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| Reshuffling China's Online Recruitment Market: Era of Specialized Services |
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China's robust online recruitment industry has come to an inflection point at the end of 2007. In November, 1010job.com, owned by Hong Kong-listed RecruitGroup, suddenly announced the layoff of its majority personnel, as well as suspension of its newspaper recruitment business in Mainland China. This incident, however, has not yet deterred the expansion effort by China's three largest online recruitment websites, namely Chinahr.com, 51job.com and Zhaoping.com. Chief Executive Officer of Chinahr.com, Mr Zhang Jianguo, recently commented that Chinahr will further increase its investments into the market in 2008. Such "one forward and one backward" situation indicates that China's online recruitment market is now entering another around of consolidation.
High growth propelling big investments
Compared to other e-commerce industries in China, intensive advertising wars in television, billboards and print media have become a distinctive feature of China's online recruitment industry. Behind such high investment input by online recruitment companies, it is the huge market potential and relatively high expectations towards this industry.
According to iResearch, a prominent IT&T industry research house in China, users of online recruitment in China reached 35 million in 2007, and the market is expected to exceed US$ 1.3 billion by 2010, equal to 54.3% of the whole recruitment market in China. Chinahr's Mr Zhang suggested, "The online recruitment industry development can be divided into 3 stages. The first stage is simply a promotion stage, as clients unilaterally choose which job website they would use. The second stage involves sales, with recruitment companies launching marketing campaigns and fighting for clients. And the third stage is about competition in products and services, at which time companies need to possess specialization service capabilities and differentiated products. At the moment, China's online recruitment market is in stage two." |
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Zhang's comment is also confirmed by iResearch, which shows that 80.9% employers choose their recruitment websites based websites' reputations and volume of retained resumes. This is enough to justify the importance of brand marketing by online recruitment websites. In 2007, Chinahr invested $20 million into marketing, which could somehow explain its staggering 100% annual growth rate for three consecutive years. At the end of November 2007, Chinahr's online recruitment income had exceeded $46 million, securing the top place in its industry.
"Specialization": the trump card
On the other hand, the room for online recruitment companies making quick bucks by simple eyeball attracting campaigns is getting smaller. Mr Zhang suggested that "in any industry, advertising investments would not be the most important factor. Compared to increasing advertising spending, a company's internal organisational capabilities, such as management systems and employee training, are probably more important for a company's sustainable development."
"Services such as helping clients post recruitment ads and publish information have become things of the past." Mr Zhang thought that for both employers and job seekers are now demanding more specialized services outside traditional recruitment information, "only those companies which understand the market and users can lead the next race."
In recent years, Chinahr.com has been doing well in these areas. Mr Zhang claimed that "we have different positioning, which is client demand-oriented. We care about the kind of services employers need, and how to help solving their recruitment issues. Different employers have different requirements, as well as people from different levels. We aim to provide specialized services, not just a single platform."
With detailed understanding of the industry and clients, Chinahr not only provides an online platform for users to obtain recruitment information, but also provides many specialized recruitment services, in order to help clients address problems encountered in the recruitment process. Since 2005, Chinahr has launched a series of individualised solution-based products, such as annual membership-based services for small to medium enterprises and senior level talent resume database. These segmentation products have optimised and standardised many aspects of the recruitment process, helping employers reach the most suitable candidates.
Chinahr also launched new generation, online video-based recruitment products in 2007, including video recruiting process and targeted ad placement. Chinahr also has a recruitment project execution department, which provides tailored HR services for individual employers.
Source: www.iresearch.cn
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