“I was a customer of Jobster a couple years ago and despite a concerted effort to make it work, it didn’t.”

I dont care what business you are in- if you execute better, you will probably make some money. You wont become a billionaire with ATS, but I see it as still a very nice business for the next few years at least.

The current opportunity is huge- moving firms from first (or second) gen systems to the newer, less costly approaches while beating on talent managment vendors via SOA.

Also nice to see Taleo take a little beating Mason !

In response to Will Scott’s comment, I disagree with your analysis.

Jobster failed because (1) their user interface was confusing (hardly “well engineered”), (2) they kept changing what they wanted to be when they grew up, and (3) the referral functionality was not closely integrated with our ATS, leaving an insurmountable gap in the referral candidate experience. I was a customer of Jobvite a couple years ago and despite a concerted effort to make it work, it didn’t.

Jobvite is a fully functional ATS with a working referrals feature. The two functions need to be integrated to each other to really work. So, it’s not “two crummy business models glued together,” but a comprehensive model that actually works better than if the two components were separate.

I also disagree with your analysis that “Jobvite will need to add lots of features fast to stay alive in the game.” I just dumped Taleo Business Edition not because it didn’t have enough features – it had too many that didn’t work very well and it had an awful looking user interface.

Jobvite works well not because it has every bell and whistle. It has the obligatory ATS functionality that actually works and has a very elegant user interface. Their approach of involving all employees is the right thing to do. I tried with other ATS platforms before, and it wasn’t until Jobvite that we got hiring manager self service to actually work, because the core functions have to work well and the user interface has to be clean and easy.

Of course, Jobvite needs to continue developing new features, but similar to an Apple/Steve Jobs approach, they haven’t and they shouldn’t release any new feature unless it actually works and is easy to use.

I’ve implemented Jobvite twice (different employers) and I believe it’s the best ATS for its target market.

I do agree though that the ATS market in general is very competitive, has lowering prices, and may be difficult to make money over time.

Wait. Wait a minute. No it doesn’t. It sounds like two crummy business models glued together with Elmer’s.

The ATS space is a extremely competitive and fast moving. So Jobvite will need to add lots of features fast to stay alive in the game. That’s a big investment. Meanwhile, the prices are compressing.

As for the employee referral bit, Jobter did a great of job of marketing that, got very broad exposure with a well engineered product, and exited the business (wisely) because it didn’t work. The problem was the employees and recruiters weren’t using it, and those that were didn’t get hires from it. Joel, I know you hated Jason, but you can’t ignore everything Jobster did in this space because of an ego clash.

Besides, where is H3 these days? They had a similar model, with cash incentives, and I haven’t read about their IPO yet.

Hopefully this Dan guy is really smart, because his company is positioned squarely in the middle of a wasteland. He’s going to need more brains than all the people who failed here in order to make something happen.

BTW your spam protection is starting to challenge my higher math knowledge.

why does everyone like to poo on the ATS business ?

sounds like a potential arbitrage opportunity to me…..

– Eric