Although I’m a bit skeptical of Google’s recent prediction of the imminent death of the desktop, it is true that more and more people are using their mobile devices as some form of a portable computer – for proof, just think of the number of times you’ve watched someone gamely try to type on their Blackberry or iPhone. It’s funny – but if your choice is writing on paper (horrors!) or entering your thoughts into your phone, there’s really no choice.

So where is your job board? Do you have a mobile version – and if not, is one in the works? I hope so – for example, over 30% of mobile device users are already using Twitter, Facebook, and the like on the go. With the advent of Twitter-centric job sites like TweetMyJobs, the pressure from job seekers will only continue to mount for mobile versions of their favorite job boards.

What comprises a good mobile interface? Simplicity and ease of use, focus on the most used functions, and compatibility on the most popular mobile platforms. It never hurts to ask your users what functions they would like to use on their mobile devices. And don’t forget to make the interaction between the mobile site and your regular web site seamless and painless.

Curious to see what your site looks like on a typical phone now? Well, you could dial yourself up, I suppose – but these sites are more fun!

It’s been a year since I started blogging – a year filled with both good things and not-so-good things. But the best thing? I’m still blogging, you’re still reading, and we’re all still learning.

I rarely (well, actually, never) write about my personal life. Why? Because I’ve always assumed that: a) it’s pretty boring; b) you have better things to do; and c) why would you be reading the Job Board Doctor’s blog, if not to learn about job boards?

That being said, I’m going a bit personal this time, so be forewarned.

One of the best aspects of the past year for me has been the support and friendship I’ve gotten from folks in the job board, HR, and recruiting industries. Most of these people didn’t know me before I wandered into the big room we call the blog0sphere/Twittersphere/internet. But they were nice anyway.

In particular, I want to thank the Recruiting Animal for advising me on Twitter icons, etiquette, and naming; Eric Shannon for his early support of my venture and continued support of everything else; John Sumser for wise counsel and encouragement; Gregg Dourgarian for having me on his show (twice!) and considerable hospitality; Chris Russell for feedback and JobBoarders (a great resource); Paul Paris for his friendship and sense of humor; Todd Raphael for his willingness to let a new guy write at ERE.net; and my clients, who have in many cases become friends as well as business partners.

It’s been an up and down year emotionally. Apart from the excitement and anxiety of starting and running a new business, both my father and father-in-law died within a few months of each other.  Our family acquired a new kitten (an addition our two mature cats did not welcome). My daughter entered high school. I finally finished a massive cherry china cabinet I’d been building for two (yes, two) years.

And through it all, I’ve been blogging. Why? Well, first of all, this is a business and blog posts keep the name circulating. But more importantly, I truly believe that job boards are not dying, that they are evolving – and I want to play a part in that process. I know from personal experience at that job seekers find work through job boards – but I also know that the typical job board could be a heck of a lot better.

I also believe that one of the ways for job boards to get better is through an exchange of ideas and experience. I hope that this blog has played some part in that exchange.  This is an exciting time for the job board world. Social media ideas and technologies offer new ways for employers and job seekers to connect – and new ways for job boards to improve their effectiveness. The recession has forced everyone to look hard at their business structures and expenses – and helped us to rethink how we approach our work. The employment chaos caused by the recession has also changed many job seekers’ attitudes toward work – moving some to start their own businesses, and again providing opportunities for job boards to provide new services.

So, everyone, thanks for a great year. I appreciate it.

And if your job board has any aches or growing pains, just call the Job Board Doctor. He’s in.

Cool – now what is that, exactly? To me, it means unusual (in a good way), well designed, and ‘of a piece’. In other words, if it’s different and hangs together, or approaches the job board paradigm in a different, effective way, it’s cool!

