from The Wall Street Journal, April 25, 2000

Ranking Job Boards
By Rachel E. Silverman

An obscure San Francisco Web site is giving some big online job boards a run for their money. Craigslist.org (http://www.craigslist.org/) emerged as the "most efficient" job-recruiting Web site nationwide in a survey of 50 recruiters by Forrester Research Inc.

It exceeded the effectiveness ratings for sites such as Monster.com (www.monster.com), HotJobs.com (www.hotjobs.com)and CareerMosaic (www.careermosaic.com).

Forrester ranked them according to their ability to generate the highest number of qualified candidates for the least amount of time and money involved. The poll shows that smaller niche sites can provide a more targeted audience for employers. Craigslist has about 8,000 job listings. Monster, one of the largest job boards, has some 380,000 listings.

Craigslist.org is a no-frills online bulletin board where San Francisco residents post employment and housing ads, party announcements and other classifieds. The site charges most companies $45 per job listing, but is free for non-profits and "really tiny businesses," says founder Craig Newmark, 47 years old.

Begun in March 1995, the site doesn't display ads. "We're not looking to make a lot of money," he says. Next month, Mr. Newmark will use the site to focus on other cities, including San Jose, Calif., Boston, New York and Seattle as well as Dublin and Sydney, Australia.

-- Erin White contributed to this column

Site Effects
Recruiters rate effectiveness of online career sites:

Site Effectiveness*


Craigslist.org 4.25
CareerBuilder 4.00
Monster.com 3.79
Hotjobs.com 3.50
Headhunter.net 3.35
CareerMosaic 2.61

*1 is "not at all effective" and 5 is "extremely effective"

Source: A survey of 50 recruiters by Forrester Research Inc., Boston.