Most recruiters are guilty of this one. ‘Giving up too soon’ is the one mistake that separates the professional recruiters from the amateurs.  

So when is ‘too soon’? How many rejections can a person take before the lead is scratched off the call list? Moreover, how can you better tailor your pitch so that your follow-up call is happily received, rather than a source of irritation?  

Here’s a guide to follow up calls, and how they can dramatically transform your conversion rates, whether you are pitching a prospective big client, or chatting with an extremely wary passive candidate.  

Allow the data to overcome your fear of rejection: Follow up calls WORK 

It is hard to call someone whohas already said no to your recruiting services. Most of us would prefer just to move onto the next lead, feeling we are almost guaranteed to have better luck with someone who has not already outright rejected what we are offering.  

However, that is where you would be wrong. 

Data collected over 1.7million calls by ConnectandSell shows that you are 2.26 % more likely to get a meeting from someone who’s already rejected you than you are to get a meeting out of a cold call.

The reasons for this are as follows. 

1. You know the contact details are solid.  

When you are cold calling, there’s every chance your call will be a dead end only because the contact does not work there anymore, doesn’t answer their phone to unknown numbers, or are not the right person at the company to speak to.
 

2. You have information from your last call that you can use. 

When the prospect said ‘no’, or ‘not right now’ last time you spoke, there’s a good chance you managed to get some information from them about why it is not for them. A good recruiter uses this information, plus any other company background research, to tailor a pitch more likely to get to ‘yes’.
 

3. There’s an existing rapport.  

Even if the person said no last time, you are not a stranger to them. But when you open with ‘I spoke to you last month about a recruitment challenge your company is facing’ or ‘a new career opportunity at a blue chip company’, you’ve already broken down some of that wary barrier that almost all of us have when we answer the phone to someone we don’t know.  

The first call has made the first building block of rapport; you now need to build on it.  

4. Their business need or career need might have changed.  

When you called before, the prospective client or passive candidate was not interested, either because they had no need for your services at the time, or just hadn’t had a chance to think about it. (Some people do not like being rushed into decisions, and would prefer to tell you no, hang up and think about it rather than give you any sense they are interested!)  

Also, the company or candidate might have had something change- their internal hiring manager quits, their current recruiter disappointed them, or they have got a new manager at work they do not like and are therefore looking for new opportunities. You have no idea what’s changed since you spoke to a person last, so the follow up call is crucial.  

5. They know you are serious.  

This one can play out either way. Some people see persistence as downright pesky, while others see it as a sign you are a serious contender for their business. It is impossible to know this from a preliminary conversation- you must persist to understand how the lead reacts to persistence!  

Done right, there’s nothing pestering about persistence: you are just showing that their business or next career move is of genuine interest to you and that you are something more than just another cold-caller.  

When is too soon to ‘give up’ following up?  

Ok, so you have followed up once, and they have said no again. Is it now time to give up?  

Not. 

A staggering 80% of sales are made on the fifth to twelfth contact. The second contact generates a measly 3% of sales, so if you are giving up at this point, your billing numbers are hardly going to set the world on fire.  

However, 25% of recruiters do give up at the second call, and another 12% of recruiters only make it to the third call before throwing in the proverbial towel.  

Your opportunity kicks in where their effort drops off. Be the recruiter that keeps following up. 

Of course, you do need to use your discretion here. If a prospect has bluntly said, ‘Stop bothering me. Take me off your list; the answer is no’, then you should stop following up with that person. (However, don’t give up on the company, there may be another way in worth pursuing if you can find another contact with some influence over recruitment.) 

How to make sure your follow ups fall on receptive ears 

As we mentioned above, follow-up calls have one glaring advantage: you already know something about the company, so you can tailor your pitch better than you did first time round. Do not squander this advantage or your follow up call will probably end in disappointment.  

Do a bit of background research on the person- check out their LinkedIn and any other useful platforms, try and get a sense of the person and maybe find the information you can lead with, like their favourite sporting team.  

You may also need to space your calls out, so the prospect feels you are ‘checking in’ to see if their circumstances have changed, rather than harassing them.  

So, ask yourself, how many times do you usually follow up before you give up? Are you giving up too soon? Why not try to make at least one more follow up call than you normally do over the next few weeks and see how you get on.  

Until next time,  

Cheryl 

Being a recruiter is often a high-pressure job, and it can be made downright painful if you are working with the billing manager from hell. Perhaps they are always on your back when it comes to your sales process, or maybe they are a very unpleasant person, always trying to put you down. 

It is easy to feel persecuted and resentful when you know a manager has it in for you, but neither of these emotional responses will help your situation. You need to formulate a plan of action to handle ‘the billing manger from hell’ in a way that benefits your career and your happiness.  

1. Look inwards.  

The first action must be dispassionate self-analysis. Be honest with yourself: are you giving the billing manager any reason to ‘go after you’? Are you failing to hit targets, have you lost important clients, or have you had an unfortunate run of being late to work? It is important to accept any part you have to play in this situation. 

If you identify aspects of your work where you are not hitting the mark, you may be able to entirely turn the situation around by requesting a meeting with the manager, admitting any fault, and requesting their help to improve. Of course, if your manager is an unpleasant character, this can be a tough pill to swallow, but their personality defects do not cancel out any mistakes you have made. 

