Many recruitment leaders I work with want their recruitment CRM to generate fees, but often recruiters are all too happy to jump back into spreadsheets, LinkedIn, notebooks and “going by memory” rather than use their CRM system properly. This blog is a quick 3minute read to create some perspective and give you some ideas for a “CRMFirst” strategy.
The above results in a nightmare for recruitment leaders who are looking to grow their business, become “GDPR-proof” and become more profitable.
It also results in a problem I call “Hairdresser Syndrome” – a term I’ve used for many years to describe a recruitment business that needs to get a grip on its processes and data to see real growth and ROI.
Do You Have a Recruitment Firm, or an Office Full of Desks For Rent?
I have been with my hairdresser for 8 years. He knows my taste in magazines, some of my secrets and all of my roots. A few years ago he was based in a large salon in the city, where he rented a chair.
The rest of the salon staff barely knew I was there, and I didn’t really notice them either – zero interaction. Perhaps if I was lucky my hair would be washed by one of the juniors. I’d pay the girl at the till on the way out, but my hairdresser was my only real contact at the salon.
One day he very quietly commented that he was opening his own salon, and would I like to move with him? I bit his hand off – why wouldn’t I? I had no relationship with the salon. They kept no details on me, perhaps they didn’t even know I existed. Would they miss my business?
For me, he was the salon.
Are Your Recruiters Hairdressers?
Can you see any similarities between your recruitment business and my hair salon?
They have exclusive relationships with the clients. Are you simply the “girl” taking my money at the till?
Do they use stuff in your business, such as hair washers, tea makers, reception (IT, HR, Finance, Admin) that their fees contribute to, but that I am totally oblivious to?
Are your consultants simply logging data at the point of sale to get the cash in but the juicy stuff which is about me, what I like, how I buy is in his/her head?
If they left and took “clients” with them, would you know? And don’t forget you’ll only know what data they’ve taken and who’s migrated with them if they told you about these relationships in the first place.
Even if you had the data on the client, would it be enough for you to continue the relationship going forward?
Are your clients engaging with your business or the consultant? Are their loyalties to the brand or their perceived face of the brand, the consultant (the hairdresser)?
I’m still seeing “30-second recruiters” who enter a candidate in the CRM just to place them and board the invoice. Recruitment consultants are tempted to brush off GDPR as a flash in the pan, carry on as usual and keep billing how they’ve always billed. That may work for them in the short term, but they’re missing out on opportunities to be more effective and profitable whilst putting the business at risk.
CRMFirst and GDPR: Hairdresser Prevention for Recruitment Leaders
2018 was the year of GDPR, and 2019 needs to be about CRMFirst (getting your candidates, clients and consultants addicted to your systems. It needs to be about data hygiene, recruiters building effective, retained relationships and recruitment firms focusing on growth, not just legislation.
A CRMFirst (BullhornFirst / AdaptFirst) culture can create a valuable pool of great data that will put you ahead of your competition and create a hidden asset that your clients (and prospective clients!) want access to.
Your recruitment CRM should be a USP – a unique selling point. Your recruitment software can be an addiction for your recruiters, your clients, candidates, and investors. All of which does the one job you bought it for – to make you more money.
Swap the Salon Culture for CRMFirst Culture…
Instilling a culture of data quality is challenging, but highly rewarding. Define the strategy, instil this into your culture and reduce the risk of bad data impacting the recruitment business.
Get your recruitment consultants engaged with your system and train them on best practice so they understand why great recruitment process is profitable for them, as well as your business. Stop them from simply renting a desk.
Once they can see and feel the benefits of following your processes (improving performance, profit, and ROI for themselves as well as the business) then your CRM can become a business growth tool, rather than an expensive data dump and potential GDPR risk.
So, are you guilty of simply renting a chair to your consultants to allow them to grow a lovely portable client base, or do you do more to grow/protect your brand, relationships, and market share?
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How Many Candidates (and Clients) Do Recruiters Really Need?
