Search consultants love to recruit. They don’t love to market. That’s generally the rule. However, marketing, as they say, is necessary. Without recruitment marketing, you can’t gain the exposure you need with clients, prospective clients, and candidates to enjoy more success. In other words, if they don’t know who you are, then how are they going to use your services?
They’re not, that’s how. With that in mind, we’re going to explore the most popular recruitment strategies for search consultants. But before we do that, we’re going to define recruitment marketing.
What is recruitment marketing?
What is recruitment marketing? (Is there an echo in here?) Well, the term can mean slightly different things, depending upon who you are. For example, recruitment marketing means something different to an HR representative than it would to a third-party recruiter. And it just so happens that we’re going to tackle this topic from the perspective of a third-party recruiter. Because that’s how we roll.
To a third-party recruiter and/or agency owner, recruitment marketing means the process by which a recruiter or agency owner communicates their recruitment value proposition to clients, prospective clients, and candidates in the hopes of convincing these groups of people to use their services in the employment marketplace.
As you might have guessed, this process can and does involve many different aspects. You can market yourself in a variety of ways. So the question becomes this: which ways do recruiters use to market themselves the most?
To get the answer to this question, we recently conducted a survey of more than 20,000 recruitment professionals in the United States and Canada. We designed this survey to gauge the professionals’ opinions regarding a wide range of recruiting and hiring topics.
The recruitment marketing magic of referrals
One of those topics was that of recruitment marketing. In fact, we asked the following question in our survey:
What is your primary method of marketing your services?
True to their nature, recruiters chose “Outbound marketing phone calls” more than any other answer (48.4%). That’s a double-digit increase from the results of our 2018 survey, when the percentage was 36.6%. “Marketing emails” was in second place garnering 25.2% of the vote. (It also finished second in our 2018 survey.) Incidentally, it was a very close race for third and fourth place, as you can see:
- “Your website” — 12.8%
- “Social media sites” — 12.4%
And yes, there are still recruiters using print marketing and direct mail. Not a lot, mind you (1.2%), but still . . . there are a few. Whatever works, my friends. Whatever works.
Speaking of whatever works, recruiters made it a point to point out that referrals are the main way in which they market their services. (Even though it wasn’t a choice for this particular question.) Below is some of the feedback that we received regarding this particular survey question:
“None of the above—word of mouth and referrals—no other marketing needed. The survey forced me to choose one.”
“After 20 years in the business, I have built a brand which I attempt to reinforce through social media, blogs, podcasts, speaking engagements, etc. The majority of my business now actually comes through referrals.”
“Referrals are my only and best at this time. There was not a choice for my answer, so . . .”
“Some marketing emails when the opportunity makes sense, and I promote my website and LinkedIn profile and also have a Facebook business page. But mostly, my business is referral based with clients being referred to me.”
The recruiters who participated in our survey are as “old school” as they come. (And that’s a good thing, in case you were wondering.) Not only are they not afraid to pick up the phone and call people, but they’re also ALL about getting those golden referrals. In fact, referrals constitute so much of their business that they went out of their way to submit it as an answer even though it wasn’t officially an answer. That illustrates how much they believe in their value. And if they believe that much in their value, then so do we!
Our State of the Recruiting Industry Report
As mentioned at the beginning of this blog post, we conduct a survey of more than 20,000 recruitment professionals in the United States and Canada. We turn the results of this survey into what we call The State of the Recruiting Industry Report. We’ve conducted this survey and published this report in each of the past four years.
Search consultants’ most popular recruitment marketing strategies are just one part of Top Echelon’s 2019 State of the Recruiting Industry Report. This special report contains much more, including the following:
- Recruiters’ top priorities for 2019
- The best methods for advertising jobs on the Internet
- Recruiters’ biggest problems with clients
- The top complaints clients have about candidates
- Recruiters’ biggest problems with candidates
- Where to advertise your jobs to reach the most candidates
- What recruiters think about the future of the profession
Download the 2019 State of the Recruiting Industry Report!
And don’t forget, Top Echelon also offers one of the most affordable recruiting software packages on the market. The price is just $59.50 per user per month under the annual plan. Click here for a FREE 15-day trial of the software.