Another social hiring platform is glancing its eye on Indonesia. After Wantedly, Singapore-based Job Forward is ready to expand its business in Indonesia this April. We had conversation with Job Forward’s CEO Yoshiaki Ieda about Job Forward’s business and his strategy on entering Indonesia’s market.
How social hiring platform works
We started the discussion by mentioning the difference between JOB Forward and other job marketplace. Ieda said, “LinkedIn and other online recruitment sites are simply job listing sites. Job Forward’s focus is to distribute job opportunities through social media—to connect job seekers to employers through multiple social media channels, with LinkedIn just being one of the many platforms that Job Forward will use.”
“Typically only active job seekers will leverage traditional job listing sites. Through distribution via social media outlets, Job Forward is able to reach out to not only active job seekers, but also passive job seekers—who might not know of better opportunities because they are not actively looking, but would be interested once they saw a better position available,” he continued.
Ieda added, “Given that Job Forward is a platform for job post distribution, and because content and distribution are equally important, by leveraging Startup Essence, startups and SMEs can create the content that will further retain the interest generated by the distributed job posts.”
About Job Forward’s business model, Ieda described, “Recently, we received a six-figure round of funding, and have been providing support in terms of management, business development, and market expansion. Currently Job Forward’s platform offers a free tier for intern hires, but charge a flat-fee commission rate for hires with more experience. However, we are still investigating right business models for both employers and job seekers.”
Expansion in Indonesia
Ieda confirmed that Job Forward is looking to expand in Indonesia by planning to soft launch in April, including releasing Bahasa Indonesia version. He said. “Job Forward is currently looking into Indonesia for their next market of expansion, after having received very positive feedback from marketing tests. While we are already available for companies to utilize, we are currently working to enhance our website for accessibility and language adaptations.”
He’s optimistic there’s big opportunity for Job Forward to enter Indonesia’s market as go-to platform to connect companies with passionate hires. He mentioned, “We would like to really immerse ourselves in the startup community, as startups and the companies that they work with and other SMEs are our target audience—so learning about the startup ecosystem in Indonesia and how the companies there work will be the first step.”