In defense of Yahoo – this product is called a HotJobs Direct. They have had it for well over a year now. The targeting criteria are actually up to the client. Even if their rep (or agency for that matter) counseled Progressive to target their IT audience as much possible – the client may have decided to just target Ohio. So far you can target by state and industry with HJ Direct.

CB & Monster have similar products. CB’s is called a Stand Alone email and Monster’s is called Targetmail. These 2 products allow you to target down quite a bit – to specific cities, keywords or even diversity.

The main advantage of the HJ Direct is that the email database that is being used is that of *ALL Yahoo! Registered users* (not just HotJobs). Among the jobs boards – I would say that HotJobs has a distinct advantage here. (Similarly with HJ adding in the ability to make recruitment banner buys across the various Yahoo! properties).