It started as an idea to setup a jobsite that will enable users to send applications and receive notifications for interview through SMS.
Set up by The Now Group composed of five partners – Jeffrey Simon Lo, Henrich Lee-Yu, Kent Allan Jay Ando, Rodel Maranon and John Kim – the website, iTrabaho.com, was launched in August last year.
According to Lo, it was Lee-Yu who led the development of the web page with guidance from Kim who provided the financial investment to get their first project started.
Unlike a typical business where you see physical investments, the group had Kim’s apartment as their office.
“This business requires only skills and hard work since most of us have our day jobs,” said Lo, who referred to him and his partners who work for software and information technology firms during the day.
Kim said he started with an investment of P1 million for the project.
Kim, a Korean American, said he first came to Cebu after a family friend told him about the prospects of setting up a business similar to those done successfully in Silicon Valley.
Kim first met Marano a couple of years ago and eventually met the rest of the partners over a year ago.
The group already achieved an ROI (return of investment) in their first project – iTrabaho
iTrabaho was their first project which is already a success having achieved ROI or return on investment after six months since it was launched.
Average unique visits daily is12,000 and 36,000 monthly according to Kim.
The website now also partners with major companies for job postings and the SMS services.
“What makes us unique is the SMS service which makes it easier for the users to send their resumes and also get notifications for available jobs,” said Kim.
But achieving the success they experience today wasn’t easy, said Kim.
He said the group also faced and went through the challenges of every startup – promoting the web page.
Lo, who is working for a software company in Cebu IT Park, said that after finishing his day job he would go straight to work on their startup business.
“It’s only natural especially that when we started there were already similar websites. The challenge was to promote it and get traffic to our site,” said Kim.
So they did a lot of offline marketing like joining job fairs in Ayala and SM and giving out prizes to those who would register online.
Kim said the SMS aspect was what sold their service to the people.
“Both the employer and the job hunters love the service. Until now, we are still the first and only job site that offers that,” said Kim.
According to the group, they will soon be expanding their services in Manila.
“We will be launching next month joining the Call Center Association of the Philippines conference and meet with the members. We will be giving them trial offers,” said Kim.
With the success of iTrabaho, the team has started to embark on another project called Foodpick which is an image driven food search site.
“Foodpick is our newest project which we have already launched and Simon is leading it,” said Kim.
Lo said the traffic had already picked up at the site and they were expecting the project to be a success similiar to iTrabaho.com.