A new public face for Seek Communications

NATIONAL online employment solutions provider Seek Communications is preparing to clean up the profile of another infamous Australian personality with the launch of new television advertisement later this year.

Seek’s controversial television advertise-ment, in which notorious businessman Alan Bond sought forgiveness for his previous misdemeanours, proved so successful a second advertisement will be launched later this year.

The new talent is being kept tightly under wraps – Seek figures it has unlocked a good thing and hopes to further broaden its brand recognition.

Seek Communications executive director Matthew Rockman said the business was offered a unique opportunity when Alan Bond agreed to make a public apology.

“This provided a degree of leverage for us for a small investment and we could get across a message through him,” he said.

Seek Communications’ advertising agency is currently working on the new television spot, scheduled for later this year.

“Stay tuned, we’re always creating,” Mr Rockman said.

Seek Communications’ core business is providing online employment advertisements for clients all over the country, including Western Australia, where the client base is mainly in the recruitment sector and govern-ment.

Income also has been derived from online advertising but Mr Rockman said the banner advertising market was highly depressed as a result of a general oversupply.

“The market is consolidating in terms of players and there will be a flight to quality,” he said.

As the market consolidates and strengthens, Mr Rockman said online advertising increasingly would “cannibalise” the classified advertising in the daily newspapers around the country.

“I don’t believe newspaper advertising will disappear, it will change and sheer volume will come under immense pressure,” he said.

Comparatively speaking, Seek Communications claims online recruitment advertising presents a massive cost advantage in terms of the actual cost of delivering a candidate to a business.

“For a lot of recruitment firms, advertising is the key cost,” Mr Rockman said.

In the Perth market, Seek Communications has 2,000 ads advertised on its site, many of which are drawn from national clients. But the company would like to increase growth in the local market and drive the site through the local businesses

In the month of April there were 3.27 million job seekers from the Perth market.