Mobile-first recruitment platform, Found, has raised an additional $1.9 million, bringing its total investment to $4.4 million, as it looks to become the ‘Tinder for jobs’ among young Australians.
Since launching in 2015, the jobs app has gained traction with Australian organisations in diverse sectors looking to tap into its largely millennial user base, with David Jones reportedly using the platform.
Speaking to IR, Found’s co-founder Andrew Joyce said the app differentiates from other platforms in two key ways, by reversing the hiring process and tailoring job ads to specific audiences.
“From an employer’s point of view, you can search the Found database for people within 20 km [of the job location] who are available at the right time with experience. And you can connect with them on chat to schedule interviews,” he said.
While Found also allows job seekers to apply to jobs that employers post, Joyce said flipping the process around helps speed up hiring.
“[Employers] aren’t short of applications, they’re short of time and quality. We can speed up the recruitment process from weeks down to days.”
Found has also changed the process for jobs seekers. Users can create a profile in the app, upload a CV and set their availability. But instead of searching for roles themselves, Found shows users jobs they might be interested.
The app tailors its job suggestions to each user over time, based on whether they apply for the job or not. That’s the Tinder part. It’s an intuitive approach for millennials, who make up a large portion of frontline retail staff.
“Most frontline retail staff are really young. They may not even have access to laptop or desktop computer. For people looking to hire this demographic, you have to really tailor your approach to speak to this,” Joyce said.
According to Joyce, over 300,000 candidates have signed up to date. They are 65 per cent women and 22 years old on average. Going forward, Found is working to make it possible for employers to tailor job ads for particular demographics.
“If you’re looking to attract 18-20 year old women, you can write a job ad that speaks to them and push it out to them with the right images. [Employers can] act more like online marketers than using a broad brush,” he said.
According to Joyce, while more retailers and other organisations have set diversity targets, they are struggling to achieve them.
“Major enterprises are struggling to achieve their diversity targets due to limitations with existing jobs platforms. Found is the only platform that lets recruiters create ads for specific demographics, which are then shown only to their target audience,” he said.
“This helps recruiters focus their efforts on the specific group of candidates they’re looking to reach, while helping job-seekers understand how a job they may not otherwise have considered is relevant to them,” he said.
Joyce explained that the idea isn’t to exclude other groups from applying to certain jobs, but to tailor ads to people’s interests.
The diversity program has been launched following further funding from top investors including Dimmi founder Stevan Premutico, Red Bull Holden Supercars owner Roland Dane and MYOB CEO Tim Reed, totalling $4.4 million investment to date.
“The capital raise validates Found’s business model and demonstrates market faith in the changing behaviour of modern job seekers. We’ve had a great response from employers and recruiters, where there’s a real desire for competition and new technology in a space that has changed little over the past 20 years. We have some very exciting new technology that we’ll roll out over the next 18 months,” Joyce said.
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