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2009 Philadelphia Marathon Recap!

Well, where do I even begin…Yesterday was such a fun and rewarding day at the 2009 Philadelphia Marathon! The PhillyJobs.com crew arrived bright and early (well actually, it was still pitch black) to set up our Cheer Zone at 21st and Chestnut.  With over 15 helpers, we quickly began to “take over” our street corner filling both sides of the street with pop-up tents, tons of PhillyJobs.com signage, bright red balloons and of course lots of smiling facing faces.

Dressed in bright red PhillyJobs jackets, we took our positions and eagerly waited for the action to start.  We even had a team mascot for the day – Lucas – a rescued boxer/pit bull mix who was there in full support wearing his PhillyJobs.com t-shirt!

The first runners began to pass through our Cheer Zone about a half hour into the race.  From then on, our goal was to have as much fun as possible cheering on the runners, passing out complimentary orange slices, pretzels and hot chocolate, pumping up the crowd, and singing along to energizing music (sometimes dancing too!)

One of my favorite parts of the day was when Mayor Nutter stopped by to join in the fun!! He spent close to an hour at our Cheer Zone cheering just as loud (or even louder) than most of the spectators out there.  In fact, I’m pretty sure he was even singing along to some of the tunes PhillyJobs.com provided for the day!  Mayor Nutter took the time to high-five many of the runners who passed by and was nice enough to pose for a few pictures holding a PhillyJobs.com sign!

To top it all off, PhillyJobs.com sponsored four people who ran the Philadelphia Marathon: Justin, David, Soon & Tonio.  We couldn’t be more proud of our runners who did an excellent job of representing the company and running a great race!  They also reported back that PhillyJobs.com had the best presence of any Cheer Zone along the course, which is a great way to be remembered by the 18,000 other marathoners!

All in all, the 2009 Philadelphia Marathon was a HUGE success! The Marathon sponsorship provided us with a multitude of branding opportunities, right in the heart of Philadelphia.  We are confident that this event, along with continued advertising and promotions, will help establish PhillyJobs.com as the “go-to” employment site for the Greater Philadelphia area.

Join the PhillyJobs.com Fan Page on Facebook to view all of the pictures from the event!

Capture the True Energy of the Philadelphia Marathon at the PhillyJobs.com Cheer Zone

Are you planning to attend the Philadelphia Marathon on November 22nd? Well if you are, PhillyJobs.com will be sponsoring an interactive and fun-filled Cheer Zone at 21st and Chestnut Streets that you won't want to miss! This area is a premium location for spectators and news reporters to gather together for a complimentary hot chocolate, meet local community members and cheer on this year’s half and full marathon runners.  

“As a local organization, we are proud to rally our team to sponsor such an important event in our community which promotes determination, strength and endurance, all positive qualities that improve overall well-being on and off the course. We are excited to cheer on the runners, have the opportunity to meet local community members and join in the excitement that this event brings to our local community,” said Rich Milgram, CEO of Beyond.com, Inc.

Full event details are below.

What:  To support our local community, PhillyJobs.com will be sponsoring an interactive and fun-filled Cheer Zone during the Philadelphia Marathon 

When:  Sunday, November 22, 7:00AM – 10:00 AM
 
Where:  21st Street and Chestnut Streets Philadelphia, PA

Who:  Enthusiastic PhillyJobs.com employees, spectators and media contacts that would like to join in the fun and cheer on this year’s half and full marathon runners.

Details:  The PhillyJobs.com Cheer Zone is a premier location and perfect vantage point for news reporters to capture the true energy of the crowd, interview members of the community and capture excellent footage. At the Cheer Zone, PhillyJobs.com will be playing Philly-themed songs to energize the crowd, providing complimentary hot chocolate to spectators, passing out oranges to participants and most importantly holding motivational signs while cheering on this year’s runners.

If you are looking for optimum camera angles and the loudest cheering group at the marathon, we encourage you to stop by the PhillyJobs.com Cheer Zone at 21st and Chestnut Streets.  For more information, please contact Tara Berger at TaraB@Beyond.com.

