Jobboard Finder’s opinion
Summary: Created in 2000 and operated by a local Cambodian company (Krawma Co.), BongThom is one of the leading job boards in Cambodia. The website has four language settings (English, French, Khmer and Mandarin), but only the English version actually works. For a long time, the visibility was rather high (around 250 000 views a month) but since June of this year, it has been steadily dropping, without could be due to the elections in July. It is currently down to 99 740 views a month. Regardless, it is still the 83rd most visited website in the country. On Facebook, 240 103 people are following their activity and on Youtube, there are 2 237 for their many videos (mostly in Khmer).The funny thing is that nowhere on the homepage does it actually say BongThom. Instead, it says, “lite version”, implying there is possibly a strong version.
Design: The homepage has a simple design and a focus on job offers. The blue elephant logo is a nice touch, and the search engine consists of two parts (keywords and the category). When you create an account, you’re plunged into the dark ages. The website becomes quite old-fashioned and slightly more difficult to use because we aren’t used to the design. That said, you don’t really need an account to apply because most offers just provide contact information (and no “apply” button). The job board has a company listing of 6 801 companies. They appear in order of the number of job offers per company. Each page can include a logo, a short description of the company, contact details and the current job offers. For the job listing, you can view the vacancies in alphabetical order, in order of the reference number, by closing date or by posting date. Expiry dates and posting dates are clearly indicated. However, the filters (quick links, the job category, the company name or the posting date) are relatively limited and “list all” does not work.
The job board objective: BongThom (which means “big brother” or “big guardian”) is looking over the Cambodian jobseekers, helping them find work in all kinds of fields.
Recruiter observations: There is no CV database. Recruiters and jobseekers create the same account, which means you become a BongThom "member". To create an advert, you need to send your job offer information to the team. Pricing information is in the FAQ.
Jobseeker observations: You don’t need any account to apply to job offers.
The job offers: There are 2 763 job offers. Most of the vacancies are for business administration, management, sales, banking and accounting positions.
Reactivity: The team answers within a day.
Special features: The calendar; the elephant logo; the classifieds (mostly for housing); the phrasebook; the Youtube videos; the videos on the site; Live Music and DJ events (which leads to a partner website also run by Krawma Co.).
Verdict: This particular job board is for a country still struggling with great poverty, poor internet access and corruption. It’s no surprise that it is slightly less modern than some other sites. That said, it’s easy to use and it continues to attract many jobseekers and recruiters. It’s definitely worth checking out.
