Show HN: Paid job search? Are you nuts?(usemassive.com) ^ That's what our team said to me initially but we think it's pretty chill now. We built a job search tool that uses investor software to help you discover the most exciting companies to work for right now. Free this week so that you guys can try it out before we hard launch next week (paywall is down). Feedback is our oxygen: What can we do better? Are you gonna give us money? Why do you hate the design? |
The product seems only to aggregate jobs, it doesn't help me get in contact with them, it doesn't provide any assurances.
Other firms such as Oxford Knight work directly with financial institutions, akin to a recruitment agency but with competency. If I apply through them someone talented will critique my CV, cover letter, offer guidance and if a good fit reach out to the firm in question. This in it's own right prevents the candidate being ignored which unfortunately happens far too much.
What your team can do better is properly explain why I'd want to use your product. The design comes secondary if I can't see a valid reason to open my wallet :)
we tried the recruitment model a few mos ago but thought we could push the boundaries a lot more with aggregation + technology -- it got us REALLY excited.
I'd love for the product to do the explaining :) we're addressing the USP issue asap!
Other feedback: I really do not like that font you are using on the site. The animations and the cleanliness of the UX though, top class, well done.
Edit, more feedback: At the current stage I'm at in my career (Senior), all I really care about anymore is culture and work life balance. You don't have much here yet that shows how a company is culturally, but I think people would probably find value in that.
also yeah we'll be experimenting w trial/usage etc aggressively
edit: interesting to hear the culture thing -- our hypothesis was raw data would be more important to sr, whereas "culture" is kinda hard to define -- like what are people saying on Blind, Glassdoor, etc? I feel like you can only get a real feel for culture on interviews + talking to employees/investors. But yeah, exciting plans there
> What can we do better?
Explain for who is this for (it's quite reductive to say that it's for everyone who wants to get a job in tech), and what value we do get. There are thousand of free remote job boards, what is the competitive advantage of using this one? on which dimension is 10x better than the status quo? If I have to pay is because it's should drastically increase my chance on some particular aspect of the job hunting process.
> Are you gonna give us money?
No. I can't see the value of this compared to other alternatives or something that I can do by myself by browsing the web. Providing access to the raw data sounds like the quickest pivoting idea, but I don't think that it's necessarily right, or at least it could serve a tiny niche that may eventually become your beachhead in this market as you as you figure out how people use those data.
> Why do you hate the design?
I don't think you have issue with it's usability (forgetting for a second about the things you are still working on), but it's a matter of I don't understand the value of using it.
As for value -- yes, this came up a lot and we're aggressively tackling this. Our beachhead is folks who want to make loads of money at a fast-growing startup but don't know how to pick the right one. We're changing a few things in the product to make this more clear + easier to actually do.
As with actual VC investing, I think the hard problem is deal flow, not identifying the best prospects among the deals that reach you. The data you provide might be useful for identifying the most promising companies on your platform. (Though I'm skeptical that it's even useful for that, since I understandably don't see actual revenue or user graphs.) But that doesn't do me much good if the best startups aren't actually using your platform.
Now, if there were some reason to believe that all the best startups were posting jobs on your site, based on past exit data or whatever, you'd have a compelling reason for me to use it. But honestly, if you could do that, you could capitalize on that ability far more effectively by starting a VC fund instead of a job board. As it stands, I'd probably be far more likely to pick a winner by just picking a top VC firm and going down the list of their portfolio companies.
Unrelated to my previous comments: I'm at a big public tech company, so I'm not sure if I'm your target audience, but I generally just ignore recruiting messages from private startups because the comp is so unlikely to be competitive. I'm sure others will feel differently, but I personally can't see myself using a startup-focused job board that doesn't have company-provided salary and equity numbers.
Also, our comp estimator tool gives you primary data from tons of other employees at very similar companies (location, $ raised, industry, etc). More accurate than something self-reported like Glassdoor. The goal is for you to be able to use this in salary negotiation. Actively working on this
[1] There is still a war going on. Edsger Dijkstra.
https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/ewd11xx/EWD1165.PDF
[2] Alan Kay SAP talk.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXjpA9gFX5c
[3] Revenge of the Nerds. Paul Graham.
http://www.paulgraham.com/icad.html
[4] Hackers and Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age.
https://digtvbg.com/files/books-for-hacking/Hackers%20%26%20...
The job suggestions I got do not match at all the filters I selected. I would feel ripped off if I had paid any cent to access them.
The fact that you have the audacity to ask money for terrible results makes me _angry_.
1. I like the "anti" filters. That's one thing I've been wanting on other job board sites.
2. I'd like a filter that allows you to choose between "remote", "in person", and "hybrid". More specifically, I'd like to be able to specifically exclude remote jobs.
3. Your location filter appears to be broken right now.
> The first job search that uses investor tools
What does this mean? I don't understand what is special about this site
Actual thoughts:
1) Who is this for? The unemployed (having been one) would be too broke/cheap to pay for a tool like this. Employed engineers already have recruiters knocking down their doors.
2) Why would I use this? This helps with company discovery, but it doesn’t actually give my application an edge. If I’m having a hard time finding a job, it’s unlikely that it’s because I haven’t found the perfect company to apply to; it’s more likely that I can’t land the interview or pass the interview.
3) Why would I pay for this? As someone who’s bounced around a lot, there are a lot of tools and resources to help me with the job search and I don’t have to pay or do additional work. Such as:
A) third-party recruiters: they’ll find companies with my exact specifications + get my resume in front of the hiring manager without me lifting a finger.
B) Hired.com: I can create a profile there listing my skills and experience and companies apply to interview me instead of the other way around. I get to pick and choose where I interview, again, without any effort on my part.
When I think about the value proposition here vs ~$15/month for a Leetcode subscription that improves my chances at landing a job anywhere I apply, it’s very hard to justify the cost.
Honestly, I would “launch” (is it not already live?) this without a paywall and gauge user behavior. If they aren’t using it for free, they definitely won’t pay for it. If they are using it, then think about implementing a paywall or premium features or some other means of monetization.
as for who is this for, we obviously didn't make it clear. Our goal is to help folks become rich by choosing the right fast-growing startup to work for. that's why we think people would want to pay, and this is what we can do 10x better than anyone else.
ie, if you asked me right now which startup you should join to make tons of money in a few years, I would tell you the top 5 right ones for you. We want to productize that.
Edit: Ah, I missed the panel that stated that only engineering roles are posted currently. I was clicked through the product pathway.
I would happily pay for the raw data! I would not pay for this search page.
Dan Ingalls is the best example of a true top programmer [2][3] (and all his 50 years or programmes can be examined [7]).
Alan Kay [4] wrote extensively about good programmers. [5][6]
You can hire a few true programmers (some of the best programmers in history) with us! Morphle {at} ziggo dot nl
[1] http://www.paulgraham.com/articles.html
[2] https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=dan+...
[3] https://codersatwork.com/dan-ingalls.html
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Kay#Reinventing_programmi...
[5] http://www.vpri.org/pdf/rn2006002_nsfprop.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20130508090431/http://www.vpri.o...
[6] The STEPS papers and most of the others at http://www.vpri.org/writings.php
