Japan Dev · B2B · Japan developer job board
Post jobs free and write each company's English profile and job ads
Enough to land the first few companies
Workedoutbound-salescustomer-support
What they did
Pitch to Japanese companies: jobs posted free, plus Eric (native English speaker) writes their English company profile page and job descriptions, and shares them on his social media, so 'even if I'm lying, you've lost nothing'. Started with in-person office visits; switched to Zoom calls during COVID, which was more efficient.
What happened
Enough to land the first few companies
This shipped together with other changes, so the result can't be credited to this alone.
In their words
Pete Codes · $60k/m from a job boardRelated topics
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New tactics from the week's founder interviews, each linked to where it was said.
More from this episode
- Japan Dev: List jobs free and charge a fee only when someone gets hiredSales converted pretty well; business at ~$60K/month
- Japan Dev: Give job seekers a ¥3,000 gift card for reporting their hireCatches unreported hires at a 'pretty good hit rate'
- Japan Dev: Collect applicants' name and email before sending them to the company's job page
- Japan Dev: Add a growing monthly fee to the contract for hires companies don't reportFounder believes cheating is rare; no numbers
- Japan Dev: Sign your own employer first, then use its name to sign othersNext two companies came relatively easily
- Japan Dev: Grow the job-seeker side with SEO and an email newsletterSlow: ~12 months to first revenue; traffic grew steadily over years
- Japan Dev: List only ~100 good companies and turn down most who ask to joinFounder credits curation for making the model work; no numbers
- Japan Dev: Pivot to a job board after visitors kept looking for an apply buttonLed to the first paying clients
- Japan Dev: Have companies report hires within ~5 days; refund only part in month one