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I am pleased to announce that Paul Forster, co-founder of Indeed.com has agreed to do an interview with me (Nathan Enns) for publication on The Search Industry Blog. For permission to copy this interview please contact FyberSearch. Question #1 Nathan Enns: Who initially founded Indeed.com and when was the project started? Paul Forster: I founded Indeed with my partner Rony Kahan. Our beta-site went live in November 2004 and we've been out of beta since March 25, 2005. Indeed can be found at http://www.indeed.com. Question #2 Nathan Enns: What background do you and Rony have in the search and/or job seeking industry? Paul Forster: Rony and I previously founded and managed Jobsinthemoney, the leading jobsite dedicated to finance professionals. Jobsinthemoney, which won Forbes Best Finance jobsite in 2003, was acquired in late 2003 by Financial News, a leading publisher for the investment banking, fund management and securities industries. Question #3 Nathan Enns: What future business development plans do you have for Indeed.com? For example, are you accepting investors or hiring? Paul Forster: We're focused now on building up our business infrastructure, enhancing our search technology and making sure our jobs index is as comprehensive as possible. A key aspect is building an excellent team of professionals in all areas. Question #4 Nathan Enns: I see a number on the front page of Indeed.com that tells us all how many jobs cataloged in the last 24 hours. Can you share any other index statistics with us such as the total number of jobs cataloged and the most jobs Indeed.com has ever cataloged in one day? Paul Forster: Indeed.com includes all the job listings from over 500 websites - major job boards, the top 200 newspapers, hundreds of associations and company career pages - and we continue to add new sites every day. We are adding around 100,000 fresh jobs per day, which remain in our index for 30 days. Question #5 Nathan Enns: Indeed.com has a nice collection of advanced features. Do you have any other advanced features planned for the future? Paul Forster: Many job seekers have told us they love the way Indeed works - it is saving them time and they are discovering completely new sources of jobs. Users like the way they can save their searches by email or RSS, and our Advanced Search functions have also been popular. We continue to enhance our search algorithms so job search results are as relevant as possible. Question #6 Nathan Enns: Indeed.com has a tool for web site owners I have not seen anywhere else called "Jobroll". Can you tell us a little bit about Jobroll and who you see benefiting the most from the tool? Paul Forster: Jobroll is a dynamically updated list of jobs - the result of a search on Indeed - that a blogger or webmaster can put up on a website or blog. The search can be tailored to the focus of the blog or website, such as a local or vertical community. Examples of sites that have added Jobrolls are Nomadic Audio, a blog focused on podcasting - weblog.glemak.com/nomadic_audio/ and ITLnet, an ISP in Oklahoma - http://www.itlnet.net/Story.asp?xID=54. Question #7 Nathan Enns: What computer hardware setup does Indeed.com have backing it's technology? Paul Forster: We have state-of-the-art servers and have been scaling up our infrastructure rapidly to handle very rapid traffic growth. Question #8 Nathan Enns: Why should people use Indeed.com instead of the other job search engines out there? Paul Forster: Indeed is the most comprehensive search engine for jobs on the web. In one simple search, Indeed gives job seekers free access to millions of employment opportunities from over 500 websites. Job seekers can also save their searches by email alert or RSS feed. Question #9 Nathan Enns: What do you think the future of the job search industry holds in store? What role does Indeed.com play in that future? Paul Forster: Job search is moving online to a greater and greater extent and, as the most comprehensive search engine for jobs, Indeed will play a major part. Giving job seekers an easy way to search for jobs is an important stepping-stone towards a larger, more efficient online job marketplace. |
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