CareerBuilder.com led the online job search pack, with 9.1 million unique visitors in December 2008 versus 5.1 million in December 2007 - 78% growth. Yahoo! HotJobs and Indeed came in second and third in terms of unique visitors after growth of 146% and 88%, respectively.
Monster, ranked No. 1 among job search sites in online advertising impressions by Nielsen Online AdRelevance in June 2008, saw a change of -9% in unique visitors.
In another sign of the times, job seekers and recruiters alike are using social networking sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn. The April 2008 Jobvite "Social Recruitment Survey" of 115 US human resources and recruitment professionals at small to medium-sized companies found that 80% turned to LinkedIn and 36% to Facebook to find job candidates.
LinkedIn ended 2008 with 33.3 million members, up 90% from the 17.5 million reported in December 2007. Site membership continues to grow at about one new user per second. As a boon to those looking for work, LinkedIn launched a new search platform that allows faster, more targeted searching within a results page and directly in a query box. The company will launch a new service for recruiters in February 2009.
“By now, just about every adult in the country knows someone who has been laid off from their job, or else they themselves have been let go,” said eMarketer senior analyst Lisa E. Phillips. "Given that so much Internet usage occurs on the job, it’s natural for people to turn to the Internet for help in finding new jobs. As job listings have migrated online from newspapers, so have job seekers."