"Mobile is the Glue for Everything We Do"

I recently stumbled across a quote that got me thinking about what a huge impact the mobile movement has made on the world. 

"Mobile is the glue for everything we do," said Oke Okaro, Vice President of ESPN Mobile.

I thought this was a pretty accurate observation.  When you think about it, most people are only in front of their computer for a limited amount of time, but they have access to their mobile device for about 18 hours day.  Not only are people spending more time surfing the internet on-the-go, but mobile devices have opened up a gateway to an entirely new and more diverse audience than ever before. 

With more people demanding quicker access to information on-the-go, it has caused nearly every industry to rethink their strategy to ensure they are not left behind in the mobile trend - and the recruitment industry is no exception!

The closest comparison I can think of to the current mobile movement would be the rise and popularity of the internet.  For example, the newspaper industry chose to ignore the internet trend for many years, even though their business heavily relied on classified ads that the internet also had the ability to provide.  By the time newspapers realized the value in aligning their business strategy to leverage the internet (not compete with it), it was too late. 

Well the same goes for the recruitment industry.  However, instead of classified ads, candidates are the bread and butter of our business.  In order to keep job seekers happy and returning our sites (whether it is through their PC or their mobile device), it is crucial to incorporate mobile technologies into our business to avoid being left behind.

In March of 2009, we optimized the Beyond.com network to provide mobile job searching to business professionals across thousands of top-tier industry and local web sites.  Soon after, we aligned with Viigo to provide job search capabilities and career content to BlackBerry and Windows Mobile devices through Viigo’s popular mobile application.

As we continued to expand our mobile program, we also launched a Beyond.com iPhone application in June 2009, which has continually exceeded our expectations in terms of downloads from the iPhone App store.

                                        

Most recently, Beyond.com launched two new iPhone applications for TechCareers.com and PhillyJobs.com.  With an increased focus on local and industry-specific job searching, these applications offer a more targeted approach to recruitment than many of the other traditional job applications available. 

We also launched a Beyond.com Blackberry application, which is now available through Blackberry App World.  Currently, Beyond.com is the only job search application available on the Blackberry device that allows job seekers to search and view available jobs by keyword, location or industry. 

So it is safe to say that Beyond.com has not only recognized the importance of the mobile movement, but we are working hard to stay ahead of the curve and offer our job seekers as many mobile options as possible.  We plan to continue making updates and exploring new devices and technologies to incorporate into our mobile program and refuse to be left behind!  

PhillyJobs.com Sponsors the Philadelphia Marathon

One of Beyond.com’s premier career sites, PhillyJobs.com, will be sponsoring the Philadelphia Marathon on Sunday, November 22nd.  On race day, PhillyJobs.com will be hosting a Cheer Zone at 21st and Chestnut Street in Philadelphia to support the marathon runners, pump up the crowd and share in the excitement with over 100,000 runners and spectators.

PhillyJobs.com will also be cheering on three team members who are running the marathon: David Brensilber, Justin Aurand, and Soon Yu.  For those of you interested in reading more about what it’s like to run a marathon, David Brensilber will be blogging about his experience.  Below are a few thoughts from David prior to the race:

I am training for the Philadelphia Half-Marathon later this month.  While I was at work, I was discussing how my training was going when one of my co-workers commented that she could not believe how slow I run (in fact, I think the joke was that she could walk the race at my pace!)

Slightly insulted by this jab, I began to think about the real reason why I was participating in the Philadelphia Half Marathon.  It was not to win, but rather to participate.  For those who argue that I am too slow to participate, I wonder how they would feel if a world class marathon runner would say the same thing to them.  While I may not run the race at an 8-minute mile pace, I’m also not trying to compete with top runners such as Joan Benoit Samuelson, who recently completed the New York City Marathon in 2 hours 49 minutes and 9 seconds.  To bring a frame of reference to this time, most casual marathon runners will not even break 4 hours!

