One Day, One Job » analyst

Nasty Gal

Willy Franzen — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 17:30:24 +0000

One of the coolest things about the time that we live in is that the barrier to starting a business is essentially nonexistent. You can test your ideas on someone else’s platform, and if it works, then you build your own. Nasty Gal is a perfect example of this. The Los Angeles, CA based company began in 2006 when Sophia Amoruso “started an eBay store selling a highly curated selection of vintage pieces.” After finding success on eBay and validating the business, she started her own site where she could control the entire customer experience (and not pay eBay’s crazy fees). A lot of Nasty Gal’s stuff is pretty far out there–their home page has a huge picture of studded platforms that look like a medieval torture device–but it’s hard to argue with a brand that has nearly a quarter million Facebook likes.

Are You Nasty?

The key to Nasty Gal’s success is curation. Even though they’re in the business of selling and not editorial, they’re seen by many customers as a guide to what to buy. If it’s on Nasty Gal, it has to be cool–and that begs the question: What is a Nasty Gal? She’s “the coolest girl in the room‚ pulling off whatever wildly unique piece that suits the mood.” I’m certainly not a Nasty Gal, but maybe you are. And if you are, you’d be a great fit for a job at Nasty Gal. Right now they have a few opportunities that seem like they could be perfect for a new or recent grad. These include Accounting Clerk, Production Coordinator, Software Engineer, PR Coordinator, and Planning Analyst. Hope you’re nasty enough.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What do you think of Nasty Gal?

Wayfair

Willy Franzen — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 16:03:50 +0000

I’ve made a point of being more active in Cornell’s entrepreneurship community, so I like to think that I do a good job of keeping tabs on which other companies have been started by fellow alums. That’s why I was shocked to learn that the #2 online retailer of home furnishings and housewares was not only a company that I’d never heard of before, but a company founded by two Cornell grads. It’s called Wayfair–they’re based in Boston, MA and did $500 million in sales last year. The reason I hadn’t heard of them is that they were known as CSN Stores until last year (they were founded in 2002). CSN Stores was focused on building out 200+ product specific properties with generic domain names like Bedroomfurniture.com, Cookware.com, AirHockeyTables.com, and AllBarstools.com. Last year they decided to get serious about branding and started pulling all of their sites into the Wayfair brand.

Find Your Way

If you’d like to read a more in-depth version of the Wayfair story, check out this write up from GigaOm. It provides a lot of interesting details, but I actually think the Wayfair site is even better. Their About page is beautifully designed and packed with information, and the same can be said for the company’s Careers page. It’s also nice that they have a Campus Recruiting section that includes this video (you may need to click through to view it):

The campus recruiting page also includes four positions targeted towards 2012 grads: Business Analyst, Business Intelligence Analyst, Category Management Associate, and Software Engineer. Additionally, they have a ton of job postings for immediate hire:

Category Analyst / Entry Level Buyer (Sydney, Australia)
Jr. Designer/Web Production Artist
Customer Service Consultant (Sydney, Australia)
Bilingual Sales & Service Consultant (Galway, Ireland)
Customer Service Consultant (Ogden, UT)
Email Sales and Service Consultant (Ogden, UT)
Inbound Sales Consultant (Ogden, UT)
Sales Consultant (Ogden, UT)
Junior Web Operations Engineer
Software Engineer
Analyst, Email Marketing – Private Sale

There are a ton of great opportunities at Wayfair, which was named one of Glassdoor’s 2012 Best Places to Work, so browse through the postings and see if any of them are appropriate for you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you purchased anything from Wayfair?

Internet Brands

Willy Franzen — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:07:03 +0000

In case you missed our e-mail from last week, Kembrel loved the response from our post about them so they’re offering a free VIP card (usually 20 bucks) to all ODOJ readers and $5 in store credit. Sign up here.

On Monday we took a look at Vertive, a company that builds internet properties to help people save money. Today we’re going to look at a company with a similar model of building and buying websites, but a much broader approach. Internet Brands is based in El Segundo, CA and started as CarsDirect.com in 1998. It was a successful brand for them, but in 2005 they realized that the platform they had built could be applied to other verticals. Now Internet Brands operates more than 100 websites that reach over a billion visitors every year. Amazingly, they’ve been able to generate almost all of this traffic organically (without buying advertising). This is all because of the platform that they’ve developed and the ability to share resources across brands. Internet Brands is a case study of how economies of scale can work on the web.

Get Branded

The best way to get a better feel for Internet Brands is to explore their… brands. There are a lot of them, but they typically fit into one of nine verticals: Automotive, Careers, Health, Home, Legal, Licensing, Money, Shopping, and Travel. Chances are that most of the brands will be new to you, but I found a few that I was familiar with. Unlike Vertive, Internet Brands doesn’t shed much light on how they operate. Even the Internet Brands Careers page is filled with mostly generic stuff like “Do you have energy, drive and ambition?” and “Do you have a strong sense of where you are going and how to get there?” Would any job seeker answer no to those rhetorical questions? At least Internet Brands makes up for it with a ton of job postings. Here are the ones that look well suited for an entry level job seeker:

That’s a lot of jobs. Hopefully a few of them will catch your interest.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Internet Brands?

Vertive

Willy Franzen — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:54:07 +0000

Having written profiles on more than 1,500 companies, I start to see the same stories over and over again. Some business models are just better than others, and those are the ones that seem to keep popping up. One of the most effective models these days is based on providing a free online resource to help save people money and using affiliate programs to monetize the traffic. Sites like Slickdeals, Fatwallet, Savings.com, ShopAtHome.com, CouponCabin, and WhaleShark Media have all taken that approach and succeeded. Vertive is another. They’re based in Austin, TX, and they were founded “to provide search engine marketing consulting and affiliate marketing services.” They eventually started building their own web properties, and that turned out to be way more profitable than consulting. Vertive’s biggest property is Offers.com, but other properties include DailyDeals.com, CouponCodes.com, and Subscription.com.

Get an Offer from Vertive

Because their properties are separate brands, the Vertive.com website is solely dedicated to providing information about the company. Luckily, the information is by no means generic. Vertive actually offers a pretty good look at how their business works. The section title How We Do It is especially good at describing Vertives’ approach to performance marketing. They also provide some good information on what it’s like to work at Vertive. If you like what you see, then you’ll want to check out Vertive’s Jobs page. Right now they have a good number of opportunities that are suitable for new or recent grads including:

Even if Vertive isn’t a good fit for you, it’s worth spending the time to learn about their business. The performance marketing model is… performing extremely well lately. It’s time that you understand how it works.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Vertive?