So here are a few job sites I think are cool:

Krop

Not surprisingly, by and for designers. Nice, simple design + a specific feature for its audience (creative portfolio) = cool. (URL: http://www.krop.com)

AuthenticJobs

AuthenticJobs: A site for web designers and creative types. Good design + open API + owner who invites collaboration = cool. (URL: http://www.authenticjobs.com)

Work in Sports

WorkinSports: A site for interns thru middle management positions in the sports world. Unusual in the niche world – candidates pay, not employers. Distributed revenue stream + clean design = cool. (URL: http://www.workinsports.com)

How about it? Do you have any nominations for a cool job site?

Matt Alder published a fascinating piece last week about ‘job clouds’ and why he thought Twitter could be the future of job boards. It was one of those “I wish I had written that!” moments for me, to be honest.

In brief, he posits the creation of a ‘job cloud’ created by multiple employer Twitter feeds of their jobs. This cloud would be much larger than any individual existing job board offering, and would force a shift away from job boards and to providing tools for job seekers to locate jobs in the cloud.

It could happen. But I see several significant barriers to the job cloud becoming an effective experience for job seekers and employers:

1. Technical: To get the majority of jobs fed into Twitter, you have to make it incredibly simple and painless for any organization to do it. If it’s not simple, adoption rates drop. (You want the majority of employers, remember – not just Fortune 500).
2. User behavior: After 15 years and countless millions of dollars, most (not all) job seekers now turn first to a job board to find a job. To make the job cloud work, you have to make them change their behavior; not impossible, but not easy.
3. Twitter must remain free: Part of the attraction of the job cloud is that it’s (more or less) free; if Twitter begins to charge, the cloud will shrink.
4. Tools: As Matt notes in his post, job seekers need tools to find these jobs. Will these tools be free? Will they cost? And…will they work more effectively that the free tools job seekers can now access on job boards? (Another question: can a good tool perform as well in locating specific types of jobs as a highly focused niche job board?)
5. ROI: As Peter Gold notes in a comment to Matt’s post, employers will (rightfully) demand some sort of conversion metrics for jobs dumped into the cloud. Will ATSs step into the breach? Other third-party tool vendors?

Again, each of these barriers can be overcome, but it’s been my experience that change comes slowly to the recruiting and HR world. The job cloud may be on its way – but it could take a while.

In the meantime, job boards should think hard about how they can integrate Twitter and other social media tools to improve the job seeker’s experience. After all, if job seekers can find the jobs they want, when they want, using tools they know, if they can communicate with employers and other seekers…they’ll keep using their favorite job board.

Doostang just announced that they’ve landed $1.25 million in new funding. That’s not a huge investment compared to the boom years, but it is a signal that our industry may have reached bottom and is beginning to rebound.

So you’ve survived the worst. Now what are you going to do?

Do you have a plan for growth? If not, now is a good time to start – because if you don’t, your competitors will. The job board industry is like any other; you can grow, or you can fade away. There’s not an in-between.

See if you can answer the following questions (all of them, that is):

1. How are you using and/or integrating social media into your services?
2. What are your plans to move beyond job postings and resume access as your primary revenue sources?
3. Have you talked with your employers recently (and I mean most of them, not just a few)? What do they need that you can provide?
4. What is your plan for improving the quality of the candidates you provide to your employers?
5. How are you planning to improve the ability of employers to find the right candidates, and candidates to find the right job?
6. How do you plan to empower your candidates and provide them with a better job hunting experience?
7. Are you planning to grow by expansion into additional niches, acquisition, and/or creation of new services?
8. Do you know where your business should be in 12 months vis-a-vis revenues, services, and competitors?

What questions did I miss?

By now you’ve probably heard of JobDeck, a modified version of the popular Twitter search application, TweetDeck. A collaboration between TwitJobSearch and TweetDeck, JobDeck has a permanent, specialized search that focuses on jobs. These are sourced from the Twittersphere, based on employment-related keywords, plus additional content from LinkedIn.

Well, it’s gotten the New York Times excited.

