Welcome to the Jungle isn’t yet another recruitment company that is going to automagically find the perfect engineer for your startup. It’s a media company that wants to make recruitment sexy again. The company just raised $2.1 million from various business angels (€2 million) and is about to launch different verticals for different competitive industries.
Welcome to the Jungle has been slowly but surely referencing hundreds of startups in Paris. This way, you can learn more about what they’re doing, what it’s like to work for them and if they’re looking for employees right now.
But it’s not just another job board. If you’ve been browsing job boards, you know that it feels more like opening an Excel spreadsheet than looking at actual companies. Welcome to the Jungle has been shooting videos and photos as well as writing articles to turn dry startup profiles into pretty profile pages packed with information.
The website is a must of course, but the company is also releasing thick quarterly magazines for business and engineering schools. I’ve been browsing past issues and they look great. Those magazines are free and help build the company’s brand.
Every year, there’s also a yearly coffee table book. This one is available in most bookshops and costs around $15. A friend of mine was looking for a job, so I told him to have a look at the guide. I can’t find my copy anymore, so he must have liked it.
As for tech companies, they’ll all tell you that hiring is a key issue. Most tech companies get a ton of applications, but it’s hard to find the right profile among all those applications. While the talent crunch in Paris is nowhere near as worrying as in the Bay Area, tech companies are always looking for new ways to attract talent.
Starting today, Welcome to the Jungle is rebranding to Jukebox Group and launching new verticals. There will be three sites and media brands operated by Jukebox Group. Two of them are already live (Welcome to the Jungle and Show Must Go On for fashion and luxury companies). Born to Be Wild is about to launch and should focus on finance companies. So it’s not going to be just about tech companies — it’s going to be about recruiting talent in general.
It’s hard to spend time working on your branding and recruitment effort when you’re just starting. So Jukebox make companies look good. And applicants will know more about your company so you should start receiving better applications.
The company wants to take that a step further and handle all the job pages on startup websites. The next time you go on amazinstartup.com/jobs, it could be a Jukebox-managed page. This software-as-a-service approach could create a good revenue stream in addition to the media activities.
Launching a niche media company today seems like a crazy idea. But if Jukebox can combine sponsorships, branded content and a recruitment solution, it could end up working just fine.