HealthCorps

Willy Franzen — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 16:33:44 +0000

If you’ve been job searching for a while, there’s a good chance that you’ve picked up a daytime tv habit. That’s not the most productive thing to do with your time, but at least you know who Dr. Oz is. If you don’t know, he’s a heart surgeon who was made famous by his appearances on The Oprah Winfrey Show. He now has his own show, but he also started a non-profit with his wife called HealthCorps. It’s based in New York, NY, and it’s aimed at “fighting the obesity and mental resilience crisis by getting American students and communities across the country to take charge of their health.” The organization was founded in 2003 and already has its peer mentoring programs in 54 high schools across 13 states. By the end of the year they expect to impact more than 100,000 students, and by 2015 they want to be in 100 high schools across all 50 states.

Join the Corps

The way HealthCorps structures their programs makes so much sense that I’m surprised more non-profits don’t have a similar structure. The base of their programs is focused on in-school programs targeted directly at changing student behavior. The next level is community outreach programs focused on getting more people involved beyond just the students. Finally, they do advocacy work at the national, state, and city levels. To get a deeper feeling for how HealthCorps does its work, watch this video (e-mail readers may need to click through):

If you like what you see, then you should probably check out HealthCorps’ jobs on Idealist. There are a ton of internships posted, but the only full-time job is for a Junior Accounting Analyst. Oddly enough, one of HealthCorps’ main ways of doing work is through their Coordinator position. It’s essentially a mentor for healthy living. You have to know to look for it, but there’s also a place to apply to be a HealthCorps Coordinator. I almost missed it, so they should probably do a better job of promoting it.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What do you think of HealthCorps?

Underground Elephant

Willy Franzen — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 17:42:53 +0000

Nearly 500,000 teaching jobs will be added in the next decade. If you’re considering a career in education, take a look at our guide to entry level teaching jobs.

Company names usually take one of two directions. They either explain exactly what the company does (i.e. Accuweather), or they tell you absolutely nothing about what the company does (i.e. Benzinga). There’s a third type that sounds totally random but actually has a significant meaning, and those tend to be my favorite. Underground Elephant is one of those names. The company is based in San Diego, CA, and they offer “a complete turnkey solution” for customer acquisition in “a wide range of vertical markets.” How is this relevant to their name? Underground Elephant plays a huge role in their clients’ businesses, yet their participation is essentially invisible to everyone but insiders.

The Elephant in the Room

If you’re not familiar with the performance marketing industry, you probably have no idea what I’m talking about. How can a company that delivers tons of customers to their clients do so without being noticed? Watch this video on Underground Elephant to get a better idea of how their business works.

While what Underground Elephant does a good job of keeping a low profile when working for clients, they haven’t been able to do the same in the San Diego media. Their CEO was named a Most Admired CEO Finalist for the third consecutive year by San Diego Business Journal, and they’re also one of San Diego’s fastest growing private companies. I guess an elephant can only hide underground so long. Now that you’ve found them, you need to take a look at their Careers page. Right now they have some great openings for new or recent grads including:

There are a ton of great entry level or near entry level job opportunities at Underground Elephant, so don’t look past them. Not only does Underground Elephant look like a really cool company to work for, but they’re based in San Diego.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard bout Underground Elephant?

RaceTrac

Willy Franzen — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 17:58:16 +0000

I don’t know about you, but I love the smell of gasoline–at least in limited doses. Oddly enough, I absolutely hate the smell of coffee, so I’m not sure how I’d do if I had to work at a RaceTrac. They’re an Atlanta, GA based chain of more than 525 gas stations and convenience stores that stretch across twelve southeastern states. The odd thing about them is that their home page puts more emphasis on their coffee than on the gas. I guess gas is pretty much the same at every gas station, but good coffee will actually bring people through the doors. Besides the coffee RaceTrac differentiates itself with its size–their stores are typically over 5,000 square feet with more than 4,000 items and 20-24 pumps. If I owned a chain of gas stations, I’d probably use clean bathrooms as a point of differentiation. I think it would be a goldmine, but RaceTrac’s $8 billion in annual revenue makes them the third largest private company in Atlanta, so maybe coffee is the right choice.

Start Your Engine

As I mentioned before, RaceTrac’s home page doesn’t make it very clear that they’re a gas station, but there is a huge emphasis on different forms of transportation. They’re obviously trying to sell themselves as a part of an on the go lifestyle. This makes a lot of sense considering that it’s often the convenience items that drive the profits for retail gas stations. I’m sure there’s a lot of interesting stuff going on behind the scenes at RaceTrac, which is why you should check out their Careers page. They have page for Associate and Manager positions, but my guess is that you’ll be most interested in the positions at their Store Support Centers (Corporate). Right now they have some great opportunities for new or recent grads including:

Real Estate Analyst (Atlanta, GA)
Fuel Pricing Coordinator (Atlanta, GA)
Engineering Coordinator (Atlanta, GA)
Recruitment and Engagement Specialist (Atlanta, GA)
Recruitment and Engagement Specialist (Baton Rouge, LA)
HR Business Analyst (Atlanta, GA)
Software Developer (Atlanta, GA)

There are some really interesting look positions at RaceTrac, so check them out and see if any of them make sense for you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you ever stopped at a RaceTrac?

360i

Willy Franzen — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 18:11:38 +0000

I can’t tell you how many bad careers sites I’ve seen over the past 4+ years. Companies with beautiful, easy to use websites often have jobs pages that make you want to poke your eyes out. Even the simple ones that just have a few paragraphs about the company and a listing of jobs are disappointing. Why can’t companies actually put some effort into convincing you to work for them? 360i certainly puts in the effort. I recently landed on their newly relaunched careers page via a link from Twitter, and I was thoroughly impressed. 360i is a digital marketing agency, and it’s pretty clear that they’ve actually put some of their in-house talent to work on the 360i Careers page. It tells a story; it provides a great user experience; it introduces you to the company before throwing job postings at you; and it actually makes you want to work at 360i (they have offices in New York, NY; Atlanta, GA; Detroit, MI; San Francisco, CA; and Chicago, IL).. This should be expected, but instead it’s the exception.

Do a 360

I usually say that the most important thing that you can look at in terms of a digital marketing agency is their client list and portfolio, but there’s actually one thing that’s more important. It’s the company’s website. If they’re not doing what they do for clients for themselves, then there’s something wrong. 360i does great work for themselves, and they also serve Bravo, Coca-Cola, J. Crew, Mattel, Oreo, Ugg and a bunch of other huge brands. 360i has done some really great work for themselves and for their clients, which is probably why they’ve been named one of Advertising Age’s “Best Places to Work and one of Fast Company’s “World’s Most Innovative Companies.” If 360i sounds like the kind of place that you’d like to work, check out their Careers page first, and then dive into their job postings. Current openings include:

Ad Operations Digital Coordinator (New York, NY)
Community Manager (New York, NY)
Digital Media Planner Coordinator – SEM (Chicago, IL)
Marketing Designer (New York, NY)
Software Developer – UI and Back End (New York, NY)

If none of those positions seem like a good fit, take note that 360i categorizes their talent into: Insiders, Thinkers, Sharpshooters, Socializers, Makers, and Advisors. If you think you fit in one of those roles, don’t be afraid to submit a résumé for an unlisted position.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard bout 360i?