The reason why people chose to run in marathons vary according to their goals.  Some want to achieve a personal goal, while others want to raise money for a charity.  For me, I want to participate in this event for the same reason why people climb mountains - because it is there. 

Either way, I’m looking forward to running the marathon and will be blogging more about my experience after race day.  Remember to check back if you’d like to read more! - David Brensilber

Deloitte Recognizes Beyond.com on National and Regional Award Lists

Beyond.com has once again been ranked among Deloitte’s 2009 Greater Philadelphia Fast 50 and Technology Fast 500 award lists for the third consecutive year. 

The 2009 Greater Philadelphia Fast 50 is a ranking of the fastest growing technology, media, telecommunications and life sciences companies in the Greater Philadelphia region based on percentage of revenue growth over the past five years.  Deloitte’s 2009 Technology Fast 500 List recognizes companies from the same industries across the entire nation.  Beyond.com experienced a revenue growth of 306 percent from 2004-2008, which resulted in the notable rankings on both of Deloitte’s prestigious lists.

“It is a compliment to the entire Beyond.com team, and to the customers who support our business, to be included among a group of companies who successfully navigated through the challenging economic times and have been recognized by Deloitte as the fastest growing companies in Philadelphia and across the nation,” says Jim John, COO of Beyond.com, Inc.  “Throughout the past few years, we have remained focused on adding value to professionals searching for jobs and helping employers target quality talent for their business, which has allowed our company to not only remain profitable, but to achieve phenomenal business growth despite the current circumstances.  In looking ahead, we are even more excited about the prospects for 2010.”

In addition to these two recognitions, CEO Rich Milgram has also been chosen as a finalist for the 2009 Technology CEO of the Year by the Eastern Technology Council.  The winner of this award will be announced at a black-tie gala on December 3, 2009.

For additional information on the company and available services, please visit Beyond.com.

Consumer Confidence and Corporate Momentum Will Ultimately Determine Economic Rebound

Beyond.com recently released its Third Quarter 2009 Career Trend Analysis Report, which revealed that Healthcare and Information Technology continue to add jobs at a steady pace, while industries in the professional services sector such as Finance and Engineering are still experiencing sharp declines.  The report provides insight into the overall employment market by leveraging Beyond.com’s Network of top-tier industry, local and specialty sites. 

Healthcare & Medical remained in the top position for online jobs with 43.5 percent after experiencing exponential growth over the previous quarter and over the past 12 months.  Information Technology jumped up to the second spot with 12.86 percent.  Accounting & Finance experienced the largest percentage decline in jobs over the previous quarter (5.14 percent) causing the industry to drop to the third position.  Among other industries that took a hit over the past quarter, Engineering & Architecture experienced a 3.16 percent decline, while the Retail industry dropped by 3.12 percent.

Although it is clear that many industries are still on a rollercoaster ride, there are positive signs that the economy and job market may be stabilizing soon.  The USA Consumer Confidence Index (issued by The Conference Board) rose by 27.77 points over the past seven months to reach 53.07 in September 2009 — still a far stretch from the 30 year average of 95.06.  While consumer confidence continues to rise, the Bureau of Labor Statistics is starting to recognize an improvement in monthly job losses, with September’s job losses (263,000) accounting for just over one-third of the peak losses experienced in January 2009 (741,000).  The increased level of confidence, combined with lower monthly job losses, may motivate some Americans to start spending again, creating more demand for goods and services that will eventually lead to job creation across many key industries, critical for economic recovery.

“Increased consumer confidence and lower monthly job losses are the first step towards improving the economy, revitalizing business revenues and eventually creating new jobs,” said Rich Milgram, CEO of Beyond.com, Inc. “Many businesses have streamlined and held the line on expenses, creating the opportunity for future profits and a shift in focus from downsizing to hiring, which will be the true determination of the economic rebound.”

To view the complete Career Trend Analysis Report and Industry Outlook Reports, please visit http://www.beyond.com/Media/QuarterlyReports.asp.