The site allows recruiters to target candidates on the basis of which clubs they are in as opposed to which subject they are studying.

David Langer, who co-founded GroupSpaces with Andy Young while they were students at Oxford University, told Recruiter that the more diverse they can make their user base, the more value it can add to its recruiter clients. “They can then use us holistically as part of a global campaign rather than just in their own country,” he said. “The challenge for us is to build a very large user base.”

GroupSpaces derives its revenue by allowing graduate recruiters to advertise their campus activity and promote opportunities to its community throughout the year. It has worked with more than 70 graduate recruiters, including many blue chip companies and major recruitment agencies.

Recruiters specify the types of students they want to target and indicate which universities are on their hit list. GroupSpaces puts together a package based on this which ensures the networks they put forward are as relevant as possible. The UK GroupSpaces community currently has 200,000 members from 2,000 societies.

Langer contends that the GroupSpaces community is highly employable because being members of clubs and societies allows individuals to build skills such as teamwork and communication: “Those that spend most time on the site are the leaders of these societies and you could argue that leaders of the top societies at the top universities are among the most employable talent coming out of the UK every year. We believe we offer a very high-quality user base.”

Langer reports that the response from the US market, where there are more than a million university clubs and societies, has been even more enthusiastic than in the UK. GroupSpaces was recently able to secure $1.3m (£0.84m) investment from Index Ventures and an angel investor consortium.
www.groupspaces.com