The Nature Conservancy

Willy Franzen — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 14:50:09 +0000

Last night I started watching Planet Earth and ended up staying awake later than I intended. This morning the same channel was on, and I ended up watching documentaries on Yellowstone. There aren’t many things that I find more fascinating than nature, so it’s easy for me to get caught up in these kinds of shows. It’s also why I think the work of The Nature Conservancy is so important. They’re an international non-profit organization based in Arlington, VA that is “the leading conservation organization working around the world to protect ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people.” The Nature Conservancy was founded in 1951, and since then they have grown their membership to more than 1 million people. The organization’s huge size gives it a ton of power and has enabled it to do some really amazing work.

Nature Over Nurture

Everything that The Nature Conservancy does is rooted in science. They gather facts first, and then they take action on a local and a global scale. That’s why they’ve been able to protect “more than 119 million acres of land and 5,000 miles of rivers worldwide.” What strikes me most about The Nature Conservancy is that they take a “non-confrontational, pragmatic” approach that sets them apart from some other conservation organizations. This may occasionally limit their short-term effectiveness, but it ensures that in the long run The Nature Conservancy will have the respect and legitimacy to continue protecting ecologically important lands and waters. If you want to dig deeper into this topic, you should really check out The Nature Conservancy’s Why We’re An Effective Nonprofit page. There’s a ton more to check out on The Nature Conservancy’s website (like How They Work and Where They Work), but I’ll leave the rest of the research to you. If you like what the organization is all about, check out their Careers page. They have some great opportunities for new or recent grads including (sorry I can’t link to the postings, but it’s a bad applicant tracking system):

Burn Crew Technician (Glyndon, MN or Karlstad, MN or Center, ND or Clear Lake, SD)
Philanthropy Coordinator (San Francisco, CA)
Preserve Management Assistant – Prairie Forest Border Ecoregion (Cushing, MN)
Seasonal Field Representative (Keene Valley, NY)
Human Resources Coordinator (Austin, TX)
Stewardship Field Assistant (Brunswick, ME)
Prairie Recovery Specialist (Watson, MN)
Conservation Coordinator (Anchorage, AK)
Preserve Management / Bison Research Technician (Leola, SD)
Grassland Bird Technician (Minor, ND)
Digital Marketing Programmer Analyst (Arlington, VA)
Stewardship Assistant (Choteau, MT)
Communications Coordinator (Oklahoma City, OK)
Assistant Land Steward (Letts, IA)

If you love nature and want to work at a non-profit, it would be hard to beat a gig with The Nature Conservancy. So take a look at these positions, and see if any are a good fit.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What do you know about The Nature Conservancy?

Bluefin Labs

Willy Franzen — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 17:58:16 +0000

When I first learned about Google Trends, I was shocked to see how much Internet search traffic is driven by television. It’s pretty clear that browsing the web and watching the tube go hand in hand, which is great news for both marketers and tv content producers. Since its inception tv’s biggest problem has been that it is a one way medium with no real feedback loop. That’s changed, and Bluefin Labs “has accomplished a breakthrough in this field by applying cognitive science research combined with large scale computing techniques to successfully and automatically link TV to social media.” If all goes as planned, the Cambridge, MA will make traditional tv ratings obsolete. Who cares how many people are watching when you can know who’s watching and what they’re saying?

Hook a Bluefin

While there’s no doubt about what Bluefin Labs does, they don’t really emphasize their business on the website. You have to scroll down on their home page to learn that their “clients span TV networks, advertising agencies, and brand advertisers” and include AMC Networks, CBS, MTV Networks, Mars, PepsiCo, MediaCom, and lots more. The solution that they sell to these clients is called Bluefin Signals, and you can read about the science behind it here. If you want to get a very basic sense of the kind of data that Bluefin Labs offers, you can check out their sample dashboard. Last night’s hottest show was the Heat vs. Hawks game, which was closely followed up by Jersey Shore (I know which one I would have preferred to watch). I found out about Bluefin Labs from a reader who landed a job there recently. They don’t post specific positions on their Jobs page, but it mentions that they’re looking for people in the following areas:

Machine learning
Natural language processing
Computer vision
Social network analysis
Data analysis
Information visualization
Interaction design
Large scale data storage and analytics
Sales
Account management
Marketing
Product development

That covers a wide range of interests, so don’t be afraid to reach out to careers@bluefinlabs.com and apply for a position in one of those areas.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Bluefin Labs?

Crayola

Willy Franzen — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 17:37:40 +0000

I took a Career Development course in college. It was 2 credits pass-fail and met twice a week for half the semester. I figured that it was a good way to fill out my schedule, but it ended up being “the hardest class I took in college.” I wish I could say it was because it was so intellectually demanding, but it was actually because the work was so tedious and mind-numbing. To pass the class we had to submit a four-inch thick portfolio of all of our homework and reading notes (yes, reading notes in college). The class was entirely process-oriented and taught me nothing relevant to actually getting a job. The lowest point was when the class met in a special room and the professor asked us to close our eyes and envision our future lives as she played some weird new age music. She then handed out blank pieces of paper and small packs of Crayola crayons. She asked us to draw the future we envisioned. I AM NOT KIDDING (and the drawings went in our portfolio). What a waste of good crayons. Crayola is based in Easton, PA, and they were founded in 1885 as Binney & Smith, an industrial pigment supplier. They quickly got into pencils, chalk, and crayons, which built them into one of the most recognizable brands in America.

Picture Your Future at Crayola

Crayola has 99% brand recognition in the U.S., and the scent of their crayons is said to be the 18th most recognizable scent behind coffee and peanut butter. It’s unfortunate that I now tie that smell to such an infuriating educational experience, especially considering that Crayola is all “about helping parents and educators raise creative and inspired children, who we believe will one day lead the world.” Crayola has obviously expanded well beyond selling just crayons, pencils, markers, and chalk, but the business remains about giving kids the ability to express their creativity in any way they want. Even with the continued focus on simplicity, Crayola was able to reach $700 million in sales in 2010. That’s impressive. If you want to be part of the Crayola story, check out their Jobs page. Right now they have a few positions that you may want to consider including The Crayola Store – Retail Associate, The Crayola Experience – Associate, International Business Analyst, and Supply Chain Planner. Check them out and see if any of the positions might be in the picture you drew of your future.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What’s your favorite Crayola memory?

