Startup Company Has Message for Americans: Invest in Yourselves by Contributing to a Solution to Unemployment  

Summit, NJ — October 3, 2011— CareerFuel™ is taking its jobs campaign right to the people.  
The startup content and technology company this week announced the launch of its crowd funding drive to raise $5 million to build the largest and most comprehensive multi-media work-related network in the country. 

Currently, the Internet offers thousands of job boards, millions of information sites and many networking platforms. CareerFuel will dynamically integrate all of these capabilities into one streamlined multi-media offering that provides job seekers and small business entrepreneurs one-stop shopping to help them get to where they want to be. Additionally, CareerFuel site users will be able to obtain personalized content specific to their fields of interest and goals.   

"We have an extraordinary jobs crisis today complicated by a sea of bewildering information that sits between people and the jobs they need or the businesses they want to start," said AnnMarie Quintaglie McIlwain, Founder and CEO of CareerFuel in Summit, New Jersey. "People have a hard time discerning what information is relevant, and what's not. In addition, people need better professional networks to assist them with their careers."

Through daily original content consisting of video shows and blogs, plus job listings and vibrant professional networks created by the interactivity of the media platforms, CareerFuel will help people enhance job-seeking skills, gain small business expertise and improve connections to other professionals. Research indicates information via video format is preferred by most people.  

"If only a tiny percentage of Americans contributed $5," said McIlwain, "CareerFuel could be up and running in as little as sixteen to twenty weeks, but that can only happen if people donate to the cause. That's why we are launching our grassroots capital-raising campaign."  

Anyone can become part of the initiative to build the CareerFuel network by contributing to the cause at www.careerfuel.net. CareerFuel is spreading the news via social networking, the media, labor organizations and word of mouth.          

Why is CareerFuel taking its campaign to the people?  

"Because," said McIlwain, "venture capitalists don't often fund startups that require expensive content and high-performance technology until they have been proven in the marketplace. New content designed to inform and motivate combined with personalized resources is a key missing piece to the job search challenge and that's why we are asking Americans to contribute."  

CareerFuel proprietary research, conducted by Horowitz Associates in 2010, indicates:  

• The job content market is broken—nearly six out of 10 adults are not happy with the job–related information available today.

• People want video—68% of people seeking a job (whether employed or unemployed) said that a video jobs channel on TV, Internet, or cell phones would be very valuable.

• People want help with networking—66% of those surveyed (74% among those who are unemployed or underemployed) rated access to people in their field as important to help them with their careers, the highest rated importance attribute in the survey. Most jobs are attributed to the use of networks, not job boards or classifieds—the old model..  

CareerFuel addresses those key issues as well as other job-related concerns.  

Over the past two years, McIlwain invested more than $500,000 of her own money to hire a development team to design the CareerFuel content, platform and networks. Team members include a former executive from ESPN, and New York digital groups Click3X and Igicom —whose clients include HBO, MTV and Time magazine.  

To see the CareerFuel video or contribute to the project, visit www.careerfuel.net.  

"When my husband lost his job in 2009," said McIlwain, "I saw first-hand what unemployed people go through trying to find the resources they need to hone their job-search skills, get inspired, participate in effective professional networks, find jobs, and start businesses. My experience as a consumer marketing executive with Procter & Gamble and Johnson and Johnson taught me to identify needs and solve them with effective technology. That's what CareerFuel is all about — a big solution to a big problem.”  

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