

Show HN: Job board designed for freelancers - mikelbring
https://bidpeek.com/

======
hluska
Nice looking site and congratulations on your launch!

The only problem I can see is that nobody will pay to join a job site until
there are lots of jobs available, yet companies won't go out of their way to
post jobs on your site until you have a large pool of candidates who will
apply for the work they post. Consequently, I'm worried that, by charging
people right away, you're going to end up stifling your site's growth.

What if you adopted a model whereby everybody gets a basic profile and can
apply for x jobs a month? Subscribers get better profiles and can apply for
unlimited jobs. I know it sounds a lot like other incumbents in the space, but
I think that model works for sites like this.

~~~
anovikov
Nope, it is a Very Good idea to charge to join a job site. That allows to
avoid sinking in a flood of spam applications from people from ugg... 'low-
cost destinations' which kills most job sites. I'd even charge more, when the
customer will see a site where they don't have to look through endless and
endless pages of outright spam, they will flock in.

After all, there is too much free stuff on the internet now. With current
bandwidth and server costs, a few bucks can go a long way, and if that makes a
huge added value by itself, why not?

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ensmotko
I don't see myself paying for the service with only a handful of jobs
available, but I like the idea and I would pay for the service if it provided
quality jobs.

Have you considered offering the service for free to early bird adopters? As
an example: those who join now get a free pass for a month/year. It would
really help with adoption in this initial phase.

~~~
mikelbring
Yes and I sort of regret not doing that now to help with the jobs. I may go
back and add that in now and see what happens.

~~~
geoffw8
Its not too late!! Chuck a banner up on the HP

~~~
mikelbring
Just added an early bird feature :)

~~~
geoffw8
I would suggest wrapping it in a different colour div, it should "feel" like a
promo right?

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jasonkester
47 minutes old and it's already filling with spam. Of the seven gigs listed
thus far, two are recruiter spam, and two are full time jobs (though at least
seemingly from real companies).

I think you're about to learn what happens if you don't charge companies to
post job listings.

~~~
harrytuttle
Need a community maintained recruiter blacklist somewhere.

IP addresses, phone numbers, email addresses.

~~~
donretag
How about Awful Recruiters? The list is maintained in Git.

[http://awfulrecruiters.com/](http://awfulrecruiters.com/)
[https://github.com/soffes/awfulrecruiters.com/blob/master/re...](https://github.com/soffes/awfulrecruiters.com/blob/master/recruiters.yml)

------
jmduke
Congrats! The site is beautiful and I hope it takes off.

Two ideas to reduce the amount of spam and reduce the amount of low-value
options (from both the gig and freelancer perspective) while hopefully getting
you a more scalable revenue stream:

1\. Charge a flat fee to place a bid -- this will show that all of the jobs
posted are serious, not "I need Facebook cloned in three days thanks."
(There's a reason Craigslist does this.)

2\. Charge a flat finder's fee when a bid is accepted from a freelancer. This
removes a barrier to entry for freelancers while also will cut down on
undercutters offering PHP work for $5/hour.

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Oculus
I get the idea of charging freelancers to cut out the really bad ones, but
who's to guarantee the quality of projects/clients? If you had some sort of
system that also filtered clients/projects, then I would seriously consider
subscribing. You've got one side figured out, but you need to figure out both,
otherwise you'll lose all your subscribers because of the crappy clients.

In addition to paying, you should also consider screening every freelancer and
client/project (any increase in quality for either side of the pie is really
important).

Aside from that, good job on the website!

------
beech
Congratulations on launching!

One quick potential problem I've found: it's easy to find out who the job is
for by searching for a sentence from their post and finding other places
they've posted.

I'm not sure how you're going to find a way around that unless you only show a
unique summary of each post—enough to give a flavour and entice the signup,
but not enough to give away who the job is for.

Or perhaps I'm just tight and others will be happy to pay for conveniences
sake.

~~~
mikelbring
I really considered having a summary of each job free members see and then one
paid members see. I may go back to that.

~~~
beech
Perhaps the summary could be automated and be based on keywords like the
experience needed, location, salary etc. That _might_ be enough to give
someone the gist and get them to pay.

Right now though, I'd rewrite the current job posts on there so they're
unique.

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csel
Great job on providing site for free for those posting jobs.

However how do you verify if the jobs or companies are legit?

The problem with companies posting jobs for free is that, it may attract
companies who don't really value the developer's work, both in effort and
monetary compensation. I have seen a lot of companies like that and companies
that are legit and who really value developers don't really mind paying a fee
to get good developers.

