Power Tools for Power Searching
The recruiter community is continuously bombarded with calls and emails from industry vendors offering quick and easy ways to locate résumés and leads for passive candidates on the Internet. As most of my readers know, I often teach classes on how to locate these resources using the search engines. However, for those who do not have the time, the patience, or the inclination to perform this function themselves, the tools and services available to recruiters can be very attractive. As the marketplace for sourcing tools and services expands in response to the demand, so does the confusion. Part of the confusion stems from the wide range of pricing and the differences in the actual service you get for your money.
There are basically two types of services: those that offer you the ability to search a proprietary database of screened profiles and those that offer a front-end to an actual Web search. Although there is something out there for everyone, the question becomes – where do you start? Here are a few options for you to review. I have omitted any pricing information because this often changes rapidly, most pricing plans are based on usage, and most vendors offer heavy discounts for member of certain groups. In no particular order . . .
ZoomInfo. Zoom has been around for many years, starting out as Eliyon. They have a huge proprietary database of over 37 million contacts and 3.8 million companies. They populate their Web-based database themselves from a wide variety of sources and it is verified on a regular basis. They have a free names lookup service on their homepage but also offer two pay services: ZoomExec (access to 1.4 million executive-level contacts) and PowerSearch (full search capability against their entire data-base). This service offers nam (profiles) only. Many have full or partial biographies and also Web and news references. Email addresses and phone numbers are also normally included. Check them out at www.zoominfo.com.
SourcePoint (AIRS). The service that offers both comprehensive name and résumé generation capability. They offer one, the other, or both, via a modular (a la carte) service. Their service searches the Web for names and résumés, searches business networks, the pay boards (if you are a subscriber), your own ATS, and your own desktop/pc. This very flexible, comprehensive offering has built-in CRM software and many other features. More information at the AIRS website, www.airscorp.com.
Platinum Recruiter by Info-GIST. A very popular tool used for résumé generation only. This installed program has many features and too many to cover in this synopsis. It searches for your keywords in over 400 free résumé sources but also searches pay résumé sources (if you are a subscriber), can search Canadian and European résumé sources, and has a flip search feature as well. Can also perform desktop searches. More info available at their website, www.infogist.com.
TalentHook. An early player in the résumé-generation field. It is an installed program with an easy-to-use interface. You can perform a freestanding search or create a client folder and link a search to a company and/or assignment. You can perform a Web search, college search, free résumé board, pay résumé board (if you are a subscriber), flip searches, and desktop searches. Their open Web search searches dozens of search engines, communities, and ISPs automatically. Learn more at www.talenthook.com.
ResumeFinder by eGrabber. A new entry in eGrabber’s long history of providing data-capture tools to the recruiting industry, it is the least expensive tool in this space. This product differs from the others in that it installs as a toolbar in IE. It is a very simple program that comes with a number of professionally developed search strings (by yours truly) that you can use as is or is completely customizable to support any search string that works best for you. You simply type in keywords, locations, and/or a free résumé site or two (or as many as you like) and hit Find. It searches Google using multiple search strings simultaneously and opens up a separate tab for each string run. For more information, visit www.eGrabber.com.
SGA Executive Tracker by Sheila Greco Associates. Don’t think that because this product is lesser known, it is lesser quality. This Web-based proprietary names database is maintained solely by Greco’s own research staff and is 100% telephone-verified, making it one of the most reliable names databases out there. It’s heavy in top and mid-management executives. A nice touch is SIC code searching, which many others don’t have. For more information, visit www.sgaexecutivetracker.com.
Diver by Broadlook. Another fairly new product, Diver is another very simple, easy-to-use interface that allows easy access to passive candidate leads and résumés from Google, Live, Yahoo, AltaVista, and AlltheWeb. This product lets you use your own search strings or has a number of examples for you to use as well. You run your searches, but then Diver parses the search results into a grid contained in the program. From the grid you can easily view one result after another without all the usual clicking back and forth. The program also contains very nice specialty searches for companies, lists, member directories, people, trade shows, org charts, and associations. More information at the website, www.broadlook.com.
Because of space limitations, I have not provided every feature available and encourage interested parties to contact the vendors directly for more complete information, a demo, and often a free trial. Please know I have not listed every player (SearchExpo and D&B come to mind) in this marketplace. I have offered a few with which I am personally familiar and know provide good results for their users. Full reviews on most of these products will be in The Fordyce Letter archives, as I have written about each of them at least once in this column, but never in a list format as above. Something for everyone out there.