Oriental Trading

Willy Franzen — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 14:25:58 +0000

It’s probably a little late to be planning a New Year’s Eve party, but I guess for a lot of people all it takes is a trip to the liquor store to prepare. But if you really want to do New Year’s Eve right, you need party hats, noisemakers, those popper thingies, and all kinds of other novelties. One of the best places to get those is Oriental Trading, an Omaha, NE based “direct merchant of value–priced party supplies, arts and crafts, toys and novelties, and a leading provider of school supplies and affordable home décor and giftware.” I remember getting their catalogs as a kid and thinking how awesome it would be to have not one stupid plastic toy, but a 1000-count tub of them. Oriental Trading has been around since 1932, and they’ve been able to stay competitive by quickly adapting to the changing ways people buy stuff.

A Favorable Trade

Oriental Trading may not sell high-end products like a lot of other long-lived mail order companies, but they’ve still “been recognized as one of the Top 50 Internet Retailers and one of the Top 50 Catalog Companies.” What I think is cooler is that The Omaha Chamber of Commerce named Oriental Trading as “one of Omaha’s Fastest Growing Companies three consecutive years.” I’m not sure how recently that was, but any time you can grow an already large, 80-year old company at an above average rate is impressive. If you’d like to help keep that growth going and you find that flipping through the Oriental Trading catalog is a good way to spend a few hours, then take a look at Oriental Trading’s Careers page. Right now they have some cool job opportunities for new or recent grads including Assistant Brand Merchant, Cost Analyst, Inventory Specialist, Payroll Specialist, Studio Sample Coordinator, and Senior Sales Assistant. Check out the job postings, and please forgive the HR people at Oriental Trading for using Comic Sans in their job postings.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you ever looked through the Oriental Trading catalog?

Allegiant

Willy Franzen — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 16:52:56 +0000

I don’t mind flying; in fact, I kind of enjoy it–especially on smaller planes. Unfortunately, it’s not often that you can hop in a 6 seater and get a sweet view for the entire flight. Usually you are crammed into a 150-seater and spend most of the time looking at clouds. I guess most people are more comfortable with that, but not me. When I’m flying I’m not particularly brand conscious, so I mostly choose my airline by who has the cheapest fare. That means that I end up on flying all different airlines, but I’ve never flown Allegiant. They’re a low-cost carrier and travel company based in Enterprise, NV. They travel to 75 destinations with a fleet of 75 MD-83s and MD-87s. All of Allegiant’s routes begin or end in one of 9 hubs: Bellingham, WA; Los Angeles, CA; Las Vegas, NV; Phoenix, AZ; Myrtle Beach, SC; Orlando, FL; Tampa Bay, FL; Fort Myers, FL; and Fort Lauderdale, FL.

Show Your Allegiance

Allegiant doesn’t cover a ton of destinations, but if you want to fly to one of the 9 places mentioned above, there’s a good chance that they’ll be offering a good fare. Allegiant is extremely focused on profitably (unlike some other airlines), so they’re constantly tweaking their routes and leaving airports that don’t perform well for them. They’re also constantly finding new ways to generate ancillary revenue. The average Allegiant passenger will spend nearly an extra $35 over the price of his or her ticket. Some of this is for baggage fees and in-flight food, but Allegiant also makes money by selling other travel products and services through their website. They seem willing to try anything, and they even are toying with the idea of variable pricing based on fuel costs at the time of the flight. All of this makes Allegiant sound like an airline that might be a little annoying to fly, but would be really cool to work for. That’s why you should check out their Careers page. Right now they’re hiring a Component Repairs Analyst, an A/C Structures Engineer, a number of Customer Service/Ground Operations Agents (Medford, OR; South Bend, IN; Peoria, IL; Des Moines, IA; Fort Collins, CO; and Laredo, TX), a Financial Analyst, a Materials Coordinator, a Revenue Management Analyst, and a few other positions. Give all the jobs a look and see what looks best for you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you flown Allegiant?

WhaleShark Media

Willy Franzen — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 14:54:41 +0000

You probably should have already purchased and given all your gifts for the holiday season, but if you haven’t, it’s a wonderful time to get deals. Retailers are eager to grab a few more dollars from all of the people returning ugly sweaters and books they’ll never read, so they’re offering deals. And if you’re looking for deals, you’ll likely end up on some WhaleShark Media properties. They’re an Austin, TX based company that runs “the world’s leading marketplace for coupons and deals.” Their sites include RetailMeNot.com (one of my favorites), Deals.com, CheapStingyBargains.com, CouponShare.com, and a lot of others. I’m not exactly sure what separates these sites from each other, but they seem to do really well in search rankings and that is why they reach more than 265 million visitors every year.

A Whale of a Deal

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not brand loyal to RetailMeNot.com, but whenever I search for coupon codes, it seems one of their pages pops up. I can’t tell you how much money I have saved by taking 15 seconds to search for a coupon code when I’m making a purchase. This behavior is getting more and more common, and that bodes well for WhaleShark Media’s business model. If you’d like to learn more about that model and see how a profitable coupon business is built, check out WhaleShark Media’s Jobs page. Right now there are a number of opportunities or new and recent grads including:

Part-time Business Intelligence Analyst
Associate Software Engineer
Merchandiser – Deals2Buy.com
Accounts Coordinator
UX Designer
Visual Designer

There are a number of other interesting looking positions, but they all require more experience, so take a look at these and see if any of them make sense.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you use coupons?

QuinStreet

Willy Franzen — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 14:03:36 +0000

In March of 2009 I got an e-mail that looked a lot like the spam you typically see when you’re a webmaster with a publicly listed e-mail address. When someone refers to my site as onedayonejob.com, it gives me the hint that the e-mail was probably automated and that I should send it to my Junk folder. But I was still intrigued by the following sentence: “I am reaching out to see if you will be interested in selling your site and would like to discuss potential acquisition opportunities with us,” so I followed up. Over the next few months I traded e-mails with a guy who works at QuinStreet about potentially selling the site, but we never even made it to the offer stage. The reason that the Foster City, CA based company was interested in One Day One Job is that they’re one of the leaders in vertical marketing and online media. They have tons of online properties, and they use them to market and generate leads for other businesses. They’ve been at it since 1999, so they’ve been around the block a time or two.

Take a Ride Down QuinStreet

QuinStreet’s main areas of focus are in Education and Financial Services (two extremely lucrative markets for lead generation), but they also work in Home Services, B2B, Medicine/Health, and Premium Brand Advertising. You won’t see QuinStreet promote their properties on their home page like some other online media companies do, and you won’t get too many details about what they actually do. Online lead generation is extremely competitive, so secrecy is really important. They do have a What We Do, but it’s extremely limited in its explanation of QuinStreet’s business (you’ll find a little more on their How We Do It page). If you really want to learn more about QuinStreet’s business, their Investor Relations site is probably the place to go. What might even give you a better sense of what they’re working is their Jobs page. By investigating the positions they’re hiring for, I’ll bet you’ll get even more insight into the business. You’ll also see some great opportunities for new or recent grads including:

Employee Benefits and Compliance Assistant
Client Strategy & Development Associate
Data Services Associate (Reno, NV)
Inside Sales Rep
Inside Sales Rep – Home Services (Portland, OR)
Jr. Java Developer
Jr. Vertical Manager (Sao Paulo, Brazil)
Jr. Web Producer (Sao Paulo, Brazil)
Marketing Analyst
PPC Media Associate
SEM/PPC Media Associate (Sao Paulo, Brazil)
Media Associate
Media Associate – Home Services
PHP Developer
Vertical Manager – Online Marketing
Web Designer

If you’re interested in online marketing, QuinStreet would be a great place to learn, so give these positions a look and see what appeals to you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about QuinStreet?