But where does JobDeck (and other specialized job-centric social media apps) fit into the job board world? Well, JobDeck is basically a pre-packaged search tool. In essence, JobDeck is competing against Twitter’s own search tool.

In a world of Twitter search tools, a job board wants to ensure that its jobs are visible. Sounds a lot like good old fashioned SEO, eh? And if JobDeck and its relatives begin to gain significant market share, the spoils will go to those job boards who have taken the time to optimize their Twitter job postings.

What does that mean? The right keywords. The right hash tags. The right links (and yes, links that work are good, too!). Not rocket science – but poke around a bit. You may be surprised at how bad some of the ‘automated’ job tweets are with regard to the above.

So take the time with your site to make your job tweets the best they can be. (And it’s probably not a bad time to start tracking their performance, either!)

There are thousands of job sites out there. If you spend much time looking at them, like I do, you quickly realize that many lack ‘brand identity’.

In other words, they’re forgettable.

Try it yourself. Go to JobBoardReviews or Google “your favorite industry + jobs” and see what you find.  I’m betting that (after you get past the aggregator and Big 3 listings) you’ll discover niche sites that look and feel, well, anonymous.

So ask yourself – is your job board forgettable? More specifically, do you have a logo and positioning statement? If the answer is no (or if your logo is simply your name in a colored font), this post is for you.

Logos and positioning statements (or ‘tag lines’) serve an important purpose for both job seekers and employers: they help them to categorize and remember your site.  Together, a logo and positioning statement can convey in a few seconds what your site is all about – and provide a visual marker in your prospects’ minds.

A good logo is visually appealing, striking, and simple. A good positioning statement is short, specific, and accurate. Easy to define, hard to get right.

For example, take a look at Doostang. The name doesn’t mean anything to me as a job seeker, and the visual treatment doesn’t give me any clues as to what the site is about. The tag line, “Accelerate your career” is generic – and again doesn’t give me a hint that this is a site for recent college grads. (By the way, I think this is a nice site despite the branding!)

Contrast that with College Recruiter. The name tells me it’s about recruitment and college (although it’s a bit ambiguous as to who is getting recruited for what). The visual is somewhat distinctive. The tag line is dead on: ‘College career connector.’ In other words, I glance at this page and know what the site’s about. That’s a good thing.

What’s the bottom line value for spending time on your site’s logo and positioning statement? Higher retention of job seeker and employer traffic. Higher return visitors (because they remember you). Higher valuation of your site (because you have risen above the crowd of competitors and created a brand). More revenue!

So trust me – spending a few hours (or days) on your logo and positioning statement will pay off. Go ahead and do it now!

It’s true: anyone and his or her dog can have their own job board. Actually, the dog could probably run the board, thanks to Job*a*matic (well, maybe not my dog – she sleeps too much).

How many job boards is too many? Peter Weddle says we have 100,000 or so worldwide. I suspect only a small percentage of these makes money.  If it seems like there’s been an sharp increase in the last few years, well, there has been, thanks to more, better, and cheaper job board software; free web-based ‘board in a box’ solutions from aggregators; and a search for new sources of revenue from successful blog and content sites.

Yet at some point common sense would dictate that there will be too many job boards fighting for too few customers (and, in fact, the recession has resulted in some industry contraction). The Darwinian question is, when?

Job boards are created to make money – and if they don’t, at some point the owners will ditch them. The profusion of Job*a*matic sites is a result of low cost and ease of launch – but they are in essence affiliate programs. I suspect few (if any) of these sites that become truly successful will remain affiliates – they’ll go out and do what the rest of us do: buy or build their own site software. Why? Because they end up competing with larger, more sophisticated sites and have no choice. The remainder will either disappear or shuffle along, making a bit of money but offering little competition to established boards.

Then there are the sites who take advantage of the new generation of lower-cost job board software. Their success depends on 2 key things: ability to serve their market, and capitalization. If they falter at either, they’re probably out of business sooner rather than later.

