In 1999 I started a dotcom in a SE European market. It contained
issues related to management and career strategy as well as job ads for
executives and managers. Every three months I surveyed a group of
corporate HR professionals and selection consultants and compiled an
index of prospects for entry middle and upper level managers in
Marketing, Sales, Communications, Finance, HR and Production.
I
ran the business for three years. Soon it featured 150 job ads, ie as
many as the market leader but more interesting ones. Readership was
good, after all the market was not a mature one for professional
managers.
Articles about career strategy and management
were reprinted after permission almost every week in the Executives
page of the Sunday edition of the country's most posh political and
financial newspaper, listing the site's address.
Normal ads were secured from the country's No1 business school which appreciated the site as a niche marketing tool.
The
country's equivalent of the Economist published a review of the site
hailing it as the site for thinking executives and managers. I heard
stories of CEOs recommending the site to executives and managers. The
site was appropriately titled - branded management-culture because it
reflected a certain culture about management and careers in management
which apparently appealed to top managers.
The main business problem was, I am afraid, with many HR professionals.
a)
At that time, their opinion was that the Internet was a good place to
find IT people not managers. Who knew that Facebook, Twitter and
LinkedIn would one day exist. Even blogs were rare at the time. So they
kept asking for posting of their IT related ads or secretaries and I
insisted that this would dilute the site's (product's) strength, clarity
and "environment".
Ads that were posted received a
small number of CVs but very relevant CVs. I proposed to the HR pros the
addition of a special reference number in each ad so that they would
know via which source the good CVs came from. Few obliged. Those who
did, were impressed. Thus the site featured many and good ads but few
were paid, so revenue was OK but the business was clearly
under-performing. The reason I kept posting free ads was that I wanted
to serve the needs of my readers and create a marketplace. Recruiters
kept their business as usual, ie posting ads in mass newspapers along
with ads for cooks, maids, etc.
I did not give up. I
tried to educate the recruiters re media planning. I wrote a few
articles about "HR Marketing" proposing that good candidates were to be
found in places managers visit whether they are actively looking for a
new job or not, ie not the usual newspapers.
b) The
second problem was that most of the HR people I liaised with proved
unable to give interesting interviews-content, I had to reply on my
personal experiences and stories I heard off the record from managers
for good content.
I asked many of them to provide me
with interviews based on a few written questions. 99% of what I got back
was flat and frankly boring replies to the questions usually leading to
the point what a great employer their company was. Very few if any
insightful points re career management or the job market. Selection
consultants were a bit better in their interviews.
To
put it in short, most HR people in that market were not good
communicators. Plus they were afraid to express themselves in case they
said something they should not.
Thus after three years
of OK results but continuing under-performance compared to targets, I
decided to call the project off, since I was busy with other activities.
Jumping to 2016 and 2018, I am not surprised to see that many
recruiters are increasingly using LinkedIn compared to the usual jobs
boards.
PS. It is satisfying when after many years I meet managers who tell me "Oh, you were the guy who made management-culture!".