Say Media

Willy Franzen — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 18:05:27 +0000

When people ask me what I do, I tell them that “I run websites that help college students find jobs and internships.” About half the time, I get, “Oh, so you’re like a recruiter?” That’s pretty far off, so I try to provide an explanation that includes the term “online media.” That usually gets the point across. We live in a time where nearly anyone can build their own media property. Technology is so cheap and easy to use that the hardest problems in online media usually come down to content creation, marketing, and monetization. Say Media is a company that brings together the technology with the media savvy. They’re based in San Francisco, CA, and they’ve been built out of two companies that merged: Six Apart and VideoEgg. Six Apart worked mostly on the technology side, and VideoEgg was an advertising network. Together they’ve become a company that “empowers culturally relevant individuals with its publishing platform and media services designed to help them grow audience and earn a living.”

What Do You Say?

Say Media has built a network with massive reach–400 million monthly unique visitors. Not only do they provide services that bring together advertisers and publishers, but they also own Blogs.com and TypePad. It’s all about “passion-based media properties,” whether SayMedia owns them, provides the technology to run them, or helps monetize them. Say Media bases everything that they do on 7 principles:

Attention is scarce

Passion is abundant

Media is fluid

Advertising is content

Storytelling is vital

Influence is earned

Engagement is a science

If you want to learn how Say Media came up with those principles and how they put them to work, then take a look at their Careers page. Right now they have a few jobs that you may want to check out including Financial Analyst, UI Site Designer, Technical Account Manager, and Sales Executive (Toronto, Canada). There are a variety of interesting opportunities at Say Media, so give them a shot.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Say Media?

University of Chicago

Willy Franzen — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 18:51:58 +0000

This is a sponsored post for the University of Chicago.

Even though I’m five years out of college, I still miss it. As much as I know many of you would like to stay (or go back), it’s time to get a job and leave the world of academia. Or is it? I’ve recently heard from a number of readers who have found a way to have their cake and eat it too. Some have landed jobs at their alma maters, while others have gone to work for other colleges and universities. If you think that Chicago would be a cool place to live (it is!), then you have to consider the University of Chicago.

The University of Chicago was founded by John D. Rockefeller, and it first offered classes in 1892. They currently serve 5,134 undegraduate students and 10,492 graduate, professional, and other students with a full-time faculty of 2,188. These three groups along with the more than 150,000 worldwide alumni form “a community of creative, demanding, inspired scholars who debate and collaborate to enrich human life through their work.” If you want more info on what the University of Chicago is all about, check out their About page.

Right now, the University of Chicago’s Alumni Relations & Development Division is working with us to fill 5 positions that they think are well suited for the One Day One Job audience. These positions include:

These are great opportunities to start your career while still staying close to the college atmosphere. Give the positions a look, and see if any of them interest you. If you’re interested in other positions at the University of Chicago, be sure to take a look at their Jobs page.

Urban Outfitters

Willy Franzen — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 18:28:02 +0000

I’m a strong believer in the theory of hipster relativity. If someone has more interesting facial hair than you, wears more plaid than you, or has thicker rimmed glasses than you, then he’s probably a hipster… at least to you. I’m pretty far up the chain (though I do have an affinity for plaid), which means that a whole lot of 20-somethings look like hipsters to me. The only thing I don’t get is where they get all of their cool hipster gear. I often walk by Urban Outfitters, and occasionally step inside. The store is packed with people and filled with what I consider to be hipster merchandise. This confuses me, because I know that no true hipster would shop somewhere so mainstream. I mean, Urban Outfitters, which is based in Philadelphia, PA, is publicly traded, has nearly 200 locations, and also owns Anthropologie, Free People, BHLDN, and Terrain. I guess the only loophole for a hipster shopping at Urban Outfitters is if you liked corporations before they were cool.

Get Urban Outfitted

Despite my sarcasm, I actually think that Urban Outfitters is an amazing company. They started as a single store in Philly in 1970, and they have grown the brand and the business to an amazing level. Urban Outfitters may be a corporation with a $4 billion market cap, but they offer a distinctly different feel from many other retailers in the fashion industry. I think the paragraph on Urban Outfitter’s About page really says its all:

Our established ability to understand our customers and connect with them on an emotional level. The reason for this success is that our brands — Urban Outfitters, Anthropologie, Free People, Terrain and BHLDN — are both compelling and distinct. Each brand chooses a particular customer segment, and once chosen, sets out to create sustainable points of distinction with that segment. In the retail brands we design innovative stores that resonate with the target audience; offer an eclectic mix of merchandise in which hard and soft goods are cross merchandised; and construct unique product displays that incorporate found objects into creative selling vignettes. The emphasis is on creativity. Our goal is to offer a product assortment and an environment so compelling and distinctive that the customer feels an empathetic connection to the brand and is persuaded to buy.

If that sounds like a company that you want to be a part of, then check out Urban Outfitters Careers page. You’ll probably get overwhelmed if you look at all of their posted jobs (there are 100s of positions), so I recommend using some of the search criteria they offer to narrow down your search. For instance you can look at positions at their Home Office or in their Anthropologie Retail Stores. I’m not going to list all of the positions that make sense for new or recent grads, bot here are some that caught my eye:

This is just a small sampling of the jobs available at Urban Outfitters, so dig in and see what positions might be out there for you. Judging from that last posting, they must do some campus recruiting too–so that’s something to look into. Finally, Urban Outfiters has a Twitter account for job postings, so you may want to follow that.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Are you a hipster?

Gorilla

Willy Franzen — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 18:09:04 +0000

Imagine that it’s 1994 and you’ve just started a CD-ROM production company. You’re doing really well because of all of the excitement about a storage medium that hold 600 times more data than the floppy disk. How much courage would it take to abandon what you were doing and start working on something new? Probably more than I have, but that’s exactly what Gorilla did. The Chicago, IL based company saw what was happening on the web and decided to jump in. Today Gorilla is a “web design, development and marketing firm” that focuses on e-commerce. They’re “striving to be the go-to ecommerce agency for mid-size businesses,” and they’re well on their way with clients including Bonobos, INC., Sub-Zero/Wolf, and lots of other big names.

