The letter

It’s the kind of letter you don’t want to send or receive:

“First, on behalf of the entire Simply Hired team I would like to thank you for your partnership. We have appreciated working with you and your clients.  I am writing you to let you know that the Company is in the process of ceasing operations and winding down and, as a result, the Job Sponsorship Program will be discontinued 30-days from this notice, or on June 26th, 2016. We greatly appreciate the partnership we’ve had with your company and regret that we will not be able to continue working with you. We would be happy to set up a call at your earliest convenience to discuss your options.“

In case you haven’t figured it out, the letter said that SimplyHired is going to the great aggregator graveyard. As Todd Raphael said in ERE.net, “Pieces of the company/technology will be acquired…Employees are apparently facing an uncertain future and aren’t included in the parts being taken over.” Yes, after tens of millions of investment dollars and a fairly recent management upheaval, SimplyHired is throwing in the towel.

Why? Well, I have no inside knowledge (although judging from the massive amount of email I received this weekend, folks think I do!). But I am willing to bet these were all factors:

• Since its inception, SimplyHired has always played second fiddle to Indeed. For a while, it offered more features and functions than its larger competitor – but that advantage has faded in recent years. So I suspect clients looked at the two – and chose Indeed for its significantly larger traffic numbers.
• A management overhaul a few years ago brought a new logo – but little else. Although much of the sales staff was purged, the new salespeople were unable to pull SimplyHired out of 2nd place.
• In the meantime, other competitors have emerged – including Jobs2Careers, Jobrapido, and Beyond. Then there is AppCast, RealMatch, and – well, you get the picture.

It’s always frustrating to see a company that has done good things and delivered for its clients lose its edge. Sometimes they manage to muddle through and make a comeback (Monster, perhaps?) – but more often, the money runs out and the employees find themselves on the other side of the online recruiting machine. And then comes the letter.

I hope you never have to write and send a letter like the one above. To all of the SimplyHired folks out there looking for their next gig – good luck! The positive news for you is that our industry is booming – even if SimplyHired isn’t.

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