SnagAJob.com Inc. has snagged $9 million in private-equity funding to more than quadruple its work force and build its brand.

Founded in 2000 by former attorney Shawn Boyer, SnagAJob is an online job recruiting company that helps people find hourly or part-time positions in retail, restaurant and other service industries.

With the new cash infusion, SnagAJob will aggressively hire sales, marketing and tech workers. Boyer, the firm's president and chief executive, expects 76 employees by the year's end and 131 by next September. It currently employs 28.

SnagAJob also will promote itself with TV commercials in several large cities, outdoor and transit ads in Atlanta and Washington, and a sales campaign to lure more small and medium-size companies.

Boyer said yesterday that the company, which has more than 100,000 postings, will invest heavily in technology to handle what he expects will be a jump in monthly visitors to the site. SnagAJob gets about 1.5 million visitors a month; Boyer expects that to hit 9.5 million by 2009.

While SnagAJob competitors such as Monster.com, HotJobs and CareerBuilder.com offer hourly and part-time jobs, the sites primarily are used to hunt for salaried or executive-level positions.

Therefore, SnagAJob doesn't heavily compete in the $3.5 billion online recruiting market with those more well-known job sites, said Gordon Borrell, president of Portsmouth-based media consulting firm Borrell Associates Inc., which has done work with the local company.

Boyer said SnagAJob's push into the hourly market has been strong enough to stay profitable since early 2004. It does not disclose financial figures but has seen triple-digit growth in revenue for five years of its six-year history, he said.

Labels: Job boards