A Smarter Species of E-Commerce

I’m most familiar with Gorilla’s work on Bonobos’ recently relaunched site. It’s fantastic, though it did have a bit of a hiccup due to yesterdays Cyber Monday sales. It offers an excellent user experience, and it definitely makes me want to buy more stuff. If you want to take a look at some of Gorilla’s other work, you should probably delve into their Case Studies. You’ll also want to look over Gorilla’s Services, as they offer a ton of solutions in Design, Development, and Strategy. If you’re impressed by their work and think that you could add value in some of the areas that they work in, then you should check out Gorilla’s Jobs page. Right now they have a few positions that you should check out including Business Analyst, Front-End Web Developer, and PHP Developer. If none of those positions seem suitable for you, you can also reach out to them at careers@gorillachicago.com to see if there are any other opportunities.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Gorilla?

Proper Cloth

Willy Franzen — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 18:18:54 +0000

Want to try Proper Cloth? Use this link to get $25 off your first shirt. It’d probably help to have a shirt that fits when you’re interviewing.

I’m a big guy at 6’3. I typically enjoy the benefits of being tall, but there are disadvantages like having to knee myself in the face on airplanes and not being able to hear a single word that anyone under 5’8 says in a loud room. I’m not so tall that I need to shop at specialty stores for clothes, but I’m just at the point where clothes off the rack don’t fit all that well. I fixed my pants problem with Bonobos, but I have a ton of shirts (button downs, t-shirts, sweaters, and more) that fit beautifully until I start actually moving around–then they somehow bare my midriff like I’m a teenage girl. Nobody needs to see that, which is why I should probably start buying custom shirts from a place like Proper Cloth. They’re a New York, NY based company that makes it “super easy to buy stylish, quality dress shirts that fit.” I haven’t tried them yet, but it’s probably about time that I go custom.

Get a Proper Job

Proper Cloth has been around since 2008, but it seems that they’ve recently become more serious about growth. Maybe it’s because GQ named them “our new favorite online shirt maker.” Or maybe it’s because of their Perfect Fit Guarantee. They work with you to get the exact fit you want on your first shirt. After that they save your measurements so that all other shirts fit just as well. You really should read up on the guarantee, because it’s core to the business. Then you should take a look at Proper Cloth’s shirt designs to get a better sense of what they offer. But don’t be dismayed if you don’t like anything that they have to offer, as Proper Cloth allows you to design your own shirt. I wonder if they’ll let you design your own job? I don’t have any answers on that right now, but I did find their job postings on Startuply. Right now they’re looking for a User Interface Designer/Graphic Artist, a Customer Service and Operations Lead, and an Analytical Marketing Engineer. All of the positions look well suited to a new college grad, so check them out.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you bought any shirts from Proper Cloth?

Refinery29

Willy Franzen — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 17:38:05 +0000

Keeping up with fashion isn’t a priority for me, but I still like to dress well. That’s why I trust Bonobos and Gilt Groupe to do the curation for me, and then I just buy what I like from them (it also helps that I’ve accrued a lot of credits from both of them). I know that a lot of people are far more active in keeping up with fashion, which is probably why Refinery29 is growing so quickly. The New York, NY based company is aiming to be “the cornerstone of fashion, beauty, and shopping for a new generation” as they offer “the only 360-degree source for shopping, exclusive deals, trends, beauty news, local hot-spots, and at-home sneak-peeks of fashion’s finest.” That’s ridiculously ambitious, but the results so far indicate that they’re pretty much killing it.

Show Your Refinement

I learned about Refinery29 from a blog post by my friend Charlie O’Donnell. The post touches on something really cool that Refinery29 is doing that I think more companies should do. They started out by focusing on editorial and grabbing attention to sell to advertisers. That’s what most companies in this space do, and it works, but why not take the extra step? Refinery29 has built it’s own e-commerce product called Reserve, and it’s essentially built on the daily deal model. It’s smart because it allows Refinery29 to capture even more value from their users than they do by selling advertising. I think we’ll see more and more companies do this–build media products as channels to promote their own products (I guess it’s nothing new considering the same idea is where Soap Operas got their start). I highly recommend that you dig into Refinery29′s content and get a better feel for who they are. If you like what you see, then you should probably check out their Careers page. They have a bunch of cool opportunities that might appeal to new or recent grads including:

Account Manager
Miami Editor (Miami, FL)
Los Angeles Editor (Los Angeles, CA)
Marketing Data Analyst
UX + Interaction Designer

There are a bunch of other positions, but they generally have more significant experience requirements. Hopefully something at Refinery29 will catch your eye and be a great fit.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Refinery29?

Spartz Media

Willy Franzen — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 17:28:29 +0000

Life isn’t nearly as exciting with no new Harry Potter books or movies coming out. I’m pretty bummed about it, but probably not nearly as bummed as the people who hang out on MuggleNet. In case you’ve never heard of it, MuggleNet is “the world’s #1 Harry Potter site.” It was started by Emerson Spartz when he was 12 years old, and it quickly started generating a ton of traffic. And with that traffic came some serious revenue opportunities. As MuggleNet turned into a real business, Emerson rolled it into a company called Spartz Media and started launching new entertainment focused sites. Some of the bigger names include OMG Facts, Gives Me Hope, and SmartphOWNED. Spartz Media is located in Chicago, IL (about 3 blocks from me), and they’re reaching more than 8.5 million people every month through their web properties. They’ve been at it since 2009, though MuggleNet has actually been around since 1999.

OMG Jobs

I actually learned about Spartz Media from a guy I occasionally play volleyball with who works there (though I’d heard of MuggleNet before that). He made it sound like a pretty cool place to work, and how can it not be when your business is all about making websites that entertain people? You can check out all of Spartz Media’s brand here, just make sure that you don’t end up wasting a few hours. What’s cool about Spartz Media is that it’s not all fun and games–there’s a science to what they do. Whether you want to be part of the fun, the science, or both, you should take a look at Spartz Media’s jobs. Right now they’re looking for a Business Analyst and a PHP Developer, and if you look at their Team page you’ll see that there may be other potential opportunities in Design, Web Development, Project Management, Editorial, Community Management, Business Intelligence, Analytics, and more. If you do end up applying, be sure to let them know that we sent you (and if you want an intro to my fried, just e-mail me at willy@onedayonejob.com). It’s a really young company, so I bet it’s a great place for new grads.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Which of Spartz Media’s sites is your favorite?

Medallion Financial Group

Willy Franzen — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 16:54:15 +0000

Last night I read an article from The New York Times about how two New York City taxi cab medallions recently sold for $1 million each. These aren’t some weird collectors’ items–they are actual pieces of metal that are attached to the hood of a taxi cab and are required for the cab to be able to operate in a given city. It’s a relatively common system (you can read about it here), and it limits the number and ensures the quality of cabs in the city. In some cities, the medallions can be bought and sold, and the secondary market for them is getting extremely expensive. Because of this, most cabbies can’t own their own medallions–they usually have to lease them or work for a fleet that owns it own medallions. That’s where Medallion Financial Group comes in. They’re a New York, NY based financing company that specializes in Taxi Medallion and Commercial Lending.

