Massive online databases vs. individually siloed data…lets take a look.
There is a movement going on, right now. Companies are starting to abandon large subscription databases and building their own silos of data. Why?
Lets first examine the general trend of technology. When a new technology first gets introduced, it tends to be (1) more complex, (2) more expensive and (3) centralized. Job Boards for example. First there were the large boards like headhunder and Monster.com, next niche job boards, and then large corporate job boards. Now even small recruiting firms post their own job postings on their own web sites. The trend once a technology matures is (1) less complex (2) less expensive and (3) ubiquitous and decentralized. Less complex because the technology is streamlined and reengineered and less expensive and decentralized due to technology improvements and economies of scale.
Watching this trend has been one of my hobbies, it’s universal like the 80-20 rule. It’s time to give it a name. Expensive-Niche-Decentralized or E-N-D.
An entire series of technologies that follow the END trend. Web based CRM is also starting to follow this curve. Salesforce.com = the early days of monster.com. In the last few years, many new CRM’s specific to vertical markets have sprung up. Recently there is a movement to self-hosted web based CRM. SugarCRM is open source and Microsoft CRM can be hosted in-house. CRM, even web-based, is decentralizing.
Quick post today. We recently completed testing on Broadlook DIVER with support for Google Desktop Search. You can now use Diver to search the web for contacts AND, leveraging Google Desktop Search, you can now search files, emails, and documents on your computer and network.
The Diver integration allows you to actually do something with the information found by Google. Most recruiters have 1000’s of resumes sitting around on their hard drive. Let Google Desktop Search index them, and Diver extract them. I’m looking for final phase testers. First 5 Diver users to call me, get a week headstart on the rest. Press release will be later in the week. Search gurus…start your engines.
Most lists are just plain dead. I waited until December before posting this blog. Back in Jan 2007, I went to inc.com to review the INC 500 list from 2006. What I found astonished me. About 25% of the companies listed did not have a website. I fired up one of Broadlook’s skunk works tools (Grinder) and quickly found out …that out of 500 companies, I could find a website for 496 of them. This was right after the list went online. Keep in mind that the INC list is high-touch. Each company gets interviewed..the works. Yet at the time of publication, the most important piece of information to learn about a company, the website URL was missing.
Fast forward to Dec 2007: I just checked: The list has not been updated. The list is dead. Dead. Dead. Dead.
This is why real-time data is soooo important. If you work with data from online directories, expect it to be dead too.
Breathelife into a dead list. Using Broadlook tools Eclipse to pull the list in seconds and Grinder to fill in the missing URL’s, I now have a living, breathing list. I can run this list through Profiler and get 5, 10, 50 or 100’s of contacts per company. These names are not going to be found in online databases. Strategic advantage, all from a dead list.
For those of you who have Broadlook’s Eclipse, I’ve included the “enhanced” INC 500 list at the end of the post, with the missing URL’s filled in. You can capture it with the “Get table” command in about 5 seconds.
I was going to avoid the Black Friday lines and go online to do some shopping at sears.com. When my browser reported a “404″ error (page not found), I assumed my home Internet connection was down. How could Sears.com be offline on one of the busiest shopping days of the year? Quickly checking Google.com, Yahoo.com, Broadlook.com…all online, I ruled out me having a bad Internet connection. So I tried Sears.com again and got this page:
For those IT recruiters out there: someone could use a new webmaster.
Now I am forgiving, I tried every 15 minutes and I got into the site 2 hours later. I was catching up on emails so I had time. I am curious how many sales they lost? I was looking for replacement parts for my grill, so I was locked to sears. Those people who might have been comparison shopping, I can’t see them waiting around.
This made me think about a webmasters role. What should it be? Should the person that let this happen be fire? Did they get hacked? I’ve seen cases and experienced it personally when a webmaster is a hindrance to getting things done. A webmasters role should be to execute the vision and orders of executive management. In the case of Sears.com, I would think a good shopping experience would be paramount. Oh, and no down time. Period. “Look kid, we go down and your fired. This is Chicago kid-o, lose me a million and it’s cement shoes for you.”
Downtime for a retail organization is equated to loss of business and perhaps death of business.
The role of a webmaster at a company like sears is not all that different from a small company like Broadlook. However the “webmaster” at sears is most likely an entire team of people. I’ve noticed some trends. The single and small operators maintain tight controls over their websites. The messaging is usually concise and it reflects the founding philosophy of the company. As a company grows to the size where a second level of management is introduced, I’ve noticed those companies move away in their core messaging. This is to be expected, that first level of management is removing some workload from the founding executives. There are many areas that would be better served for middle management. Messaging is not one of them. Later, as a company grows to have an experience executive in charge of messaging, the web messaging moves reflects the original vision or even improves on it.
Until now, I had no idea where this sears post was going. I do now. It is sort of a self autopsy on working with my own webmaster, past and present. For me, each of my blogs is a personal journey of discovery. If they were not, then I am writing for everyone else and not myself. I am not that giving. This blog is for me and my discovery process, first and foremost. If others read and get something out of it, great. If they don’t, that’s ok because I’m learning here.
Regarding my working with a webmaster, in the past, I failed. My autopsy tells me that it is management’s role to convey with clarity what is expected of the webmaster and the website. I did not do this. That was my mistake. The same mistake that I see happening at many growing companies. Time to change.
Google is fast. It fits pop culture. Sit down, brainstorm on a topic. Type some keywords and get results. You’ve all done it 100’s, and maybe 1000’s of times.
Here is a secret. Slow down cowboy. Plan your search. Use a low tech solution…it’s called paper. Plan, get your ideas down on paper, then search.
Occasionally, I drop into a client training session when a new client is getting their one on one training on Broadlook’s tools. In this case, the client was looking to use our Diver software to find a Benefits Administrator from a local company. They were not out trolling resume boards, they were targeting a specific company.
For those who have forgotten, it’s called direct recruitment.
