Well it’s official folks. CNNMoney is reporting that Monster Worldwide, the company that owns the second largest job board Monster.com, is for sale. The last couple of years have been extremely tough for the job board. Shares of Monster are down over 52% from last year. In January, I broke the news of Monster slashing jobs after posting disappointing fourth quarter numbers.
When a company starts “restructuring” aka laying people off, the writing is usually on the wall at that point. With unemployment numbers beginning to look better or at least that’s the perception, you would think that this would be good news for Monster. It’s clear that this is definitely not the case.
More and more recruiters are looking to social media to recruit, and more and more job seekers are turning to social media to leverage their networks to help them find their next job.
I understand that Monster has a business to run, but I think where they lost it was that they were no longer featuring quality positions. They have a fiduciary responsibility to their users to not jam crappy ads about going back to school and positions that are of no good down their throats. Companies like LinkedIn and BranchOut are running circles around Monster and are benefiting largely from it. This is the future of recruiting. This is the future of job searching.
What is Next for Monster?
That’re really hard to say at this point. Speculation is that this would be a great buy for a private equity firm. Google has been thrown around as a buyer. LinkedIn has also been rumored to be a buyer. Since going public, they are sitting on a pile of cash. But, this wouldn’t make much sense for LinkedIn to buy Monster. They have a pretty good thing going. The news about Monster being for sale, wasn’t all bad. Once Monster announced they were for sale, the stock actually surged.
Monster has been a target for acquisition for quite some time now. But it’s been independent for so long, that it’s really tough to say if any suitors will step up. Any potential buyer is going to have to take a look at the books and see if this is the right move for them. I cannot underscore this enough, most recruiters are spending their time and money on social media and social recruiting. We’ll have to keep a close eye as this one plays itself out.
March 14, 2012 at 10:25 AM
Not surprising to say the least…..why…because after launching a ground breaking business, monster sunk into the hot, volcanic mess it has become today. Job seekers berated with Phoenix University ad’s, debt consolidation and just about every useless and obtrusive marketing possible, Monster has been swallowed by its own success. Good riddance to a horrid bussiness model but not to those who will lose their job because of it.