Hail a Job

Medallion Financials’ slogan is “In Niches There Are Riches.” It’s quite fitting considering the story of their Founder, Leon Murstein. In 1937 he was an immigrant who was driving cabs. He eventually saved up to buy his first medallion for $10. He got hooked and ended up buying 500 more. Now Medallion Financial is a publicly-traded company (their ticker symbol is TAXI) with a market cap just under $200 million (and they have over $1 billion in assets under management). If you really want to dig into the numbers, you can check out Medallion Financial’s Annual Reports. I think this business is absolutely fascinating, which is why I decided to do a writeup on Medallion Financial even though I can’t find any info on current job opportunities. My recommendation is that if you really like what they’re doing, check them out on LinkedIn, and then use their Contact page. It’s a long shot, but that’s what you have to do if you want to work at unique companies like Medallion Financial (note that Medallion Financial is not uniquely named, so there are some other companies with the same name). I do know that they’ve offered internships in the past, so entry level jobs really aren’t out of the question.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Had you noticed taxi medallions before?

Cvent

Willy Franzen — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 16:30:27 +0000

Yesterday we told you about Blue Chip Career, so here’s another reminder to check them out. They offer personalized guidance from seasoned executives to help you overcome your biggest job search challenges. Get paired with one of their experts and receive the inside scoop on how to land the job of your dreams.

My girlfriend and I are having a housewarming/birthday party this weekend. We invited people by e-mail, and we’re keeping of track of who is coming through a Google doc. That’s about as simple as it gets in terms of using software for event management. I don’t think our solution would cut it for companies like Verizon, Yahoo!, Walmart, and Oracle. They need something a little more… industrial strength. That’s what Cvent offers. They’re a McLean, VA based company that offers comprehensive event, survey, and eMarketing software solutions–exactly what large companies need to make sure that every little detail is taken care of when they put on an event.

Have a Cventful Job Search

The best way to get a feel for the scale that Cvent operates on, you need to look at some of their key statistics. They were founded in 1999, and since then their software has managed more than 275,000 events, sent 850 million e-mail invitations, and managed 30 million event registrations and survey responses. You can learn more about what those solutions look like here. You may also want to dig into some of the Resources that they provide–it’ll give you a better sense of the kinds of problems that they solve for their clients. If you like what you see, then you’ll want to check out Cvent’s Careers page. You’ll see some great openings that seem suitable for new or recent grads including Blogger/Social Media Associate, Business Development Associate, Information Security Analyst, Mobile Application Developer, Product Consultant, Quality Engineer, Sales Associate, Software Engineer, Systems Analyst, Systems Programmer, Systems Support Engineer, and Technical Support Engineer. There are lots of options, so hopefully at least one will intrigue you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Cvent?

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency

Willy Franzen — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 17:01:25 +0000

Columbus Day isn’t much of a holiday anymore–it’s become yet another regular work and school day for many. It makes sense considering Christopher Columbus wasn’t really the guy that my 1st grade teacher taught me that he was. Still, I’m amazed by the feats of guys like Columbus (which is why I’ve written about Garmin and Facet Technology on past Columbus Days). Getting in a boat with an uncertain route to a far away destination still seems crazy to me, and these guys did it in a time when navigation equipment was quite basic. Their minds would be blown if they knew what kind of information the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (formerly the National Imagery and Mapping Agency) has. The agency is headquartered in Springfield, VA and has major facilities in St. Louis, MO (I learned about them from one of my awesome interns whose boyfriend works for the NGA). They are part of the Department of Defense, and they are tasked with providing “timely, relevant, and accurate geospatial intelligence in support of national security.”

Do You Have Geospatial Intelligence?

If you want an example of what the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency does, you’re not going to get a full answer because a lot of what they do is classified. However, they have been identified as playing a “critical role” in Operation Neptune’s Spear, which was the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden. The agency’s employees operate in a number of areas including aeronautical analysis, cartography, geospatial analysis, imagery analysis, marine analysis, the physical sciences, geodesy, computer and telecommunication engineering, photogrammetry, and more. The NGA website is ok, but I highly recommend that you check out Wikipedia’s entry on the agency for a really good overview of the organization’s history and what it does.

If you like what you read, then you’ll want to take a look at the NGA’s Careers page. (Remember that we’re dealing with the federal government, so this isn’t going to be simple.) First, you’ll probably want to visit the Occupations page, where you’ll see that the NGA offers the following positions:

Accountants
Aeronautical Analyst
Bathymetrist
Contract Specialist
Counterintelligence Officers
Enterprise Account Managers
Geodetic Surveyors
Geospatial Data Stewards
Geospatial Intelligence Analysts
HD Consultants
Imagery Scientists
Imagery Intelligence Analysts
Information Assurance Officers
Maritime Analysts
Open Source Analysts
Police Officers
Political Geographers
Program Management Execution Officers
Project Scientists
Recruiters
Regional Geographers
Regional Source Analysts
Scientific and Technial Program Managers
Source Strategies Analysts
Systems Engineers

You won’t see most of these positions in the NGA’s Current Opportunities, so you may be better off meeting them at one of their On-Campus Recruiting Events or by reaching out to them at recruitment@nga.mil. You may also want to read through the NGA’s Recruitment FAQs and looking at their Application Process. It’s all complicated, but that’s to be expected with one of our country’s intelligence agencies.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Are you amazed by what the NGA does?

Care.com

Willy Franzen — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 15:58:13 +0000

When you’re young your biggest responsibility is taking care of yourself. But eventually you get a dog, buy a house, have kids, and even have to start caring for your aging parents. As the responsibilities pile up, many people have to seek professional help to handle it all. I’m not talking about mental health professionals–I’m talking about babysitters, nannies, dog walkers, senior caregivers, and other people who can take on some of your daily responsibilities. Care.com is a Waltham, MA based company that makes “it easier for families to find reliable, trustworthy care for their loved ones.” Care.com does this by providing a closed community for matching up caregivers with people who are looking to hire them. By keeping the community closed, Care.com is able to ensure quality with features like background checks, reviews, and reference.

Show That You Care

The biggest impediment to finding a caregiver is trust. Whether you’re looking for someone to bring in your mail or babysit your first born, you don’t want to have any doubts about the person that you hire. Usually people use their real world social networks to find people for these jobs, but where do you go if you can’t find anyone you already know? Care.com wants to be that place. By combining an easy to use online experience with a team of experts, Care.com has positioned itself as the place to go to find caregivers or caregiving jobs. From what I can tell, Care.com is growing at a really good rate and they’re extremely well funded by venture capitalists. That must be why Care.com’s Jobs page has so many opportunities posted. The jobs that look like they might be good fits for new or recent grads include Data Analyst, E-mail Producer, Inside Sales Representative, Marketing Associate, Member Care Call Center Representative, Online Marketing Analyst, Operations Analyst, and Software Engineer. These look like really cool opportunities, so don’t pass them up.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you care for anyone?

