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New Internet Service Offers Job Seekers Payment from Companies Viewing Their Résumés
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 11,, 2008 - Tampa, FL – The days of blindly sending résumés into the void without any indication of success are over. Applicant Tree (www.ApplicantTree.com) not only enables users to keep track of how many times their résumés are viewed by an employer, it will pay them half of the access fee.
Applicant Tree is offering an innovative way to apply for jobs on the Internet. In the typical paradigm, job seekers post a résumé on one or more of the online job boards and work to get that information in front of companies. Applicant Tree recognizes the amount of work it takes to hunt for a new job and will pay the applicants for their effort.
Applicant Tree President Jen Cooper said, “Job boards are really built upon a pre-Internet mentality where information gatekeepers withheld access to the public – and made a lot of money doing it. Examples of this are stock trading, real estate, car sales, etc. We’re going to open this up for the public to take their share of the pot.”
Although most of the associative costs of job hunting – printing, mailing, etc. – have been eliminated by the Internet, job seekers still invest a tremendous amount of time in the process, often needing to take time off of work to interview. Applicant Tree will now compensate people for that time.
Once an applicant builds a profile, he or she is contacted by a representative by phone and interviewed. This process helps determine the price for his or her résumé, which ranges from $15 to $100. After the profile goes live, companies interested in that candidate can purchase his or her contact information with half of that fee then being paid to the candidate. If the résumé price is $30, the applicant will receive $15.
In addition, established users can earn extra money by referring new users to the Web site. Every time a referral’s résumé is purchased, the original user receives $5.
There will be several payment options including being paid by check or using the popular Internet payment service PayPal. As the site matures, more methods will be added to give users convenient access to their money.
“We’re hoping this offer will drive traffic from friends and colleagues eager to receive the same great deal,” Cooper said.
I love scaring college kids. Whenever I’m asked to speak to a group of students about jobs after college, I love to mention the fact that employers will plug their names into Google to see what they can find out.
At this point, they’re skeptical. “Why would they do that?” That’s usually the first question that springs to mind. The poor saps…er, I mean collegiate minds, don’t even understand what the employer is looking to find.
I tell them that their digital life is a far more accurate representation of who they are than what their résumé says. An employer can read about how they blew off a class because they stayed out too late partying, cheated on a test, bought a paper or two; in short, stories that are funny to share with friends but reveals a poor work ethic.
That’s the part where eyes start to fly wide and sweat beads on brows. That’s when I know I hooked them. I see that they’re whispering to friends about stuff they think they should take down.
It’s the new millennium ghost story.
If you’re not a millennial, it should scare you too. Sure, you don’t have a My Space page with pictures of your Spring Break that could get you arrested in twelve of these fifty states – but there’s other information living on the Web that could do you even more harm.
If you write a blog related to your work, what’s the message of that blog? Are you critical of your company, even indirectly? Do you question your company’s direction? Do you go so far as to cite little irritations you have about your boss or your company?
In reality, it’s the established employees that have more to fear from a Google search than the young folks. We were all young and did stupid things, and it’s easy to forgive those indiscretions in others. It’s expected of young people to screw up their early twenties, but we know they’ll pull it together eventually.
Those late night party messages aren’t as damaging to them as a complaint about a boss is to you. You should know better, the young ones don’t.
