[Startup Interview] Lars Wetemans, CEO Recruitz

Dutch Creative Industry is publishing a series of interviews with Dutch startups. Today we talk to Lars Wetemans, CEO of Recruitz. 

Please describe Recruitz.io?

Recruitz.io wants people to be happy with their jobs and companies to find the perfect matching talent. Therefore, it invented an Artificial Intelligence powered technology that autonomously reaches not only the active job seekers that visit the traditional job boards (19% of the total job market), but also the 81% passive job seekers by advertising job vacancies on social media, Google, websites and apps, media people use daily. Our technology creates the adverts (text, visuals and animated banners) fully automated, based on Artificial Intelligence; this means it knows what attracts people in certain job functions best. Big data also makes sure our technology only reaches the perfect matching candidates, at the right time, on the right channel.

Why did you start Recruitz.io?

I have a passion for automation and technology and had worked in the recruitment industry for a sometime. I noticed it's a very traditional industry which - I think - can be much more innovative. That's how I got the idea of recruiting people from a different approach. I want recruitment campaigns to become as easy and transparent as booking a hotel or a flight where you have access to the entire labour market instead of only the people who at that moment are looking for a job. Besides that, I believe as a society we have a discriminatory approach when it comes to prejudices to gender, age and nationality in hiring. We believe that everybody deserves an equal chance. Our technology will target candidates on their true passion and therefore their skills and/or attitude - for example by showing job ads to people who stay up to date on sector news combined with their geo-location.

Who owns Recruitz.io?

I started Recruitz.io with my companion Laurent Scholten. Before Recruitz.io, we both owned a social media agency. Also Philo Hermans, one of the best backend developers in NL, was on board to get our technology set up. Since March 2017 Slingshot Capital invested in Recruitz.io as well.

How and where are you located?

Our office - an old, industrial warehouse (cultural heritage) - is located at the Zeemagazijnkade in Amsterdam. We have an in-house gym & bar and we provide yoga, kickbox and personal training classes to our people. We give our people a lot of freedom to excel in what they do best. We have unlimited holidays and people can work when and how they like. We treat our people as our biggest assets. They are our company, they create our products, they create our success.

How is Recruitz financed?

We've used the income from our social media agencies to bootstrap our company. When we launched the beta version of our software in June 2016, we got a lot of traction in the market - both from customers and investors. In March 2017 we also received an investment of 2 million euros from Slingshot Capital. Money to scale up our business internationally.

What distinguishes Recruitz.io from other businesses in the industry?

Unlike any other job advertising company in the world, we're able to reach both active and passive job seekers - fully automated. Our advanced targeting in the advertising - combined with big data & AI - means that we only reach the perfect candidate and no one else. This means that the traditional 'post and pray' of vacancies is gone, resulting in better candidates with lower and fairer pricing. We charge our clients a 'cost per click' based on a real-time bidding technology which you pay only what you spend which is a fair price.

What is it that clients want from you?

They want to receive higher quality candidates and hasten the hiring process of new employees. But probably most important: they want to lower their recruitment costs. When they start a campaign with us, they can sit back while our ads attract top talent for them. They'll effortlessly recruit and have time for other important tasks - meeting quality candidates.

What does Recruitz.io need to grow?

We're now mainly focusing on hiring more people who can make the company grow in all its facets, like development, sales and customer success. Q1 2018 we'll also setup our first office outside The Netherland, probably New York, US.

What are your international ambitions?

We want to become a global market leader in the online recruitment industry, but more importantly, we want to change the way companies find people and the way people find their dream job based on their true passion. People no longer have to look for work. Work finds them. We want to eliminate the resume and discrimination in hiring by letting technology objectively endorse the best matching talent for the job, based on online behavior, skills and attitude, and therefore true identity of a person. We will blur the boundaries between talent engagement, marketing and IT.

Any recent news you would like to share?

We just launched our fully automated display advertising technology. This means that we can reach 90% of all internet users - on websites, in apps and communities.

www.recruitz.io

Are you also interested in a Startup Interview in this series, please send an email to Max Vlugt - max@nederlandsmedianetwerk.nl