, which you need so you can take the time to understand what they have done!
Let’s break it down:-

  • Job Search: Taking direct aim at Indeed, SimplyHired and others Jobster now has their vertical job search tool front and centre on the home page. Yes they have had search for a while but now it is right in your face. (On a side note I wonder what they think of the Job aggregating patent Joel spotted.)

    They have all the bells RSS, email alerts, trends, date ranges, location ranges, and their own referral jobs.

    As you search you can also building content through the ability to add content via the at service, see further on in the post.Based on the last 7 days of search history Jobster are offering both a rising and declining popularity trend tool, with RSS. I would like to see a longer trend offering.

  • Social Networking: You create a profile which is a basic resume, including tags about yourself. A question I have is there now seems to be two profiles the old one and a new one??? I’m sure this will get sorted out.

    Social networking is also tied into the initial job referral tools released by Jobster. However, the social networking is not “in your face” like other tools, it is used to enable to overall user experience. Nor is this a social networking site trying to do jobs.

    A great tool is the Jobster at service. I have to admit when they first deployed it a while back I just did not get it, that might be because it was not full integrated into the site in the same way as it is now. This allows users to provide candid real life content to build a more detailed understanding of what is it like to work at the organisations listed in your profile. As Jason Goldberg says it is all about the BRAND!Tags are also use to explore both people and companies making this a great way for both recruiters and job seekers to connect.The final piece of the social networking allows users to connect to each other through a function called favs. To quote the Jobster site “Your faves are people who you want to bookmark. They might be a coworker, an admired colleague, or someone working at a company that interests you.”

  • Personalisation: Jobster tracks your previous searches and provides recommendations of jobs found matches your previous searches. A neat little feature and not new to job search but I like how it is done.
  • Technology: Everything you would expect, AJAX, RSS, images etc
  • User Interface: Clean, quick and responsive. The new UI is what has made such a change to the Jobster service.
  • Referrals: Still there in the background enabling lots of the new cool functionality.
  • What’s Hot: All of it, can’t you tell….

This is only just the start as I have not even looked at the new employers site.

Accountant Careers.co.uk provides accounting jobs in the UK via its employment Web site.

Looking for a new media job in the US?

Just noticed that The Podcast Network is hiring! Cameron is looking for someone to head up their US operations, the opportunity is very unique is many ways.

Firstly, there is no salary, just equity and success bonuses.

Secondly, you need to be familiar with media, VCs, start ups and advertising.

Third, you need to be able to work with an Australian. (Ok we are not that bad!)

And finally you will be helping rip intellectual capital away from Australia, not a good thing but in this case it seems necessary for TPN to grow. A couple of days ago Cameron provided a unique insight into the troubles he has been facing working with potential Australian based investors. The up shot is he has spent a truck load of money on lawyers only to have all investors pull out.

Anyway if you know anyone who would fit the bill drop Cameron a line at cameron@thepodcastnetwork.com.

links for 2006-07-11

Welcome to Human Capital Magazine Readers

The latest Human Capital Magazine has published their article on blogging and HR which included the interview from Frank Arrigo. A good introduction to blogging and covers the fact that organisations needs to watch what is being said about them online, however it would of been good to direct readers to Technorati, IceRocket as well as Google Blogsearch and BlogSearchEngine.

They listed several recommended blogs, yours truely is included which is a fantastic honour! If you have arrived here via the article you should check out community.hrblogs.org for a list of some fantastic HR related blogs.

On a related note Microsoft Australia should update their recruitment blog, (last update 19 April 2006) it was even mentioned in the article with a quote from Fiona Hathaway Microsoft ANZ Recruitment Manager.


Search London jobs at Canary Wharf Jobs.com.