What is Referral Union?

Probably the most common question I get is "What is Referral Union?" There are several answers to this, and each serves a different audience. Let's explore a few possible audiences and the responses, but first the short answer:

Short Answer AKA the Elevator Pitch (This is probably the toughest one and is always in flux): Referral Union is a community of job-seekers and current employees of companies who offer referral bonuses. It introduces applicants, who benefit by getting a foot in the door to a great new job, to those working for their target companies, who are fiscally rewarded by their HR departments for referring qualified new applicants.

A bit more detail: Referral Union maintains two databases--one each for both applicants and current employees. Much like match.com, members of both databases can browse, search, and message anyone they're interested in, which will hopefully lead to successful pairings. From time to time, you will receive suggested candidates in your inbox; these are based on some keywords you entered when you created your profile. Yes, if you have a job but are looking for something new, you can create both accounts. You sly dog.

Potential Current Employees: Referral Union is a way for you to find qualified applicants to fill openings with your firm and earn the referral bonuses associated with them. Referral bonuses range from around $500 to as much as $10,000 and are one of the easiest ways to supplement your income. In addition to the fiscal rewards, many companies include such company-involvement activities on their yearly assessments, so you look good while taking an active role improving your company/practice/division/whatever. Once you create an account and upload your profile, which includes your contact info, your company's info, and select your account type, we will help you identify and screen the candidates. All of your contact information is kept confidential until you chose to release it to applicants.

Potential Applicants: Referral Union is a way for you to guarantee your resume gets put in front of an actual person. Instead of submitting it to a corporate career site where it might disappear or waiting for someone to email you after posting it on Monster or CareerBuilder, you can partner with someone who has an active interest in getting you hired. Because the current employee you link with has a financial interest in getting you hired, she will help you customize your resume and put it in front of as many people as appropriate. Don't think referral bonuses are a big deal? A search on Google for "referral bonus" returns over 900,000 hits. Some of these are unrelated, so let's narrow it to "'referral bonus' hire". Google returns over 100,000 hits. Even the Army offers one. Once you create an account and post your resume you can choose to either seek out potential matches or wait for them to come to you. Just like current employees, all your contact info is kept confidential until you choose to release it to a current employee.

My Friends: [see short answer above]. Also, why you never see me anymore.

Various Management Types not Interested in Receiving the Bonus but Who Want Good People Working for Them: Referral Union is a way for you and your company to make on-boarding more efficient and effective. Referral bonuses have long been a way for companies to bypass traditional methods of hiring new candidates, and their merits are well-known and documented (otherwise you wouldn't offer them). By flattening the professional market, we encourage the maximization of information sharing. This, combined with sophisticated filtering systems--both human and otherwise--increases and optimizes your candidate pool.

My Mom: I'm sorry I don't call enough, and I promise I'll send back your house keys as soon as possible...

Value Added

While mulling over the conception of a Launch Party sometime over the next couple months, I came up with an idea of how to add value to both our applicants and current employees.

In order to extend the Referral Union community beyond the internets, I'm going to explore the idea of regular (perhaps monthly) happy hours that both applicants and current employees can attend. This would include drink specials, free appetizers, etc, and give both parties an opportunity to interact in a real-world environment. This would also help ensure applicants are good fits for the companies to which they're applying.

From a marketing standpoint, I might encourage members to bring a guest or two and include a free drink (or two) for each guest that registers. It's also a good way to get the word out about the site and encourage some 'buzz.'

The social and professional scenes in the Washington, DC area (where we're based) are very happy-hour-centric, and this sort of event is right up the young professional's alley.

Pre-registration going well

The pre-registrants continue to come in, and I'm happy to say employees of some top firms have signed up.

Here's a sampling:

Feedback from Last Night's Email

Apparently there is some maximum number of recipients allowed by Outlook, so it took about 45 minutes to get the email out to everyone last night. Ten people at a time is no way to email a large group.

The response, though, was encouraging. A couple people signed up right away and more streamed in through the evening and into the morning. Also, a few people signed up who were not on the original distro list, which means the email is getting passed around to some degree. I'm glad people are taking advantage of the chance at a free six-month subscription for pre-registering.

Further encouragement came in the email responses I received from friends and other well-wishers. A couple excerpts to toot my own horn a bit and show how encouraging friends can be:

"Very impressive! I like the concept and the presentation, I think you've got a great thing here."
"You know, this is actually a good idea...."
"Wyatt... pretty cool idea man! Good luck!"

Less encouraging were the Out of Office and Mailer-Daemon emails indicating I've lost touch with some people.

One interesting point I noticed among those who signed up for more information: everyone who ticked the box as a current employee also ticked the box as a potential applicant.... It looks like everyone is always looking for new opportunities.

Payment Methods: Visa, MC, Google Checkout?

Looking into various methods of payment available to the site's users, I've begun to develop an appreciation for stores, bars, etc who have a minimum purchase requirement for credit cards. Per-transaction fees are rather high: about 3% (depending on the company's status: e-commerce results in a higher fee) of the total sale plus a mandatory $.23 or so. This doesn't work out too well for a gas station selling a candy bar for $.65.

Preferring cash to credit is against every major credit card's terms of service, of course, which makes minimum purchases a no no, but I can see the logic behind it.

This is one reason Google Checkout is an attractive option. They're offering no service charges through the end of 2007, and it's much simpler to set up than major credit cards. Of course, having the Visa/Mastercard/Amex option adds some legitimacy and flexibility, so I will likely use both options.

If you've never set up a Visa/MC/Amex account it requires a bit of work. You need to go to the www.visa.com (or whichever), where you apply for an account. At this point, you are given a lengthy list of merchants through which you can set up accounts. Within less than 15 minutes of registering, I received four emails and two phone calls from said merchants, which is either nice or annoying.

From there, you have to just pick one, from what I can tell. There are several sites out there to help you, but every merchant seems sort of the same once you select the lowest rates, etc. I suppose I'll go with one of the merchants who will give me QuickBooks (retailing for about $200) for free, which is apparently rather common.

Pre-registration Email Going out Today

I finally figured out how to use Outlook to manage the various email accounts associated with the site, and I composed my pre-registration email. I tried to send it out at work, but my company's firewall blocks my outgoing emails (incoming messages are fine, apparently), so I will have to do it when I get home.

For some background:

I have decided to prime the pump somewhat before the site comes online. While it will be about six weeks before it's good to go, I want to populate the database with quality postings before that. This way, the database isn't empty when people show up. No one wants to be the first person to arrive at a party. I selected various people from among my professional and personal network who are good candidates as either applicants or current employees, or know people who might be (if you get the email and know people who could use the site, pass it along!).

The email gives a good overview of what the site does and what's coming in the future. I also introduced my "Six months free" promotion. I will be giving away free subscriptions to a number of pre-registrants. This way, they will have sufficient time to find applicants to refer before they have to pay. It's sort of a two-pronged strategy. First, it incentivizes early registration, which helps me, and second, the more quickly the site matches up applicants and current employees, the sooner it will be able to publish testimonials. Pre-registrants who are not selected for six free months will get two free months instead. Applicants are free, of course.