How to Fell a Giant
No one accuses Amazon of being a bashful player in the retail market. It’s huge and a bare-knuckled competitor. So, the conventional wisdom is that it’s unstoppable. But, now there’s a little company that’s calling the conventional wisdom into question and, in the process, developing a strategy for job boards and other employment sites.
Amazon is unlikely ever to be disrupted into oblivion, but Postmates, a start-up using mobile technology and an innovative approach to local retailers, may fight the company to a draw. Postmates runs an Uber-like network of drivers who deliver products from local vendors right to the consumer’s doorstep in 18 U.S. cities. In effect, it’s reinvented the consumer’s experience from trying to cram a site designed for desktop commerce into a cell phone to something new and potentially more appealing.
Here’s how the CEO of Postmates describes it: “We want to use the city as our warehouse instead of building a warehouse outside the city. We want to be part of a city versus saying ‘Here’s a way you can save $2 on an item, but nobody in the city earns a dime and all you have is a cheap DVD – congratulations!'”
We’ll have to see if he’s right, but the strategy, at least, is the first plausible alternative to bigness, convenience and aggressive competitive tactics. And, that’s something job boards should take to heart.
Right now, LinkedIn is the Amazon of our industry. And its bigness and aggressive behavior can also be countered by a Postmates-like strategy.
- First, capture the high ground with mobile technology. Get beyond the Gen 1 cramming of our sites into a smaller platform to the Gen 2 development of an entirely new experience for both the employer and job seeker.
- Second, don’t try to go it alone. Look for strategic partners like Postmates’ local vendors that can help create a value proposition for employers and recruiters that is at least as compelling if not more than that of LinkedIn.
- And third, don’t use techno-babble to explain what you’re doing. Describing the Postmates strategy as using the city as its warehouse brilliantly counters the Amazon bricks and mortar facilities and builds a subliminal connection with each city’s residents.
Disruption isn’t always driven by technology. Sometimes, it’s the result of a really good strategy.
2015 IAEWS Spring & Fall Congress
Leadership Summits for Employment Web-Sites
Each year, the IAEWS conducts two global summits for the CEOs of employment Web-sites and their direct reports. These meetings offer the leaders of the online employment services industry a unique opportunity for networking, discussion, learning and doing business.
The 2015 IAEWS Spring Congress
The 2015 IAEWS Spring Congress will be held on April 25-26, 2015 at the Manchester Grand Hyatt in San Diego, California USA. It will be collocated with and immediately precede the SHRM Talent Management Conference & Expo.
The 2015 IAEWS Fall Congress
The 2015 IAEWS Fall Congress will be held on October 16-17, 2015 at the Mandalay Bay Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada USA. It will be collocated with and immediately precede HRTech.
This extraordinary lineup enables you to attend the premier conferences in the online employment services industry – the IAEWS Spring & Fall Congress – and then stay on to attend:
- The premier conference for talent acquisition professionals and managers – the SHRM Talent Management Conference & Expo;
- The premier conference for HR technology companies worldwide – HRTech.
and
Participation is open to all employment site professionals worldwide. Registration information will be published shortly, so check the IAEWS site regularly to make sure you don’t miss out on these one-of-a-kind conferences.
Private Research Bulletin
It’s tough to keep track of what’s happening in the online employment services industry. Companies are being bought and sold, new technology and services are being introduced, partnerships and alliances are being formed, and alternative business models and strategies are being tested and promoted. All of the time.
Staying on top of it all is critical to bottom line success. But who has the time to collect and read what’s published at the multiple channels that report on such matters? And equally as important, who wants to read everything when only a subset of the information is likely to impact your business?
WEDDLE’s Research Bulletin – a private, monthly e-report – solves these problems. It uses a wide range of sources – both inside and outside the industry – to capture the latest news relevant to online employment and then curates that information to deliver what’s most important with commentary about why and what it could mean.
The WEDDLE’s Research Bulletin is a for-fee publication that gives you your own in-house research and analysis arm. It focuses exclusively on the online employment services industry and delivers exactly what you need to know in just four easy-to-digest pages.
For more information about the Bulletin and its cost, please contact Peter Weddle at peter@weddles.com.
Global Job Board Survey
The IAEWS-Job Board Doctor Global Survey is a unique opportunity to express your thoughts on the key trends, issues and opportunities in our industry. It costs nothing – except a measly 17 minutes of your time – to participate and doing so provides a number of important benefits.
- All those who participate will be offered a copy of the Final Report detailing the aggregate results by region.
- You’ll be invited to attend a participants-only discussion of the final results at a meeting just prior to the IAEWS Spring Congress.
and
So, don’t miss this opportunity to have your say about the state of our industry and to see how your views stack up with those of your peers. Deadline for participation is January 26th. Here’s the link to the survey – invest your 17 minutes right now. You’ll be glad you did!
Book of the Month: Next Practices
Doing Better Than Best in Online Recruitment
Best Practices are so yesterday! They are sourcing and recruiting techniques designed for a time that has passed.
Next Practices are strategies and tactics for winning the real War for the Best Talent – the one your customers actually face today and will face tomorrow. They modernize recruiters’ approach to:
- Social Recruiting
- Candidate Engagement
- Optimizing the Candidate Experience
- Managing a Recruiter’s Career
so they maximize their success.
Written by former Wall Street Journal columnist and author, Peter Weddle, these short, straight-to-the-point essays can be read in five or ten minutes and still transport you to a whole new dimension in the state-of-the art for recruiting and sourcing talent.
So, don’t recruit with yesterday’s techniques. Get Next Practices and help your customers achieve success in today’s and tomorrow’s competition for top talent. Click on the link to get the huge discount Amazon.com is offering on the book.