Roger Lear, President of OrlandoJobs.com, was looking for a unique way to fire up his staff and drum up some business that could help him reach the sales goals he fell short of in 2008’s fourth quarter due to the lackluster economy.
Then he met John Guthrie, VP of Marketing for the Daytona International Speedway. Guthrie told him point-blank that for the first time in 50 years, the Daytona 500 didn’t sell out. Pressure on the automakers caused a lot of sponsorships to be pulled from the event. So the two men devised a way that they could work together to bring business to both of their ventures.
Lear, who was working on hiring trends white paper at the time, agreed to invite the respondents of his survey to an event hosted by OrlandoJobs.com and GreatInsuranceJobs.com at the Daytona 500 on February 15 in Orlando.
“While it is a large expense and completely against the grain, I said yes knowing this is exactly what I was looking for,” Lear said. “To get [HR directors] excited about an event like this and the opportunity to meet them is invaluable. Hopefully, it will create some sales that day, but we know that it should really help our brands in the future.”
Scott Kotroba, Lear’s business partner and president of GreatInsuranceJobs.com, is planning to announce a major partnership with National Insurance Publication at the event as well as officially kick off VolunteerOrlando.com, a nonprofit site that will allow anyone in Central Florida to post volunteer opportunities.
About 100 HR reps and their invitees are expected to attend the event.
Lear said, “Overall, this event has been a very bright light in a very gloomy business climate. Like I told my staff last month, if this is the worst economy in 100 years, boy do we have an upside.”
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February 10th, 2009 at 8:00 am
I think taking gambles in times like this is what separates the winners and losers. However, I am curious, since selling to HR is different than selling to consumers – if they don’t have jobs to fill you can’t convince them buy, so what is the payout on this? or are they in a competitive marketing trying to grow through market share.
February 11th, 2009 at 9:02 am
Great idea, we are all going to have to re-invent ourselves.
We sell HR solutions and have a sister website that is a job board and we kicked off a competition before Christmas of 1 year free membership to the job board for the most jobs posted at http://www.jobs2ireland.com
We will probably run some more eye catching opportunites to draw the crowd.
Yes We Can – yes we have to !
All hands on deck and everybody get the sleves rolled up including the Captain :)