~~~
mikelbring
I don't really have a fool proof way yet. I do approve all the job postings
before they go out. I think it might be hard to profile job posters because a
lot of them are probably going to be first time posters.

~~~
csel
I totally understand as you would need to somehow attract job postings to
bring more developers to the site (or vice versa). I guess once the site picks
up, and both companies and freelancers see the value, then you can come up
with a way to verify jobs. Best of luck.

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kmfrk
Whenever you're launching a product in a market that a lot of other people
have already entered, you need to explain how you are different.

Perhaps you could data mine the popularity of skills - or locations - on both
the supply and demand side and do something with that. For one, it would tell
developers what skills are in high demand, and perhaps something could be done
about that. That would set your service apart from the rest, just as an
example.

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mikelbring
Hello HN. This is what I call a reverse job board. I was hesitant in making it
paid right away because of the lack of jobs but I wasn't entirely sure how I
would go back later, so I did. If you are looking for a contract, it is
completely free to post. Let me know if any one has any suggestions or
questions. Thanks!

~~~
Felix21
Try adding a "post a job" link.

I know I have to sign up to post a job, but many others don't.

I like your idea because one doesn't need to keep "buying credits" to bid for
jobs. Just one tiny monthly fee and I'm good.

Building a multi-sided platform is a lot of work but I really hope it works
out for you. Good luck.

~~~
mikelbring
That makes sense. Marketing and engagement isn't my strong point (I am a
developer), so any advice like that is absolutely helpful. My thought behind
the monthly / yearly fee is, if you get one job, it's worth it indefinitely.

------
flipchart
Very good looking site! Congrats on launching. I had a thought though: if
posting is free, what stops people from posting a job with an email address in
it for candidates to contact them directly and circumvent your payment system?
I noticed that there were some posts which did this already.

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BWStearns
< PEBKAC > So the email verification needs to be fixed. My email is
brianw.stearns@gmail.com and it won't accept the '.' as part of an email. I
don't have an email that is only chars and numbers. Can you fix this?
</PEBKAC>

Edit: Sorry!

~~~
mike
Side point, but '.'s in gmail addresses are not significant so email to
brianwstearns@gmail.com will still reach you.

~~~
BWStearns
I did not know that. That is pretty cool.

------
mikelbring
Thanks to feedback. I just added a "early bird" feature. Any one that has
signed up or signs up over the next week or so will get a free account for a
year.

------
justplay
Good idea but not always freelancers are culprits - some employees use board
just to know the pricing . Best wishes \- Freelance web developer

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lifeisstillgood
I'm going to make a plea to destroy all job boards

[http://jobstxt.org/](http://jobstxt.org/)

Its simple, easy, can be harvested by Google / anyone else instantly and
solves at least 50% of job searches

~~~
hello_newman
That's cool that you think job boards should be destroyed or whatever. But to
shamelessly plug your idea to another users show HN thread is not cool.

I am assuming he spent many days/weeks/months etc working on this site and
idea, and for you to come along and shit on it is not cool.

Stick to the old adage; if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say
anything at all.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
OK, thats fair - I apologise to the OP. The best excuse I can muster is that
I'm having a bad personal day, which is not much of an excuse.

I have in the past argued that Show HNs should get honest and open feedback,
and not snarky stuff so here goes

1\. "Subscription Signing up and posting is free but to reply to job posts you
must have a subscription." I was confused - I liked the idea of getting the
early bird but this wording threw me - I could not work out if I would be able
to reply to posts. I nearly did not sign up because of it.

I suggest you add wording that "The early bird will allow you to apply for
jobs free for a year" \- at that point.

2\. Try having two account type - company and jobseeker. That might make the
above issue clearer. Also if I am a jobseeker why would I want to post a new
job? if jobseekers accounts can do that you may have some moderation to do.

3\. suggest putting name boxes into profile - apparently more boxes to fill in
less sign up.

4\. overall - impressive, even your css is cache-busted.

Well, my opinion on the business model is really what started this mini flame,
so here is a longer explanation of why I am not a total shit:

1\. if these jobs are cross-posted anywhere, there is no convincing argument
to pay your subscription fee. I may as well apply to the ad that does not cost
me 2.50 to apply.

2\. Quality jobs on here is vital - if anyone can add them for the cost of an
email, you will get spammed by idiots. And I am afraid that if you are
charging to post a job _and_ charging to apply for a job, you will struggle to
make critical mass.

Finally, and the reason for the grandparent post, I think that there are a
number of "industries" that the Internet _should_ have killed a while back but
for some reason are still here. Real Estate Agents (Realtors) being one, job
searches being another. Frankly anything that involves being an agent between
two parties where those parties can find each other through structured
searching is really going to be on its last legs.

I understand the desire (finding a job is broken, lets fix it) - but honestly
I do not think that another agency approach is the long term solution - and as
such I would suggest the OP thinks long and hard as to whether the game they
are playing has a positive end in sight.

The pond is shrinking, you clearly have the chops for this, try finding a pond
that is growing.

(yeah easy to say I know)

------
rodolphoarruda
I'm a great contributor to the site already. I have just created the 'PHP'
project tag.

/jk

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Djonckheere
Does this job board focus strictly on developer roles?

~~~
mikelbring
That was really my intention, but I could see sysadmin and such being part of
the user base. I am not sure sure on Designers, but I wouldn't decline a job
that has a designer focus.

