She is an HR manager and everyday her usual routine is to scroll through resumes to find the right person. Numbers in database are either outdated or incorrect and the task gets mundane when hundred of resumes that are too long. Her company pays thousands to two-three job portal for the database, and worst is similar people posting resume on all the sites, thus, the duplicity goes up to 20-30%.
Karthik Prasad, a former consultant at Cognizant, left the outsourcing firm to run his consultancy in UK. During which he realised that getting the right talent was as difficult as running the firm. And this was across the board, not only his consulting firm, but even his clients were facing the same issue. He met Swash Ram and Ronak Jain, who later joined in as co-founder.
In 2014, the trio came up with the idea to start Beatmysalary, in a bid to solve the problem of the HR departments and job seekers. The basic idea was to create a platform for senior job seekers, who prefer to remain anonymous during their job search, to be discovered by employers without actively engaging in the whole rigmarole of job search. From an employer’s standpoint, it provides a marketplace with a list of unique candidates in its database; thereby making the candidate search more easy, effective and less time consuming.
How It Aims to Beat Other Portals
There are multiple stages in recruitment process; starting with lead generation & discovery, engagement, verification and onboarding. Beatmysalary plays in the first and second stage where it helps the employers find the candidates and engage with them. Also, it targets senior candidates with 5 years to 15 years of experience, or more.
The differentiation, however, is in the way they connect the two sides. Beatmysalary provides anonymity to the job applicants. According to Karthik, candidates do not like to list their names in job portals, because their present employer might find about them, thus, ensuring privacy for the candidates.
Also, it doesn’t require uploading of cover letters and resumes.
A candidate just needs to register by sharing details of his/her roles, current salary, expected salary and key skills. There is also an option to add more details like patents filed, or certifications/achievements. Candidates can also share their requirements like day care services, transport services, and more. The entire profile is condensed into 30 keywords and produced in form an identity card.
While for an employer, the experience is made similar to that of online shopping or surfing profiles on Tinder (dating app). There are skill-based categories, a selection basket and pre-defined steps. Starting with first step where employers can use filters to search candidates of required age, notice period, availability, skill and projects. Employers can pick the chosen identity cards and put them in the basket.
Next step is connecting with the candidates and taking the conversation forward. Rejected profiles can be discarded in the bin. It takes away the hassle of maintaining a worksheet and updating the status, time and again for every candidate.
During the connect phase, the employers use online telephony system to contact the candidates. Since the calls are made over the internet, the candidates don’t have to divulge their numbers, thereby maintaining the anonymity. The candidates’ profiles are regularly phased out after every 12 weeks, to keep the database active.
Business Model
Like any other job portal, Beatmysalary has subscription based model for the employers. It has three plans; monthly, half-yearly and annual for business bucketed as startup, small enterprise, business and enterprise. The pricing ranges from $100 for a monthly package for a startup to $11,000 for an annual plan for an enterprise.
The online portal started early this year and is still in the Beta stage. Within its first month, it signed up around 70 recruiters and 1000 job seekers. A few of its marquee clients are Amazon, Target Corp, JustDial, Walmart Labs and IMS, among others.
At present, it has over 125 recruiters, around 30% of which are startups and small businesses, 40% are medium size and remaining are large enterprises. It has over 2500 registered job seekers, 30%-40% from IITs and B-schools.
The Hurtle Of The Portal
In the next twelve months, BeatMySalary, aims to have 75,000 senior candidates and 1000 paid recruiters. At present, India is their largest market, with Ronak looking after the entire India business. But the startup plans to enter global markets like the US, Australia, Japan, France and the Middle East by the end of 2016, and touch over $10 Mn in revenues.
On the product side, it is building data analytics and data validation technologies in the backend to improve employer experience and give better suggestions during their search. Recently, the startup has launched its app for Android and iOS.
In order to fuel its expansion plans, the company is trying to raise $2 Mn in a couple of months.
The Competitive Landscape
Naukri is the biggest player in job search space with more than 20% of market share. According to latest reported numbers in its annual report, it has around 41 Mn resumes in its database compared to 25 Mn in 2011 and unique customers at its website have grown by 7.9% CAGR to 57,000 compared to 42,000 in 2011.
The online recruitment space is highly competitive, and for ages it has been monopolised by traditional players like Naukri, Monster, Shine, Indeed and TimesJobs. Sensing a stagnation in this space, a whole bunch of startups like IIMjobs, Hiree, Babajobs, HackerEarth, GrownOut and Venturesity, among others, have sprung up aiming to grab the disruptive market opportunity.
However, Beatmysalary is focused towards mid-to-senior level hiring, like HeadHonchos – a career portal exclusively for the senior management professionals.
Super, the job-seeking app is another player in this space and calls itself the “Tinder for jobs”. It connects people not only to the job, but also to the company culture, their vision and what it actually feels like to be there. Recruiters can search through the list of candidates and simply swipe to choose the ones they like. This Mumbai-based recruitment app acquired Viraltrics, a mobile SaaS startup for deep linked referrals, in March this year. Soon after that, it acquired Crunchcommerce to disrupt jobs on mobile.
Furthermore, PM Narendra Modi recently launched a job portal called National Career Service, to take over all government-run employment exchanges in the country. The portal plans to bring in 20 Mn job seekers already registered with the various employment exchanges in India, and it is also trying to bring 900,000 establishments and companies on the portal.
Editor’s Note
The online recruitment space is evolving. Traditional players have dominated the market since ages, creating a stagnation. However, of late, the online recruitment startups are creating quite a stir in this space. Sensing the disruptive market opportunity, a number of players have mushroomed. However, experts believe that with the growing number of job seekers entering the market each year, there can be room for everyone to grow.
Capitalising this opportunity, however, will be a different ball game altogether. Bringing down giants like Monster, Naukri and TimesJobs won’t be an easy task. It would require meticulous planning and impeccable execution. These online recruitment startups have to remain on top of their game and ensure that they adapt and evolve regularly to cater to the demands of the constantly evolving talent pool. In order to stand out from the crowd, they should ensure that they highlight their differentiating factors and make sure they stay relevant.
