Kuwait's first Virtual Job Fair receives 11,230 job seekers

The Virtual Job Fair, which was held from January 18th to January 22nd 2009, provided both employers and job seekers a convenient and hassle-free opportunity to interact and explore potential job openings throughout Kuwait and the GCC region.

As part of the initiative, Bayt.com constructed animated 3D "Virtual Booths" on the website for the different participating companies, which received approximately 11,230 booth visits across the five days. The virtual booths, like physical job fairs, were branded with the exhibitors' names and logos and provided access to a range of information about that particular company.

Job seekers had the opportunity to submit their CVs directly to their booths of choice and apply immediately for new and existing jobs; while potential employees and employers had the unique option of interacting in real time via online or video chat. A total of 250 jobs were available during the fair.

Barry Stokes, Senior Recruitment Manager at Alghanim Industries commented on the fair;

"The Virtual Job Fair has been an innovative experience for all recruiters at Alghanim. Being one of the first online recruitment events in the Middle East to deploy such advanced tools, it managed to bring together a lot of companies as well as candidates from across the world. It gave recruiters a chance to meet different candidates in a single forum and gave candidates a chance to realign their perception of the Middle East."

"One of Alghanim's core values is being at the forefront of technological innovations. If virtual career fairs will pave the future for candidate-employer relationships, then Alghanim will definitely be a part of them."

Nael Ahlat, Operations Manager at Dagher & Co. General Trading said; "Thank you very much Bayt.com for your support and wise recommendation to participate in your Virtual Job Fair. The event was a great opportunity to showcase our company for all future candidates. The pool of applicants was huge and we were literally able to recruit and select from the best ever caliber of talent. This event should definitely be repeated more often."

Employers participating in Kuwait's inaugural Virtual Job Fair included regional heavy weights such as Alshaya.com, Al Rai newspaper, Kout Food Group, NBK, Alghanim and Al Safat American Hospital; with each of the participating companies benefiting from a wide online exposure of their brands and a direct dialogue with prospecting candidates.

Al Safat American Hospital's CEO, Christopher Evans stated; "The Virtual Job Fair provided Al Safat American Hospital with a completely new approach to its recruitment of candidates, and has proved to be successful in producing a number of strong candidates for future vacancies. It has been a good experience and an effective event for Al Safat American Hospital".

As the financial crisis continues to evolve globally, people are raising many questions about the impact of the crisis on the hiring and employment market. In such hard times, Bayt.com aims to stimulate and support Kuwait's job market through events such as the Virtual Job Fair, to get more of the right talent into jobs, which will in turn prompt economic growth through growing and improving the labor market.

"An event such as this is an ideal forum for really bringing together job seekers and employers in this increasingly technology-savvy regional business environment. Online recruitment has a fundamental role to play in the way that companies engage and recruit their staff today, and in holding this event, we effectively trialed a process which could become widely adopted for connecting potential employees with employers, by capitalizing on the sophistication of online recruitment with sites like Bayt.com," concluded Ataya.