For any staffing firm, budgeting ahead for the new year is an important element of end-of-year planning. As you assess your prior year’s spending, there are many factors to take into account as your firm continues to evolve – including technology needs, marketing activities and employee feedback. As your leadership team gets planning underway, here are some tips to keep in mind as you develop your firm’s budget for next year:
Identify functions that can be automated.
One of the biggest sources of wasted time and money in staffing firms comes from administrative tasks that could be easily automated with the right technology. As you develop your budget for the new year, evaluate what parts of your recruiters’ daily activities can be automated and work on incorporating this technology in your expense planning. By automating certain routine functions, your recruiters will be better able to allocate their time to meaningful and creative candidate acquisition strategies. Over time, automation can result in reduced labor costs, as you’ll need fewer recruiters on your team to perform the same level of work.
Evaluate your marketing expenses.
For many staffing firms, marketing costs can add up quickly. It’s helpful to take an inventory of all your marketing expenses, including costs incurred from advertising, public relations, sponsorships, events and any other activities. If you’ve invested a lot of marketing dollars with little return, you may want to consider social media marketing as a cost-effective alternative. Training your recruiters about social media recruiting tactics can be a powerful way to cut back on marketing costs while attracting more top candidates. While managing social media does take time, it’s a free tool to use and is often more effective than traditional marketing methods.
Seek employees’ feedback.
Some of your most valuable feedback for budgeting can come from your employees. What areas of your firm does your team believe could be improved? What changes could be made to improve productivity? What barriers are holding your employees back from achieving more? Asking these questions will allow you to assess what types of functions need to be implemented so your budget is developed accordingly with your business needs.
Assessing your expenses is key to proper budgeting for the new year. Getting this process started sooner will allow your team to maximize its resources while achieving the best results in 2019.
Planning for the new year?
Learn why an ATS platform should be included in your budget and contact TrackerRMS, a leading cloud-based recruitment, applicant tracking and CRM software provider serving the needs of the recruitment industry.
