Branding Pivot: The Ladders Moves Away From Only $100,000+ Focus

In my bulk emails this morning, I received an email from The Ladders tagged with the subject line, "Bye-bye!" A quick review noted that they're abandoning their "only $100K+ jobs" focus, instead focusing on operating a curated board. Here's a clip from the email:

We're expanding, and today we say "bye-bye" to helping only those over $100,000 and "hello" to helping all career-minded professionals. TheLadders now takes all salary levels and shows the right jobs to the right person. So while we're saying goodbye to our narrower segmentation, we are not saying "goodbye" to keeping your job search on TheLadders relevant, focused, and targeted.

So, for example, you won't see jobs that pay half (or double) what you're currently making. You won't see jobs outside of your field — we still won't show sales jobs to finance professionals, or marketing jobs to technologists. And we won't be letting in scammy jobs, work-from-home schemes, or commission-only opportunities — we'll still be vetting every job and every recruiter before we allow them into our community.

I never liked the $100K+ positioning myself. I always felt like it put too much emphasis on numbers and not enough emphasis on the quality of the candidate or the job. My sense is that now, when the economy is so crappy and the job outlook so bleak, that finding any fish in the opportunity pond is a hunt. Still, other than a slight scent of despair, do you really feel like this expansion of their audience does anything for you? If you were an established customer under the old $100K+ umbrella, do you feel a greater sense of connection now that they have expanded their marketing circle?