Recruitment leaders and their resourcers / recruiters need to read this blog for insights on how much data they really need, and how much data they can realistically manage, to run a successful desk and recruitment business.We’re all human (even recruiters) and we all have limits. In recruiting world, our limits can be how many jobs we can work, how many calls we can make, how many temps we can manage. One significant human limit is our ability to nurture relationships. Data = RelationshipsRecruitment is a relationship business. A recruiter’s job is to build and maintain relationships. Candidates need managing, clients need managing, colleagues need managing. Dunbar tells us that humans have relationship limits – we have “a number” we can manage. Robin Dunbar is a Professor Emeritus of Evolutionary Psychology of the Social and Evolutionary Neuroscience Research Group at Oxford Uni he knows a few things about human behaviour. Think of your relationships a bit like a layered onion with you in the middle. 5 loved ones 15 good friends 50 friends 150 meaningful relationships 500 acquaintances 1500 people you can recognise People can move in and out of these layers. What is Dunbar’s Number? And What’s It Got to Do with Recruitment? Where does a “typical” recruiter sit in their ideal candidate / contact’s layer? And where do their candidates and contacts sit? Recruitment Leaders! What should you be considering if you want to maximise the value of your database, and the relationships you want to maximise, optimise, monetise? How should you focus on and nurture the right relationships? What’s the Number of Candidates and Contacts a Recruiter Can Actively Manage? Dunbar suggests that humans are capable of building, nurturing and maintaining 150 good meaningful and trusted relationships. Of course, there are variations to this, such as extroverts vs introverts and social networks – for example women tend to have more contacts in the closest layers. Dunbar v Recruitment Dunbar’s study isn’t focused on recruitment or recruiters, but it’s definitely food for thought. 150 meaningful relations is not that many people when you consider the average recruiter has a database in the 1000s. But could you really market your recruitment business on a database of “acquaintances” or “people you recognise”? Where do your candidates and clients fall within these categories? Have you got any in the magic 150 “meaningful contacts”? Is your database segmented in such a way, or do you have a “data dump” which needs a good clean?[link to clean webinar]. Recruitment in the Good Old Days Before tech and data began paralysing recruitment (too much / never enough), recruitment was much more of a relationship business. You knew your candidates, their dog’s names, their kid’s ages. Relationships were easier to sustain, they were more valuable, and we charged more for our services. It’s likely that Dunbar would say a recruiter pre-social media had 150 meaningful relationships with candidate and clients, and perhaps even some friends? Now with infinite data and technology allowing for massively increased reach and volume, relationships, ironically, are a harder to start and sustain. Are you / your recruitment teams engaging with the right people, or just lots of candidates? (Too many applicants, not enough candidates?) Are you working the right opportunities, or just a list of one-off jobs? (Too many jobs, not enough sales?) Is Your CRM Simply a Datadump of Strangers? Recruiters who try to maintain too many relationships actually limit their own success. They dilute the relationships they’re trying to build, resulting in weaker, less meaningful, and less valuable relationships. Could Dunbar help you run your recruitment business? For example: Recruiters who run a busy temp desk and managing 100+ temps might not have the capacity to take on more or even do other activities such as Business Development or Sourcing. 360-degree recruiters will have more relationships to manage than a 180-degree recruiter, so this could mean a less focused strategy and outcome. Is it always necessary to hire another recruiter to manage more relationships, or could tech do some heavy lifting? 4 Ways to Be Smart with Recruitment Contacts Social Networks can help. Publishing content to your “connections” can help keep you in and around the Acquaintances and People You Recognise category. Your goal, though, should be to get your ideal contacts on to your CRM so you can more actively work them. Ideally you should be aiming to nurture them in the 150 “meaningful contact” space! Your Recruitment CRM/ATS (ideally powered by automation) also has ways to identify and categorise your relationships. Status fields, rating and grading fields are great places to start and will enable smart ways to manage and work the data. Automation (and recruiters) can keep these vital fields current. Automation is helping Recruiters identify, engage, nurture (and monetise) Acquaintances and People You Recognise and capitalising on these relationships. In the automation projects we deliver we are creating functional data so recruiters can focus on segments of contacts and candidates. They can then “work” their data, rather than just collect it. Your recruiters (ideally powered by automation/CRM) need to keep this data updated to ensure you can track, manage and support where necessary. This should also protect your relationships when recruiters move on. Final Thoughts Engaging and nurturing your candidates and clients is an important part of the recruitment lifecycle. Recruiters often struggle with “too much data, too many systems, not enough process”. Any help and support you can provide to your recruiters to create focus, so relationships are stronger and profitable, is crucial. How could you use Dunbar’s theory to help you create focus, function, and sustainability?(Big thanks to Louise at UK Recruiter for initially posting this blog.)Bullhorn ROI + Trained Happy Recruiters = More SalesWe pride ourselves on helping recruitment leaders achieve Bullhorn ROI. We create a Bullhorn1st vision, reduce the need for other tech, optimise Bullhorn, automate their sales-prevention processes and data, and train recruiters to trust it and use it.ARRANGE A FREE CONSULTATION NOW
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Automation Tip - Nail Your Date Ranges in Automation Lists
We've got an automation tip to help you ensure that you can really target the data (candidates and clients) you need to source, sell to, and place.We help recruiters to source quicker, and sell more, through our Automation Buddy program. Automation can positively transform a recruitment business - when it works. But when it doesn't work it feels like it simply costs money and keeps you reliant on Linkedin, Job Boards and other expensive data sources and tech.Don't Miss Out On a Hot Date (Or Sale)!When you build automations, they can be date-related, but I often see lists that aren't quite right, date ranges are setup incorrectly, and this means that you'll be missing out on vital sales (and candidate) opportunities. This can really affect automation ROI (and RoE - return on effort!)Damn!In my recent "5 Automations to Make You Money" webinar I explored how to create good quality lists to target your time and attention and keep hungry recruiters busy with the right calls. For example, you'll want to target lapsed clients, wake them up, and get them back into paying clients. These automations really need to work!But I have a fix for you to ensure that your lists and automations really drive revenue.Watch My Quick 1-Minute Automation Video, Nail Your Date Ranges, and Make More MoneyAutomation BuddyWe are Automation Buddies set on helping ambitious recruitment businesses who want to drive revenue using automation.READ ABOUT OUR AUTOMATION BUDDY SERVICENeed more Bullhorn / Automation Tips?Try our 1-minute tips.Be sure to sign up for (or watch the recordings of) our regular free Bullhorn and Automation webinars.CHECK OUT OUR WEBINARS
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