I built & shipped a startup in 3 mins
My idea is to give a home for creators to find jobs without swarming into the pool of various job postings out there. So, I began coding a full-stack web app but wait, there is another way I can do it in just 3 mins.
Here it is: https://twitter.com/jobs4creators
Yes, a Twitter profile. Twitter got everything a job board needs. It gives a domain, hosting, messaging service, instant update, etc. So why bother building an app?
It's simple for creators to access job openings too. I just went with it. The kind of jobs postings I expect here are content creators, copywriters, marketers, video makers, designers, etc.
And I highly expect your feedback on this. Feel free to roast :P
When I started my job board (flutterjobs.info), I got people to DM me job postings and I used a super basic Hugo template for the website. I used to copy job postings to a Google Doc, export it, then I had a short script I ran locally to regenerate the website, which I hosted on Firebase. I also tweeted the job (manually). That set up took about 1 hour to create + I spent about £15 for domain. It was super simple but allowed me to change my tech stack + automate my systems using same location (ie my domain name) as the job board grew. I don't know much about Twitter tools in terms of automating flows, but it seems to me you may feel restricted when it grows and you want to scale up (or use extra ways to get traffic such as your job listings being picked up by Google Jobs).
hello Natalie how can i contact you
I want the businesses to dm me their job postings and I'll tweet them, so that creators can easily find jobs. Managing dm on the scale is tough, but that's the problem of the future. I want to keep things as much as possible. That's why I went with a Twitter profile.
What do you mean by Twitter tools? the only tool I got is this Twitter profile.
I was referring to third party Twitter tools to help you manage DMs at scale. You will need to read the submitted listings and decide whether to tweet them, but with DMs, rather than a form in a website, I expect you may get a lot of spam. Also, without a form, you will get job incomplete job postings, where business forgot to write job location, or how to apply, so you'll need to reply to them to ask them. When posting a job, you will want to add hash tags was well, relevant to job postings. I was wondering if there are some third party Twitter tools to help with that kind of stuff basically. If I were you, I would investigate that now.
Having a form is a great idea. Thank you for that. I'll look at that when I am scaling. For now, I think I don't need to worry about spam.
Being overwhelmed by DM's is a problem you want to have. 😃
haha, exactly. 😜
I liked this idea so much that I copied it. I'm still coming up with a platform solution for blurt, but you've inspired me to get uncomfortable (for what I'm used to) and go live within a minute without having a shiny web app, but twitter at hand. Keep up the good work!
You made my day. It is a great thing to hear that people copy our idea. There is no validation other than this to prove that my brain is not useless. 😜
You solved the tech part (in 3 minutes, nice!). But now you still need to solve the cold start problem. Nobody will post their job openings where there are no applicants. And no applicants will join because there are no jobs posted.
You could solve the job part by already sharing jobs from other sources. Then it already becomes useful for applicants.
By the way, you should definitely read "The cold start problem" by Andrew Chen, which talks about marketplace startups.
Thank you so much.
You are right, @deWiTTERS. It's like a chicken and egg story! lol
I will read that book - thanks for the title!
I sincerely loved the humor. As in, you really got me on the headline and didn't disappoint on the message body. Kudos and I wish you good luck in this. I have also followed you on twitter with @Hakiza256
Thank you Hakiza. And I hope this benefits more creators as well. That's my goal.
You could have people Tweet you the kind of job they'd like and then you go and find those jobs on the internet for them. DM them back with a list and links. This way you don't need to find jobs before you have people interested in them. You just need to connect with creators seeking employment. I think putting Santa in the name would be interesting, just like how you send Santa a Christmas a wish list for toys.
How to initiate such a thing?. And relying on creators to tweet me is viable? because I think that is too much work?
What about curating job vacancies from other sites and posting on this Twitter profile, so that creators can easily find the jobs they like?
This is a cool idea and near-zero upfront costs :), do you have plans to migrate over to a dedicated website in the future once this idea is validated? What is your plan for driving traffic to the Twitter profile now?
I'll think about migrating if it became difficult to handle the traffic, or if creators can't find available positions in a clutter-free way. But I think I don't need to worry about it now.
For now, I obsess over making it viral. Because the best way to have traffic for this stuff is going viral and hitting more eyeballs asap. Without traffic/revenue everything will eventually die off.
My current goal is to find at least one job posting and drive more creator traffic to the profile.
It will take a while for companies to contact you for jobs. When I started my job board, I found jobs online (using Google basically) and reposted them on my website + tweeted them using hashtags. That brought me traffic to my Twitter profile, I got about 500 followers in about 2 months. Once I reached that,I got free listings from businesses, and now, about 3 quarters of businesses use the paid service (faster listing approval and it starts on website for longer).
Great idea, thank you for this. I also thought about the same thing to repost vacancies from other sites. Let's see.
As far as MVPs go, congrats! You've nailed it 👍Best MVP is one you can build in 3 mins.
I'd focus on the core problem here - there are a gazillion job boards out there. What sets yours apart?
If I'm a company and I come to you with a recruitment success fee, what will you offer? That's how I'd think about it.
If I'm someone looking for work, how will you help me find a job?
Hope it helps!
Looking forward to seeing how this develops
Thank you. Keep supporting.
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That's a fair question. That's why I believe in the power of virality. That's what I am trying to achieve with this. Get as many eyeballs as possible before my startup dies.
No eyeball means not worth maintaining.
If you want virality, you will have to figure out why twitter users would like or retweet your tweets.
I see the benefit in following a job postings twitter account, but I don't see the benefit in retweeting those jobs. Especially not the one I want to apply for.
I am not looking for RTs.
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Maybe you are right. What about building an audience of creators first?
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If it is you, how would you add value for a job board?
Btw, what's there to take from an audience? I don't care about having an audience.
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Agreed. I have this plan of finding creator job vacancies from other sites and organizing them in my profile so that any creator who wants to start a corp career and find all the relevant vacancies in one place.
Of course, they can see the job postings on those sites themselves, but that's the problem I am trying to address. I want to build a job board that contains exclusively creator jobs.
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I am glad you asked, tbh I don't care about all this legal stuff. It's not something that I should worry about now.
I am adding this Levels Pieter's post for reference: https://levels.io/12-startups-12-months/
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What starts as a Twitter account can become more.
Once this becomes popular, the rest will fall into place and you can build up the company from there.
Yeah, thanks for the word man.
Agreed.