Ok so you want to launch a job board. Copngrats. But before you undertake this project better ask yourself a few questions.
What are your short & long term goals for the site?
You need to set your expectations. In the short term it probably wont make any money but it will suck up a lot of your time. Be prepared for the long haul. It really takes 1-2 years for a job site to gain any kind of traction. These things take time to grow.
Have you researched the competition?
You’d better check out your competition and research them thoroughly. By picking a niche with only 2-3 competitors you have a better chance at success vs a niche with 7-8 sites trying to do the same thing. Find out how much each site charges, get an idea of the number of postings on each site and determine if the market they’re in is well served by them. If there are a lot of sites in a niche you want to go into you are better off trying to buy one of them rather than compete.
Do you have the resources to manage/maintain it?
If you aren’t a technical person (or have access to one) you will probably struggle with your board. You do need some techie skills such as HTML, domain knowledge, FTp, etc. to be good at it. Or you will need a strong vision and a web guy to help you implement that vision. Internet marketing skills are also VERY valuable. Knowing how to implement Google Adwords, Adsense, syndicating your jobs to Indeed, etc are all things you will need to do.
Do you have money to market it?
Ah yes money. Sure you can launch a job board for $0 with Jobamatic but that wont get you very far. In the first year of a job board, you need to concentrate on getting candidates to your board and build up your database. That takes time and money. The cheapest way to get them is through Indeed/Simplyhired at around .25 per click. But that can quickly add up. And SEO can only get you so far. You will need to spend some money on a good logo and have a well designed site that you must pay to advertise across the web.
Are you prepared for failure?
Sadly I have seen many job boards come and go. They usually fail from a combination of bad design/no marketing/wrong niche.
Choose yours wisely.