Finally, there are those entrants who are successful in capturing some market share. Their paths are similar to those in other industries: grow or die. Some will expand via expansion, others through acquisition. But the proliferation of sites puts significant pressure on the single-focus niche site  – a pressure that wasn’t there even a few years ago (and don’t forget about the ‘free’ sites!).

So, how many is too many? I say (with apologies to Alfred P. Neuman), why worry? Focus on making your board effective for employers and job seekers. Grow. And let the market shake itself out.

Now, if I could only get my dog to wake up….

A few weeks ago I put out a request: what would you want to see from job boards in 2010? Quite a few of you responded – so here are your comments and ideas:

1. Better crafted job posts: This is in fact something that a job board can’t produce, as it’s the responsibility of the employer. Such a small thing – and yet most employers and recruiters still fail to post engaging, succinct, and informative job ads. Let’s put it this way – if you don’t write a great job ad, someone else will…and they’ll get the candidates you wanted!
2. Better pricing: The consensus seems to be that old-style ‘monster’ pricing is on the way out – to make the way for what? Not sure, but I’m betting we’ll continue to see changes in how employers pay for job board services.
3. Stop the job boards already!: As one person said, “Can everyone and their mother stop trying to create a “niche” job board? Oy.” Well, you can ask – but I suspect people will keep creating as long as there’s a demand.
4. Fewer duplicate jobs: A side effect of job aggregators and lots of recruiters, duplicate job postings seem unlikely to disappear.
5. No spam job postings: As discussed last week, ‘fake’ job postings – and ads for multi-level-marketing, work-at-home, and other ‘opportunities’ – make both job seekers AND employers unhappy.
6. Move beyond the job post / resume paradigm: For some, the advent of social media will kill the traditional job board model. For others, job boards just need to get better at what they do.

So what are your thoughts? What would you like to see from job boards in the coming year?

It’s never a good idea to upset your customers. So why would a job board allow a so-called ‘fake’ job posting – a job listing that, in fact, does not currently exist?

1. Maybe the job board didn’t know it was fake. After all, dozens or even hundreds of jobs are posted at many sites each week – by employers, not the job board.
2. The ‘paying’ customer posted that ‘fake’ listing. Money speaks.
3. ‘Fake’ postings are almost impossible to screen.

For the sake of argument, let’s say that all of the above reasons have validity. Nevertheless, the fact remains that when a job seeker applies for a ‘fake’ listing, he or she will ultimately be disappointed or even angry when they discover that the ‘job’ was never there. Perhaps they’ll think twice about applying for another job – or simply avoid visiting the job board altogether.

At this point, you’re looking at less site traffic, less job seeker activity, and (probably) some bad word of mouth.

On the other hand, many employers and recruiters will push back if told they cannot post ‘fake’ listings. Why? Because they use these listings to gather resumes for future needs. Let’s say you’re an employer and you’ve bought 50 job postings, but you’ve only used 40 and the rest will expire in 60 days. Why not run some fake listings to stockpile resumes for future hiring – especially if you know you’ll have the future need?

The problem boils down to ‘truth in advertising’. These ‘fake’ listings are presented as  if they are real, actual, ready-to-fill jobs – which they aren’t. When a job seeker spends 15 or 20 minutes applying for one and then finds out it isn’t ‘real’, they are inevitably disappointed (or perhaps something stronger).

Instead of gnashing our teeth about this, why not create a new type of posting? Let’s call it the ‘future hiring’ posting. Create a template that’s optimized for this type of position: broad, keyword-based, aspirational. Promote these listings separately from the standard listings. Tell the job seekers exactly what they’re getting.

The upside? More ‘truth in advertising’, resulting (I hope) in happier job seekers and employers. More reasons for job seekers to visit and employers to use your site. Idealistic? Maybe. But in my experience, doing nothing always seems to end up biting you back.

Tell me your thoughts!