Recruiting requires a lead-gen mindset. The best recruiters are the ones who always have one eye out for opportunities to engage and capture new clients. If your recruiters are getting stagnant in this regard, there’s good news — this mindset can be developed.
With the right tools and a little guidance, your recruiters can become pros at finding new clients. Let’s look at 10 reasons why your recruiters aren’t generating enough opportunities and how you can help them turn that around.
1. They don’t know their value proposition
Are they confident in their abilities? Have they established a strong personal brand? Can they define the value they bring to a potential client? Are they able to explain what makes them unique from other recruiters?
This is square one. All the other tips rest on this one. Make sure your recruiters have this down, and help them get there if they don’t. Consider hosting an afternoon workshop to help your recruiters figure this out — it will be time well spent.
2. They’re not leveraging the right technology
Human relationships will always be at the heart of the recruitment industry, but there is amazing technology available that can help your team be better, smarter and more productive. Are you giving them access to it, and do they know how to make full use of it?
The most important thing you can give them is recruitment software with a full suite of tools and reporting metrics to help them be successful. TrackerRMS is a fully customizable, end-to-end relationship management system with applicant tracking, sales and CRM capabilities, workflow automation, onboarding tools and analytics.
Access to the best technology in the world isn’t any good if your recruiters aren’t properly trained on it. Make sure they know how to analyse the data and use it to boost leads. Tracker RMS provides comprehensive and continuing training and support for customer success.
3. They’re not fully leveraging social media & job boards
Your recruiters are already using social media (namely, we mean LinkedIn, but we don’t want to discount all other social channels) to source candidates, but make sure they’re using these channels to connect with companies as well. Three tips here:
- Make certain they’re setting alerts on their social channels to get notified when a company in your industry is hiring. If a company is posting several openings, they might need your services to find qualified candidates.
- They should maintain an active and valuable presence on LinkedIn and other social media. They should be posting regularly, sharing relevant and helpful content and interacting with prospective clients. This boosts their reputation and helps them be seen as experts in the field.
- Similarly, make sure recruiters are paying attention to job posting websites to see which companies are searching for new employees.
For more tips on using LinkedIn successfully, read our post, “10 Power Tips for Finding New Clients via LinkedIn.”
4. They’re not asking candidates any lead-generating questions
When recruiters interview candidates internally, are they asking questions that might generate leads? Smart recruiters use the initial candidate interview to uncover potential clients. Ensure they’re asking:
- Where else are you interviewing? (this alerts recruiters to companies that are hiring)
- Why are you looking for a new job? (something could be brewing at their current workplace that’s driving them to look for a new opportunity)
- What else can you tell me about your job search in this field? (open-ended questions like this just might turn up a lead)
5. They’re not making use of the reference-checking process
Similarly, when recruiters call to check on a candidate’s references, this might be a good time to make contact with a company that needs positions filled now or in the future. Use tact and good sense here, however. Recruiters shouldn’t force this one and appear tacky or opportunistic, but if it makes sense under the circumstances, it could kick off a good relationship.
6. They don’t maintain relationships with candidates they’ve placed
Good recruiting isn’t just about developing key relationships — it’s about maintaining them, too. Encourage recruiters to stay in touch with the people they’ve placed in jobs. Doing so strengthens the bond they’ve formed, and it could present an opportunity to:
- Gain deeper insight into how the company hires
- Further develop relationships with hiring managers there
- Get a recommendation from the candidate in the future
7. They don’t ask for referrals
This is a straightforward method to generating new clients that’s often overlooked. Simply put: They gotta ask. For example:
- They should ask current clients for referrals to other companies that could benefit from their services
- They should ask their placements for referrals as well
- They may be able to set up mutually beneficial relationships with other recruiters outside their niche (they can feed each other good clients and candidates)
- They can ask friends and family members to keep them in mind and give a referral when appropriate
In addition, recruiters should flat-out ask their clients how they can build and improve their business relationship — e.g., “I want to do more business with you. How can I make that happen?”
8. They’re not trained properly
Are they plugged in to the recruiting industry and aware of the latest trends, tools and best practices? This is a dynamic, changing industry — make sure they keep up, and give them the time and resources to do so. Specifically, ensure they understand how to:
- Perform Boolean searches to get the best results
- Use analytics to boost performance
- Get the most out of LinkedIn and other platforms
Provide targeted training where necessary.
9. They’re not trying to fill the positions they helped make vacant
Also known as “backfilling,” this is when a recruiter tries to move someone into a position made vacant when they placed the person who had the job into another position. Your recruiters already have a heads-up that the position is opening up — are they taking the opportunity to put another candidate in there?
Proper timing is key to pulling this off; your recruiter needs to act quickly to get in there, but they also must make sure the first candidate truly has the new job and has given notice to the company.
10. They’re not cold calling.
Sometimes, recruiters just need to grind out some old-fashioned cold calls. It’s not a lost art, as some industry sources believe — but it’s also not easy or particularly fun. But this is a numbers game, so make certain your team knows the do’s and don’ts of cold calling, including:
- Do call a with a “success” mindset in place; visualize yourself achieving what you want the call to achieve
- Do your homework; no one wants to receive a cold call only to learn that you don’t know even the most basic information about what they do
- Don’t claim to know the answer to anything you don’t; tell the prospect that you’ll find out and get back to them
- Don’t be negative or argumentative, and don’t discuss politics
- Do focus on the value you’ll provide
Empower your recruiting team
Take some time to find out where your recruiters sit with the above points. Most of these issues can be fixed in an afternoon team meeting, but the benefits can be swift and far-reaching. Maybe your staff just needs a nudge back on the right path — that happens to the best of us. Review these missteps and give them what they need to revitalize their efforts. It’s a little corny to say, but it’s what great leaders do.
To learn more about TrackerRMS and how it can help you manage your sales, recruiting and onboarding needs, contact us today.