New America Foundation

Willy Franzen — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 16:01:46 +0000

There’s no question that America’s future is filled with challenges, and we’re going to be the ones who have to rise to them. It’s a huge opportunity, but it’s also a bit daunting. The New America Foundation is a non-profit organization that “emphasizes work that is responsive to the changing conditions and problems of our 21st Century information-age economy — an era shaped by transforming innovation and wealth creation, but also by shortened job tenures, longer life spans, mobile capital, financial imbalances and rising inequality.” They’re based in Washington, DC (and Sacramento, CA), and they’re working to ensure that every American generation is able to live better than the one that came before it.

Are You Part of a New America?

The New America Foundation has ideals that pretty much everyone can get behind, but how do they actually go about achieving their goals? They have a wide range of Programs and Initiatives that cover a number of areas including College Savings, National Security, Open Technology, Economic Growth, and lots more. These programs “combine ongoing research and publications with working groups, conferences and public events” to “bring innovative, cutting-edge policy solutions to the fore of the national debate.” The New America Foundation’s approach is broad, but if you think that you could help them build a better America, then take a look at their Jobs page. They have a number of positions available that look suitable for new or recent grads including A/V Multimedia Producer, Innovation Policy Research Associate, Program Associate – Global Assets Project, Research Associate – Global Assets Project, Schmidt Family Foundation Fellow, Events Associate, Field Analyst – Open Technology Initiative, and Research Associate. There are lots of options, so hopefully one of them will be a good fit for you.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What’s your vision for a New America?

ShopAtHome.com

Willy Franzen — Tue, 20 Sep 2011 15:35:05 +0000

It’s not often that you see 25-year old companies on the Inc. 5000, but that’s exactly what ShopAtHome.com is. They got their start as a husband and wife team, and they’ve growing consistently since 1986. It seems that the growth has accelerated over the past few years, as ShopAtHome.com, which is based in Greenwood Village, CO, has a 442% three-year growth rate and generated $35.4 million in revenue last year. Now, ShopAtHome.com isn’t really what it sounds like. It’s not an online version of QVC. It’s a coupons site; in fact, it’s “one of the largest websites offering free online coupons, grocery coupons, cash back rewards, free samples, restaurant coupons and contests.” Their site had 37 million visits last year, which is a staggering number. What’s even more staggering is that they appear to have generated about $1 in revenue for every visitor.

Shop at Home, Work at Shop at Home

Although ShopAtHome.com does offer some forms of daily deals, they’ve really stuck to the traditional coupon model. It’s proven, and it obviously generates a ton of money. Essentially, ShopAtHome.com has built the ultimate audience (median age 35 with a household income more than $75K per year) for distribution of coupons, contests, and other types of deals. The killer feature is ShopAtHome.com’s Cash Back program, which rewards people with cash for shopping through the site. So far they’ve delivered $50 million back to consumers, so it’s been pretty effective. If you’re interested in what ShopAtHome.com is doing to save people money, then give their Jobs page a look. Right now they’re hiring an Online Marketing Data Analyst, and the position looks like a great fit for a new or recent grad. You may also want to check out their internships in Sales Support, Site Marketing, and Paid Search Marketing.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you used ShopAtHome.com?

One Click Ventures

Willy Franzen — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 16:38:00 +0000

The thing that I love most about the Inc. 5000 is the diversity of the companies. While there are definitely some strong themes throughout the list, there are companies doing all kinds of things in all kinds of places–and succeeding. One of the biggest themes on the list is that online marketing is offering massive opportunity to new companies. One Click Ventures is a Greenwood, IN based company that is big on Internet marketing. Unlike many of the other companies on the list, they do the marketing for themselves, not for clients. One Click Ventures runs a number of e-commerce properties including ABC Neckties, Affordable Scarves, Handbag Heaven, Inexpensive Watches, Reading Glasses Shopper, TravelProducts.com, Socks4Life, and Sunglass Warehouse. Each of these sites is in a very competitive niche, so it should be no surprise that One Click Ventures claims to have a distinct competitive advantage with their “marketing engine” that “consists of a diverse team of subject matter experts, including SEO, PPC, email marketing, social media, affiliate marketing, conversion optimization and content development.”

One Click to a New Job

When I came across One Click Ventures, I knew their name sounded familiar. It was because one of my friends from Cornell works there now, and he just sent me an e-mail about some of their job openings. That coupled with One Click Ventures’ fast growth really got me interested. The Inc. 5000 has them at #542 with 619% three-year growth to $3.4 million in annual revenue. A big driver of that growth has been acquisitions. One Click Ventures finds online properties that they think can benefit significantly from their online marketing capabilities. In other words they’re able to significantly increase the value of a site just by acquiring it and getting it up and running in their system. It sounds fascinating, and I’ve heard great things from my friend. If you’re interested in what One Click Ventures is doing, head over to their Careers page and take a look at their open positions. Right now they’re looking for a Marketing and SEO Specialist, a Marketing Analyst, a Graphic Designer, and a Junior PHP Developer. If you’re interested, feel free to apply on your own or e-mail me at willy@onedayonejob.com and I’ll make an intro for you to my friend.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about One Click Ventures?

Levelwing

Willy Franzen — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 14:16:14 +0000

The fun thing about going through the Inc. 5000 looking for companies that offer interesting entry level jobs is that the list just keeps getting better as you move down the rankings. The companies may be growing a little more slowly than those at the top, but it’s often because they’ve reached a size where quadruple-digit growth is nearly impossible (so they have to settle for triple-digit growth). One company that has grown large quickly is Levelwing. They’re a full-service digital advertising agency based in New York, NY and Charleston, SC. Their big focus is on making data-driven decisions and using technology to measure the effectiveness of their work on a constant basis. They’ve grown at a 720% rate over the past three years, which brought them to $44.8 million in revenue last year.

Be Level Headed

Levelwing does pretty much everything that you’d expect an advertising agency to do, though the focus is definitely online. You can get a full rundown of the services that they offer here. They provide those services to a wide range of big name clients including the Bahamas Ministry of Tourism, BMW, Le Creuset, Nickelodeon, Thrillist, and many more major companies. If you want to take a closer look at the kind of work that they’ve done for these companies, you can take a look at Levelwing’s Case Studies. If their work speaks to you, then you might want to head over the the Levelwing Jobs page. Right now they have a number of positions that might be suitable for new or recent grads including Account Analyst (Charleston, SC and New York, NY), Account Coordinator (Charleston, SC), Data and Reporting Analyst (Charleston, SC), Inside Sales Representative (Charleston, SC and New York, NY), Social Research Analyst (Charleston, SC), and SQL Database Developer (Charleston, SC). Give the jobs a look and see what gets you excited.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Levelwing?