Ray’s web 2.0 business minitests: The Blue Chip Expert Network

Theses minitests are purely about real business potential, not about the technology behind it.

Blue Chips Expert

A couple of weeks ago my mailbox was suddenly overflowing with emails by tens of people who wanted to introduce me to the Blue Chips Expert Initiative. The emails annoyed me a bit but also I got interested and wondered what would be behind it so I checked it for you.

Surfing the portal you’ll notice that it’s a portal for jobseekers and recruiters. So I made a few phonecalls to know a bit more about this initiative. It seems that this initiative is ‘in partnership’ with Heidrick & Struggles, Korn & Ferry International, Spencer Stuart & Boyden Executive Search and is legitimate.
The idea is as follows: if you use this hyperlink you get to a login page where you can put down your personal information and resume. There are 3 roles from which you can choose: recruiter, networker or candidate. The portal thus brings together candidates and recruiters and if that works, you get a commission.

So how high is that commission? To make a difficult calculation simpler, it’s about 2% of the annual gross salary of the newly recruited employee. I have uploaded a document to my own Open Networkers Group (Yahoo Groups) to explain the fee system more closely.

Kevin Kramer, one of the people who are leading this, informed me that first they wanted to make some adjustments in order to further the quality of electronic matchmaking. Once that is in place, they want to add some services in order to manage the recruitment process. Having been a recruiter myself I wonder how they will be able to manage and secure their fees, because once a candidate is found what will keep you contacting the candidate directly instead of using the portal and thus saving a lot of money in commissions..

Summary

The Blue Chips Expert Initiative is a promising web 2.0 network initiative where you can make direct money out of your introduced contacts. The Business model seems to be ok, the partners are renowned, but not everything is in place yet. I am looking forward to their next steps to see if they are able to secure their income. Will they be able to bind customers and candidates and will they be able to introduce compelling services?