LatinOcean - Marketing and Web Technologies Applied to Talent Management

Throughout my time as a LinkedIn user, I have received a large number of invitations to connect. Every one of these invitations can be grouped in three categories that are represented with the following real and recent examples:

Example 1:

Jorge

I’d like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn.

-Joe

Example 2:

Jorge,

I am reaching out to you as a fellow member of (another online network).

I would love to connect with you to share networks.

I do understand that you might choose not to accept my invitation. If that is the case please ARCHIVE the invitation instead of saying you don’t know me.

I appreciate your time.

- Joe

Example 3

Jorge

I’d like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn. We are connected through a number of different people and the X Talent Conference group and I was impressed when I saw your profile. I am seeking to create a powerful network of fellow professionals from around the world that I can learn from, share with and develop best practice to use every day. I thank you for your consideration.

-Joe

What matters most to you?. Is it:

- How interested/beneficial it is for you to connect to Joe?
- The style of the invitation and how much ‘effort’ the inviter has made in producing a customised invitation?
- The fact that you don’t know Joe

Popularity: 1% [?]

A quick snapshot of the self-confessed Australians on LinkedIn

1. 60k shy of half a million members.

2. In Crowds:

a) C-Level types = 8.5k
b) IT Professionals= 47k
c) Small Business = 15k
d) Finance = 14k
e) Sales = 19k
f) Entrepreneurs = 7k

That leaves a few hundred k’s unaccounted for, but suspect marketing, engineering, other professions are a big stack

Bottom line is there is critical mass on LinkedIn for the region. Now, how do you go about engaging them?

Stats kindly provided for an ad campaign by Mary Oliver-Iglesias from Linkedin. Maybe she can help you with a campaign too.

Popularity: 2% [?]

company name: notchup

based in the US, currently in beta mode. you can apply for registration or get referred (send me your email if you want to go straight in)

the idea: give candidates cash for taking interviews with employers and recruiters; members are also encouraged to spam, i mean refer the site to people that might be interested in joining by given the inviters a % of the money made by the invitees in one year.

the user experience: clean design (although someone commenting on the techcrunch article reckoned that the layout was a ripoff from google’s grandcentral. uploading your profile from linkedin is meant to be easy too, though I did not manage to connect. On the other side of the equation, employers get to see a blind profile which they can choose for interview and lay out the cash

The site offers 100% money guarantee, not sure about the terms of reimbursement though.

It will be obvious to you that the model can fall on its bum before it comes out of beta if there’s abuse, lack of talent or buyers. I am wondering tho if you as individual agency or corporate recruitment department would be prepared to materially reward candidates at interview, shortlisting or placement stage of the process. Or, are you already doing that?

Hope you have a safe weekend

Popularity: 3% [?]

Hope you all had a fab beginning of 2008 - personally, I had a ‘fat’ beginning to the year, after all the holiday food that I am still trying to work off..

Just to bring to your attention what might be the type of online operation we’ll see more of in the coming months if it works for their stakeholders, Recruitment portals or markets are intended to aggregate employers and recruiters and take the friction out of a what is still very convoluted, and therefore costly, exchange. A couple of players coming up with soft and hard launch dates soon:

- VacancyBid, you can catch Danny Nerezov, the 24-year old CEO, on Facebook any day of the week. From their site:

VacancyBid is a Sydney based company which exists to lower the cost hire for employers, and create maximum revenue opportunities for recruiters.

- NeedRM; I met CEO Michael Rhodes many moons ago about this initiative, so I guess the business model has been reasonably worked. The tag line for the company from their homepage:

NEED Recruitment Market is a recruitment revolution that has the capacity to change global business dynamics. As an efficient recruitment marketplace that sits between employers and recruiters, NEED delivers real value to traders by harnessing the speed and global reach of the Internet.

I will be watching with interest to understand how they go to market and how well received they are specially in the context of:

- the continued growth of the BPO/Managed services deals between employers and one agency which brings its own exchange platform, thus locking out unauthorised delivery by other agencies

- the continued scarcity of talent, e.g. recruiters wondering “why do I need to go and bid for work which may not be overly profitable if I still have job orders I cannot fill?”

- the fact that these markets may rely on externally sourced data to reveal its effectiveness, that is employers/recruiters have to go back to the system and flag an engagement as closed (person placed)

In some ways, recruiters are already bidding for work using the classifieds model: if the see company abc publishing an ad for an accountant on a job board, I won’t be surprised if they receive a few calls from agencies canvassing the demand on an ongoing basis.

As I said, the marketplace is still partially intermediated. There’s a few challenges, I certainly don’t have the solution. My bet is technology alone will not diminish friction.

have a great year

Popularity: 3% [?]

Had you asked me at the beginning of the year: will you be in Vizag for business in 2007? I would have honestly said no.. but here I am. This is all part of the plot to justify why I have not been writing - or reading - blogs in the last couple of months or so. More details soon.

Anyhoo, I was reading today about how LinkedIn is not going to be bought by News… Just in case they change their minds and/or Nye stops playing cat and mouse, I reckon this is a fab purchase because it enables News to

a) move up the value chain re. employment [from classifieds (immediate placements) to relationships with professionals (workforce planning)]

b) nurture an interesting audience for its other advertising and content

So there

Have a great weekend

Popularity: 3% [?]