‘Google for Jobs’ to disrupt $200 Billion Recruiting Industry

Great article from Forbes on Google for Jobs.

Several billions of dollars are spent on job advertising (Indeed, Glassdoor, LinkedIn, CareerBuilder, and others compete for this market) and even after people apply, companies on average spend approximately $4,000 per candidate on interviewing, scheduling, and assessment to decide if someone is right for a job. We estimate that the entire recruitment market is over $200 billion worldwide, and nearly every employer is a participant.

Companies like Indeed, Glassdoor, and Dice have long made money off of the large total addressable market (TAM) for jobsearch. Interesting these companies pay massive sums to Google for ad placement in attempts to rank higher than each other for various queries.

Google walks a fine line with these companies and their search ad spend. It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out, but I expect a big shift to come to online job search ecosystem.

Google starts connecting the dots for omni-channel marketers

The capability, which Google unveiled this week, allows the company to connect the dots between the ads that it shows its users and what they end up actually buying. This is a crucial link for Google’s business that, for all of the company’s inventiveness, remains a matter of attracting users to its predominantly free services, collecting user data, and leveraging that data to sell advertising.

This squarely fits into Google’s mission of organizing the world’s data. Omni-channel ROI tracking is a tough nut for marketers to crack. Google certainly has many opportunities with this additional data added to their user ad profiles, and certainly that data is valuable.

Google has been making huge investments with the development of it’s 360 Suite of business intelligence products. Even just looking at the top level navigation on the 360 Suite product page: Analytics, Tag Manager, Optimize, Data Studio, Surveys, Attribution, Audience Center.

Google has long since moved past just organizing data for the sake of Google Search, it’s now helping companies connect the dots between customers and revenue, and doing it in a way where Google can be a company’s one stop shop end-to-end.

‘Sex Sells’ with acquisition of Gay Hookup App, Grindr

Run by billionaire Zhou Yahui, Beijing Kunlun is one of China’s largest game developers. The purchase of Grindr, which has more than 3 million daily users, will put it in a more strategic position internationally.

‘Sex sells’ has always been a marketing mantra, I find humor seeing that hold true in technology. I also find humor that a game developer is buying an online hookup app, as if dating wasn’t enough of a game already swiping, taping, hearting, liking seemingly endless digital profiles.

What’s curious to me is the 2.6x Cost per percentage point growth between the early 2016 and present day acquisition of Beijing Kunlun’s purchase.

In January 2016 Beijing Kunlun Tech acquired 61.5% of the gay social-network app for $93 million. It’s now announced plans to purchase the remaining 38.5% stake in Grindr LLC for $152 million, according to Reuters.

 

This leads me to wonder, what strategy does Beijing Kunlun have here? How would Grindr’s user base react knowing their intimate data is being shared with a Chinese corporation. China doesn’t exactly have a great track record with LGTBQ rights.

Update: a bit more commentary on intent from a South China Morning Post article:

A little-known Chinese tech company has agreed to pay US$240 million for America’s Grindr so that it can become fully involved in the daily operations of the world’s largest gay social media app, as it expands and builds a loyal user base beyond China.

“[With the deal,] we also aim to be a world leading social media company in the future, and to expand our platforms into film, streaming and animation,” it said.

Keep your passwords safe, even when traveling

When you turn on Travel Mode, every vault will be removed from your devices except for the ones marked “safe for travel.” All it takes is a single click to travel with confidence.

Increasing public fears of digital asset searches (particularly while traveling) have arisen since Trump’s ‘extreme vetting’ executive order earlier this year. While Trump’s order is still currently stayed by courts, fears have not diminished. Fantastic to see a product company like Agile Bits go out of their way to support their customer’s fears. It’s clear 1Password is in touch with it’s user base. I’ve been using 1Password for years as my primary password store, and swear by it. I’ve tried many password managers over the years, 1Password is the only one I have stuck with.

Update: I didn’t anticipate the press coverage that this feature would generate. Strategic feature addition resulting in great positive media coverage for AgileBits. Smart.

Google announces Job Search

In a few weeks, Google will begin to recognize when U.S. users are typing job search queries into Google Search, and will then highlight jobs that match the query. However, Google is not necessarily taking on traditional job search service providers with this launch – instead, it’s partnering with them.

Google already knows a ton of information about you in your ad profile. For many of us, Google is first to know the question on our mind, the websites we visit, the emails we receive, even our calendars. Put all this together and I think Google has more than enough information to provide you fantastic and highly relevant job recommendations.

Consider the fact that most employers communicate job application status via email these days, and now you’ve got the magic bullet for tracking hire rates. The recruiting industry has largely moved away from more traditional CPC models and towards cost per hire as the leading metric for both success and ROI.

