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Print Edition StoriesFriday, January 30, 2009
Startups use social networking to link job seekers with work
By Brendan Lynch
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With layoffs dominating headlines day after day, two startups — Assured Labor.com Inc. and Labortopia LLC — want to harness the interactivity of social media and the mobile web to help people find work.
Assured Labor started last year as an entrant in the MIT $100K Business Plan Competition. At the time, it had its sights on bringing transparency to day-labor and low-wage job markets in India, China, Brazil and Africa. Since then, the United States has fallen into recession and Assured Labor has launched in Boston.
That decision had more to do with the company’s confidence in its product rather than a sudden opportunity created by a collapsing U.S. economy, said founder David Reich. He said he hopes the economy recovers as quickly as possible, but in the meantime, the recession has led to more people looking for jobs. That helps Assured Labor grow its membership.
“We’re definitely countercyclical,” Reich said.
The service allows “urban professionals” — college students and stay-at-home parents who provide services such as computer repair, dog-walking, or tutoring — to advertise their availability. A user can send a text message to a service provider’s mobile phone, and the service provider can instantly accept or reject the offer. After a job is complete, the two parties can rate each other and recommend each other to friends on the Assured Labor network.
The beta test of the service is free for both sides of the market until the site builds up a critical mass of users, at which point Assured Labor will begin charging providers. So far, Boston and Cambridge are the highest traffic areas for the site, Reich said.
The Beacon Hill-based startup, which has five full-time employees, is bootstrapped so far, but is looking for an angel investment round of under $1 million, Reich said. The company still plans to roll out its service in developing nations, though nothing is imminent.
“That part has not disappeared,” Reich said.
A similar startup, East Boston-based Labortopia, launched last week. Labortopia wants to make it easier for small-business owners and freelancers to promote their services online — a simpler, more focused alternative to websites like Craigslist, Angie’s List and Trusty’s, according to CEO Keven Dones.
“We try to make it super, super easy for provider and seeker,” Dones said.
Labortopia is web-based for now, but Dones said his developer is working on an SMS gateway for the service, since a plumber, for example, may not be waiting by a computer all day. Service providers can get messages from e-mail or a message through their Labortopia profile, a bit of social networking functionality similar to a Facebook message.
The bootstrapped, one-man operation doesn’t have a marketing budget, so Dones said he’s using social networking tools such as Twitter and Facebook to attract users.
“I’m doing as much talking as I can to small-business owners,” he said.
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