It's OK to show up fashionably late to the party, as long as you bring quality grub for everyone to share. That's what Dice Holdings (NYSE:DHX) is aiming for with this morning's second-quarter earnings report.

The first glimpse into Dice's financials since last month's IPO is encouraging, as long as you know where to look. Earnings clocked in at $0.03 per share, below last year's $0.04-per-share showing, but that's not a fair comparison. Operating profits actually soared 87% higher during the quarter, before debt payments and a bigger tax bite ate away at the bottom line.

Revenue surged 79% to $34.5 million, though that, in turn, is too flattering a snapshot. Last October's eFinancialCareers acquisition accounted for more than half of the company's top-line gain.

All in all, it's a respectable start for the online job-listings specialist. Unlike Monster Worldwide (NASDAQ:MNST) or Yahoo!'s (NASDAQ:YHOO) HotJobs, Dice caters to specific industries. Its flagship Dice.com houses nearly 100,000 tech-job listings. ClearanceJobs.com is a work-force hub for folks with active security clearance.

True, the company's timing is lousy. It went public four weeks ago, just as the market was starting to get queasy. Its IPO may have opened at $14.50, slightly above its initial $13 price tag, but it's been mostly downhill after that. The stock closed at $11.83 yesterday.

It's not the first time that Dice has rolled snake eyes. In its original incarnation as Earthweb, it became one of the many dot-com bubble casualties. It eventually cashed out most of its properties -- save for Dice.com -- to Jupitermedia (NASDAQ:JUPM) before filing for bankruptcy.

The new Dice is a more financially centered company. It's profitable. It's growing. It's also a buyer, judging by last year's acquisition of eFinancialCareers (a site for financial-industry jobs, with a stronger presence overseas than in the U.S.).

Catering to specific industries may not seem like a recipe for Wall Street success at the moment. Companies like Jupitermedia and CNET Networks (NASDAQ:CNET), which serve tech-based communities, find their stocks trading in the single digits. However, I would argue that this time, Dice is actually early to the shindig.

As global Internet adoption rates continue to improve, there will be a greater need for IT jobs, as well as a Web-based audience looking to fill them. Dice is at the right place. Now it just needs to wait patiently for the rest of the party to show up.

CNET is a Rule Breakers stock pick. Yahoo! is a Stock Advisor recommendation. You can be fashionably early to the party of finding great growth-stock ideas, and with our free 30-day trial subscriptions, it won't cost you a penny.

Longtime Fool contributor Rick Munarriz is fairly sure that he has never owned a pair of fuzzy dice. He does not own shares in any of the companies in this story. He is part of the Rule Breakers newsletter research team, seeking out tomorrow's ultimate growth stocks a day early. The Fool's disclosure policy isn't fuzzy at all.