Google also owns the Search engine results pages (SERPs), so for many Job Search Engines, a job seeker is never even going to hit their web property once Google launches. The recruiting industry has started shifting away from traditional job search models towards more head-hunter focused solutions like Hired or Indeed Prime.

The company said that Google for Jobs will initially partner with LinkedIn, Facebook, Careerbuilder Monster, Glassdoor, and other services.

Notice any company missing from that list? Indeed.

If I were Indeed, I’d be scared. Having previously worked at Indeed, I can say the primary web job search engine was always described as, ‘google for jobs’. I’d say that phrase is likely no longer uttered in the halls of Indeed.

I sent this tweet to a few of my previous colleagues at Indeed on the heels of this announcement:

66% of iOS devices are running iOS 10

iOS 10 is now installed on more than two thirds of the active iOS device install base, recording 66.7% twenty-seven days after iOS 10 was released according to Fiksu. Mixpanel is also recording iOS 10 adoption topping 66% since Sunday.

As shown by the graph, iOS 10 has the fastest adoption rate than any previous update, a month after release.

If there is one thing Apple does well, it’s increasing adoption of their software. From Public Beta Testing, to automatic updates, to intelligent “install later” deferrals, iOS kills it when it comes to updates.

I’ve been running iOS 10 since the first developer beta, and it’s one of the most stable releases I’ve run. Same for MacOS Sierra.

When you look at the economics behind it, this is why Apple beats Google in mobile. They have a unified platform, with strictly controlled hardware, limited device types/sizes, and a base that is more willing to spend money. This is key for building an ecosystem like the app store. When you build an iOS app you have strong confidence that you don’t have to support 500 different devices, and most users will be running the latest software, that is a huge incentive as a software developer.

Even if you wanted, you can’t buy a Galaxy Note 7

We remain committed to working diligently with appropriate regulatory authorities to take all necessary steps to resolve the situation. Consumers with either an original Galaxy Note7 or replacement Galaxy Note7 device should power down and stop using the device and take advantage of the remedies available.

This is what Samsung should have done in the first place. When your product is catching fire, you stop selling it and issue a recall. Somehow Samsung managed to botch the recall and has held out far too long on actually halting sales. I wonder if Samsung is hiring QAs…

What’s glaringly missing from this press release is ANY information for Galaxy Note 7 customers on what options they have available to them.

The case of a billion dollar discount

Verizon is pushing for a $1 billion discount off its pending $4.8 billion agreement to buy Yahoo, several sources told The Post exclusively.

Yahoo revealed two weeks ago that it had been hacked in 2014 and that usernames and passwords for 500 million accounts were swiped.

Then, earlier this week, it was learned that Yahoo had been ordered by a secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to scan emails for terrorist signatures.

Yahoo just can’t catch a break. It makes you wonder how a company that once was on top of the world came crashing down.

A fun theory I heard over dinner this week was a friend mentioning Yahoo CEO, Marissa Mayer’s stint at Google. Did big G dodge a bullet when Mayer left for Yahoo, or will Mayer be returning to the Goog after burying the hatchet?

What does it cost to lose 500 million users’ account information and to invade their privacy by scanning their emails for the US government? Verizon thinks it’s worth $1B.

Yahoo is saying, ‘no takebacks’.

Mayer on the other hand, is laughing her way to the bank.

Samsung has never been hotter

Southwest Airlines flight 994 from Louisville to Baltimore was evacuated this morning while still at the gate because of a smoking Samsung Galaxy Note 7 smartphone.

More worrisome is the fact that the phone in question was a replacement Galaxy Note 7, one that was deemed to be safe by Samsung.

You wouldn’t think things could get much worse for Samsungs botched recall of Galaxy Note 7’s. Well, it did. Replacement devices are even overheating. Looks like the FAA should have completely banned the phones from flights.

And let’s not forget Samsung washing machines are exploding too.

It’s unclear what’s happening over at Samsung, but one thing is certain: I’ll be steering clear of all Samsung devices for the foreseeable future.

AMP’ed for Success

  • Washington Post — 23% increase in mobile search users who return within 7 days
  • Slate — 44% increase in monthly unique visitors and a 73% increase in visits per monthly unique visitor
  • Gizmodo — 80% of Gizmodo’s traffic from AMP pages is new traffic, 50% increase in impressions
  • Wired —  25% increase in click through rates from search results, with CTR on ads in AMP stories up by 63%.
  • Relay Media — in the last 30 days alone has converted over 2.5 million AMP pages for publishers like The Daily Dot, Hearst Television and The Miami Herald which says mobile users who start with an AMP article spend 10% more time than those who land on regular mobile pages.

These numbers are fantastic. In a recent post I questioned how AMP and Instant Articles might change publisher’s strategies, but Google has kindly shed some light over the success some publishers are seeing with AMP.

The data speaks for itself.

It’s not hard to see why AMP adoption is off to the races: