Newsmaker: After shakeup, Jobster goes to work

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What's been your retention rate among customers?
Goldberg: We've had very high retention rates. Our churn is relatively low. We sign up folks to term contracts, and we've been very successful at renewals. Large companies are consistently renewing with us. For example, we recently said Boeing renewed with Jobster for the third consecutive year, and Nike is in its third consecutive year. There's a number of examples like that.

What percentage of your customer base has renewed for three consecutive years?
Goldberg: Three consecutive years is hard, because, you know, we've only had the tool in the market since March 2005. Our renewal rate from year one to year two is very high. I would say that we have a loss rate of less than 20 percent for folks who don't renew from 2005 to 2006 contracts.

Why did you feel compelled to sign up with Facebook? Aren't you competing against yourself since you both rely on some form of social networking for your technologies?
Goldberg: The business problem that we're trying to solve is to help employers connect with valuable audiences of people, so they can hire them. Jobster is that linkage between the employer and those audiences.

The tools we give employers kind of goes from the employer-out direction. And one of the things that they've asked us to do, and the feedback we've gotten from them, is to bring them unique and valuable audiences. That's what spurred us to create a unique and increasingly valuable audience on Jobster.com and also inspired us to work with Facebook. On Facebook, you can tap into the 18- to 25-year-old demographic, and increasingly (the) 25- to 35-year-old demographic.

How do these different revenue models compare with each other? Which will give you the highest return rate?
Goldberg: Jobster, from a revenue perspective, without revealing the exact numbers, had revenue in the millions in 2005. We grew 400 percent in 2006, and we're on pace to grow by 60 percent over the last year in 2007. We're doing it at a 50 percent of the cost basis from last year, which is part of the business optimization resulting from our restructuring.

You faced some controversy in the way you handled the restructuring and layoff notices. How would describe that?
Goldberg: It's understandable that when you go through something like what we did there are a lot of people on the outside that don't necessarily understand it. They might see a different view of the company than what they thought, and there might even be a little bit of a reaction to it. Ultimately, over time, we think it's the facts that will speak the loudest as the business grows. 

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Call The Bluff

I think it's time someone call's this guys bluff. He has lied to his users, changed his model numerous times and lies time and time again. The latest lie about him being profitable this year is just another in a long list. I think it's time for a change or time to say goodbye to jobster.