The online job board focused on college students and recent graduates has landed a spot on the Inc. 5,000 list of the fastest-growing privately held companies in the United States.

In its 2008 list released Wednesday, August 20, business publication Inc. said CollegeRecruiter.com was among its fastest-growing companies, finishing 1,403rd as revenue jumped from $660,424 in 2004 to $2.4 million last year.

Recruiting industry analyst Peter Weddle says CollegeRecruiter.com has been at the forefront of experimenting with the social and viral aspects of the Internet. The Minneapolis-based firm has tapped blogging, podcasts and cell phone text messaging.

“They are a good template for how job boards are evolving to be more a part of people’s lives on a daily basis,” Weddle says.

CollegeRecruiter.com earned Weddle’s User’s Choice Awards in 2007 and 2008 for being a top online employment site.

Job boards have come under scrutiny in recent years for cost concerns and security risks. But they remain a major recruiting resource. Job boards account for about 18 percent of all hires, according to research from recruiting advisory firm CareerXroads. And they rank second only to referrals in terms of external sources of hire.

CollegeRecruiter.com is published by Adguide Publications, which was founded in 1991. Initially, the company published maps of various areas, including college campuses, and earned revenue from selling advertising on the maps. It later published a magazine called College Recruiter and in 1996 launched the CollegeRecruiter.com Web site.

The site now aims to help students and graduates find jobs, continuing education and business opportunities.

Inc. said CollegeRecruiter.com has “found new ways to advertise its site to job seekers by creating several collegerecruiter.com Facebook applications and even a YouTube channel with more than 350 career-related videos.”

CollegeRecruiter.com founder and president Steven Rothberg caused a stir several months ago by ending résumé searching at the site. Rothberg explained at the time that his company wanted to protect candidates using the site from identity theft and unwanted solicitations.

The move has been positive, Rothberg said in an e-mail on Friday, August 22. “We’ve seen no revenue impact from eliminating résumé searching, but there has been a lot of good will built up,” he said.