The Hindu Business Line : Portals — for getting a job and investing too

A professional degree, an MNC job and a six-figure salary best describe Ashwin. But before you begin to envy him, look at his reality check: A `Hari Sadu'- kind of boss, negligible performance incentives, and zero job satisfaction. Caught in a quandary, Ashwin registered himself with an online job portal. It was only a matter of days before he started getting a flurry of calls and mails from prospective employers and, in no time, found a job that suited his aptitude (and worked happily ever after!).

If only all our job searches had such a fairy-tale ending! Yet those those of you who think you do not have the luck of Ashwin, do not lose heart for help is on its way. Online job portals have seen tremendous growth in recent years in India, and there is more to come. With growth prospects from the IT-ITES sector set to explode and the dizzying growth forecast for the brick-and-mortar sectors such as manufacturing, retailing or infrastructure, the online job portal space is hotting up with the entry of new players.

Info Edge's (which runs the premier site naukri.com and one of the early entrants) recent IPO and its massive over-subscription; Monster's acquisition of Jobsahead.com; Bharat Matrimony offering clickjobs.com, and new entrants such as Dice Cybermedia are set to shake up this market in a big way. News broadcasters too seem to be cashing in on the new trend. Television Eighteen, earlier this year, had picked up a stake in JobStreet.com and now NDTV's foray into job portals in co-operation with the Bangkok-based Yello to launch NDTVjobs.com, spells more action.

Online help

For job-seekers, a new job is only a click away. All you have to do is register with any job portal and post your resume online. The e-recruitment sites even offer you the option of restricting your current employer from viewing your online presence. You can categorise your job search based on the sector, years of experience, salary expectations and location. Most job portals offer you a comprehensive search tool and post your resume across to a multitude of prospective employers. Some sites even offer paid services for resume-building. These services are optional but, remember, that with the recruiter's zeroing in on candidates using a search tool bar, the use of right key words in your resume may be crucial.

Also, make sure you update your resume periodically, for some portals provide search results to employers based on the time of last login, for it is a general feeling among employers that the dated resumes are redundant. It is better to log in with multiple job portals as that increases the probability of your landing the dream job. Another noteworthy point is that these portals mostly cater to lower- to middle-level management jobs. Candidates seeking a top management job would, perhaps, be better off with a specialised offline head-hunter or consultancy.

The investment dimension

And if you do have the dream job, there is still some news for you here. For, the Info Edge IPO may give you a shot at profiting from the growth prospects of the online job market. If you are convinced of the effectiveness of this model of head-hunting, why not invest in them?

But before you reach for the cell to call your broker, a line on the dynamics of this industry.

Online ads form an integral part of the revenue model for these portals. The online advertising market has grown tremendously and is expected to be the key revenue driver in the coming years. Given that only 10 per cent of the job market in India has moved online, there is ample scope for growth. Also, you need to keep track of the online database of registered job seekers, with online job listings at each of these portals, and examining the share of total traffic (in terms of unique visitors and average page hits at these sites, with data from agencies such as Comscore).

And what of the risks involved in this business model?

The model depends, to a large extent, on the recruitment needs and costs of various companies and any downside in the economic cycle can spell trouble for these portals, not to mention the ugly memory of the dotcom bust.

No wonder, it is forcing players such as Info Edge, that derives over 90 per cent of its revenues from online recruitment, to de-risk through investments in such ventures as Jeevansathi.com (for marriages) and 99acres.com (for real-estate) just as BharatMatrimony, is moving into online jobs to reduce its exposure to the online marriage market.