Revenue streams – do you have enough?

April 15, 2009
JobBoardDoctor

revenue streams When was the last time you said your job board made enough money? Never?

The search for revenue streams other than job postings and resume access is eternal. These ‘big 2’ have ruled the job board world since its inception. Yet there are other ways to leverage your audience. Here are a few:

Site advertising: buttons, banners, interstitials, text links – the possibilities are limited only by your avarice or good taste.
Job seeker services: resume writing, e-books, ‘premium’ placement of resumes, affiliate programs with 3rd party vendors: you have many choices of things to sell to the job seeker while keeping the basics (search and resume posting) free.
Site access for job seekers: in other words, make the job seeker pay! The reasoning here: if TheLadders can do it, why can’t I? The basic premise: targeted job postings that you can’t get anywhere else, plus other ‘membership’ features. (For a non-Ladders view, take a look at FlexJobs and its membership/value model).
More services for employers: you could call this ‘buying just what you want’ or ‘nickel and diming’. For example, charge for Tweeting jobs; charge for premium placement or bolding job listings; charge for videos or podcasts attached to jobs or employer profiles. But be prepared to back up each service with some response numbers.
Sell/rent your technology: is your back-end technology something special? Then private-label it to other job boards or larger employers. See JobTarget as an example. Warning: you really should be technology-heavy if you’re going to do this – customers will expect flawless execution and lots of updates.
Lateral expansion: ok, this is stretching it a bit, but some job boards have turned into RPOs or hybrid HR/technology companies, providing recruitment, back office, ATS, and other sorts of related services. It can work if you know what you’re doing – or sink you if you don’t.