News from HireAbility
I wanted to share with everyone some news from HireAbility, a recruiter group I have supported in the past and I am sure will support in the future. “A New Era in Recruiter Social Networking,” per their email announcement, addresses some major changes affecting their recruiter network, one that I have written about in this column before.
One of the major changes is that they have expanded the features and availability of the Talent Trader networking platform by adding Web 2.0 technologies and opening the membership to the recruiting community with a new basic membership option offered at no charge. At this new membership level, all staffing professionals will have access to the network and will have the ability to contribute their own content and develop their own recruiting communities based around discussion groups defined by the members themselves.
They also announced a big change in their pricing model. They have eliminated transactional fees for placements among members, unheard of in this industry. Craig Silverman, their EVP of sales and marketing, told me that HireAbility is trying to initiate an overhaul in the ways recruiters and staffing professionals network together in a “split placement” scenario. They are doing this by offering their members a fully secure way to share candidate and job order information under a subscription-based model that no longer includes fees for split placements.
To me, still one of the best reasons to take a close look at their membership is the outstanding discounts for members from a wide variety of recruiting industry vendors. These discounts are sometimes 50% or more off retail pricing, and often the annual savings from just one of these services can actually pay for an entire year of HireAbility membership fees.
For more information on HireAbility’s Recruiter Network and Talent Trader memberships, visit the website at www.hire-ability.com/rn or call (603) 432-6653.
StaffBytes.com
I recently became aware of a neat recruiting site I thought I would share with everyone, StaffBytes.com. This is a fairly new site and definitely a work in progress, but there’s lots of great content already. Basically, it is a news-oriented site dedicated specifically to the recruitment industry. The content takes the form of step-by-step techniques, instructional videos, site reviews, expert tips, demonstrations, and more. They will also be highlighting websites, and products and services of interest to the recruitment community.
The homepage of the site is set up in a blog-type format, with features posted and comments welcomed. There are many other pages in the site as well, with information about free résumé sites, job boards, communities, blogs, names searching, sourcing, search engines, and many other topics as well.
As of this writing, the site is free to take a look at and enjoy. I would encourage anyone with a spare few minutes to visit www.staffbytes.com.
News from Sendouts
Sendouts Pro 6.0, the venerable applicant tracking system provider, now includes integrated back-office functionality through its integration partnership with StaffMetric, the industry’s leading staffing-specific time and attendance Web-based service solution. This integration enables Sendouts users to track and manage timesheets and synchronize with popular back-office applications such as QuickBooks, Peachtree, and ADP for billing and payroll processing.
Anyone who would like additional information on the advanced Sendouts Pro 6.0 can contact them via voice toll-free at (977) 309-5222, ext. 114, or visit www.sendouts.com.
Tip
MySpace.com
Unless you live in a cave, you have probably heard about the social networking site MySpace. Its membership is now in the tens of millions and growing by millions each month. There is a common misconception that MySpace is the exclusive domain of teenagers. It makes sense to think that, as usually when you hear about MySpace, it is in the context of younger people. I have three young children who are all members, but so am I. Actually, you might be surprised to know that the average age of users is mid-30s. It is fast becoming a great way to get leads for passive candidates on the Internet. Although you can go directly to the MySpace website and search the membership from theirs, we have had better luck using one of the lesser-known search engine techniques – the “site” search method. Try this:
Go to www.google.com (or any other search engine that supports the site).
Type in: site:www.myspace.com “graphic artist.”
Click the search button.
I got over 3,000 results using the string above. Not résumés, but profiles of people of all ages, many who were graphic artists. Since that is a lot of hits to go through, to pare down the results I would maybe add some other skills keywords to the string or even some geography keywords to find people in a specific locale.
Do try this in your office: simply replace “graphic artist” with keywords of your choice. Be sure to use the quote marks if you are using a keyword phrase and omit them for individual keywords.
Mark E. Berger, CPC, AIRS CIR, has been in recruiting since 1979. He is currently a partner in Ramsey Fox, Inc., an IT services firm, and has been there and at its predecessor, M. E. Berger & Associates, since 1986. He has been heavily involved in Internet recruiting and is an expert on recruiting and sourcing products, services available on the Internet, and how these products add to the bottom line. Mark’s interests include successfully integrating both computer and Internet recruiting technology into a traditional recruiting environment. He has taken AIRS I and II traininxg and has obtained the AIRS CIR designation. Mark is also on the board of directors for the Missouri Association of Personnel Services. He can be reached at mark@ramseyfox.com. His website is www.swatrecruiting.com, and we recommend that you visit it to see archives of his articles and information offerings exclusively for recruiters.