Australian online recruiter takes on Seek, Trade Me Jobs in NZ

CareerOne, the number two Australian online recruiter, is launching in New Zealand today, allowing companies the chance to advertise jobs in both markets simultaneously.

With 40 percent growth since March last year, CareerOne says it now has 1.5 million unique monthly visitors in Australia, still some way behind market leader Seek which is three times larger in that market and is the leading jobs search site in New Zealand ahead of Trade Me Jobs.

CareerOne chief executive Ben Foote said the decision to launch in New Zealand reflects that transtasman jobs traffic stopped being one way some time ago.

"Job seekers and companies increasingly see Australia and New Zealand as one job market," he said. "In 2015, the number of people moving from Australia to New Zealand overtook the number of people moving the other way for the first time in 24 years."

The latest Hudson Report, which measures employer hiring intentions, also says intent to hire has reached a six-year high in New Zealand with 92.5  of employers surveyed planning to increase or maintain headcount in the first half of the year. The survey results showed 63%  of the New Zealand workforce would consider a new job this year, including 85%  of professionals surveyed saying they would move industries for the right role and 46% who would move countries.

Mr Foote said any employers advertising on CareerOne would be listed for the same cost on both the New Zealand and Australian sites, unlike its competitors who operate in the two countries.

Mr Foote, who wants his site to become the leader in the transtasman market in the next couple of years, said its main point of difference is the monthly subscription service, Lux. Under the software as a service (SaaS) model, employers can tell a story about their company and culture on a micro-site similar to a blog and can list an unlimited number of jobs.

Australian clients include Optus, Telstra, National Australia Bank (which owns the BNZ) and Commonwealth Bank of Australia (ASB's owner).

Subscriptions range from $A6000 a month for larger corporates to $A500 for small to medium enterprises and Foote said he's been surprised by the popularity of the SaaS model for small and medium-sized businesses.

Mr Foote said current recruitment sites are out of step because candidates are looking for more than just a searchable jobs board, even though CareerOne still offers listed jobs ads as an option for A$200 for 30 days.

"Candidates have moved from just looking for the right job to increasingly looking at the company and its culture as the most important element of making their choice on where to invest their time and career," he said.

CareerOne's matching technology, sourced from US-based Monster, recommends the right role at a company for candidates and better answers questions they may have about the firm before they apply to avoid the wrong fit, the company says.

Australian private educator Acquire Learning bought a controlling 65%  interest in the former loss-making CareerOne last year while existing shareholders Monster Inc and News Corp Australia retained minority stakes. It then relaunched the platform in May, shedding many of its former digital offerings and returning to its core business of job search.

It retained its advertising business, Digital Headhunter, which allows brands to buy targeted advertisements based on how website visitors use the site.

In Australia Acquire also uses the job search platform to sell education courses to users but Mr Foote said there were no plans to do so on the New Zealand site given Acquire doesn't operate on this side of the Tasman.

(BusinessDesk)