This is a hard thing to do that only brave; self-aware recruiters will be able to pull off. However, that is you, isn’t it? Think of them as a problematic VIP client, and use your powers of persuasion to shift the situation in your favour. 

2. Become better at your job.  

Weak managers are often insecure managers. The very worst managers are narcissists, meaning their fragile ego drives almost all their decision-making. This means they like people who bring them favourable attention.  

Top billers reflect exceptionally well on managers, as senior figures tend to attribute at least some of the recruiter’s success on their manager. If you can improve your billing numbers, you may find you are suddenly flavour of the month. We have written very extensively on how to improve your billing numbers, so check out our blog catalogue to craft your strategy. 

Moreover, you know what? If it does not work, your brilliant billing numbers will make it a cinch to move onto another recruitment company where they do value your input (and your boss is not an egotistical maniac.) 

3. Learn to control your emotions. 

Seems unfair, doesn’t it. They are the one behaving badly, yet it is down to you to learn to better control your emotional response ?!  It is unfair, but it is the only practical solution; after all, you cannot hope to change another person, you can only work on yourself.  

A great way to start is by noting your emotional response when you have any contact with the manager. Does your heart rate rise? Do you immediately feel on the defensive (even to the extent that you were possibly reading in negative behaviours when there weren’t any)? 

Writing down your thoughts, meditation, and deep breathing can help you to start noticing when your emotional state is heightened. Our bodies are instantly triggered by ‘fight or flight’ mode when we’re stressed, so a great thing you can practice at your desk is 4-7-8 breathing (in for 4 counts, hold for 7, out for 8), which will force your nervous system back into the ‘rest and digest’ mode. It works, try it next time you notice your heart racing when the boss has a go at you.  

4. Discuss your concerns with the manager. 

If you find your strategy is not working to improve the relationship, you will need to have a discussion raising your concerns. It is possible they simply don’t realise that their management style is problematic for you, particularly if others do not seem to have an issue with it.  

Your strategy should be: Frame your concerns in light of how it benefits them, particularly if you are dealing with a narcissist.   

For instance, ‘I want to get my billing numbers up, but I find when you yell at me in front of the team, I get flustered and find it hard to concentrate for the rest of the day. Could we schedule a private meeting next time, and I would love to get some coaching from you so I can perform better for the team.’ 

You have then provided them with an attractive reason to change their behaviour (while throwing a bit of flattery into the mix.) 

5. Document everything. 

When dealing with a boss who has a vendetta against you, it is vital to document everything, so you are not left without recourse if they start counteracting their earlier instructions to trip you up. When you have a verbal discussion, send them a ‘recap’ email to have it in written form.  

Also, keep your files backed up so that you can leave the job at any time if you need to.  

Remember, there is so much still in your power. However, if you find that none of these strategies gets the boss from hell off your back, there are plenty of great companies out there looking for recruiters! 

Until next time,  

Cheryl  

We’ve written recently about how the pressure of operating in a skills-short marketplace can sometimes lead to recruiters not doing their due diligence with candidates.  

Less qualified or suitable candidates can sometimes slip through the net in these circumstances, bringing professional embarrassment on you when the hiring manager or client is disappointed with the candidate quality, or if the hire doesn’t work out. 

In the last blog, we shared some interview questions to ensure the candidate’s quality before putting them forward to the client. In this week’s blog, we’re following the same theme, but applying it to certain warning signs, you should be looking out for on candidate CVs. 

It’s so easy just to skim CVs, alighting on those skills that you know the client needs, but there’s often a whole subtext in the details if you just know where to look.  

1. The CV has not been tailored to the role.  

Receiving a general CV, no matter how impressive, indicates two things:  

1. That the candidate has not made any extra effort to get this role, and therefore may not be enthusiastic or particularly driven to succeed in winning the position. This lack of effort (whether driven by apathy or laziness) may extend into their everyday working style.
 

2. They are probably applying for many roles with that same CV. A scattergun approach like this indicates that the candidate doesn’t really care about the role or company in question and that the chances they will accept an offer may be significantly diminished.  

It is not much to expect for a candidate to amend their CV to reflect the requirements mentioned in the job spec. Those who don’t bother are often not worth considering. 

2. The CV provides no proof of achievements. 

Many candidates make the mistake of listing all their skills, responsibilities, and job titles, but forget the most important bit: their achievements.  

You want to be reading about the proof that they ran a team successfully, not just a statement that they ran a team. What did they achieve in that role? What were the tangible results? 

Note that this is often just poor CV-writing skills to blame, rather than an indicator the person hasn’t achieved, so if you see potential in the candidate, be sure to probe for further detail and ask them to rewrite their CV to reflect their accomplishments.  

3. The CV has a patchy work history. 

It’s common and absolutely fine for people to change careers or take time off to travel or have children. What may indicate a problem is: 

1. Time off that is unaccounted for—were they long-term unemployed, and why?  

2. Inconsistent dates—why does their LinkedIn profile say they were at a job for 14 months, when the dates on their CV say 2 years? 

3. Lots of job-switching—particularly into different careers entirely, indicating they have trouble settling in one job or field. 

Many gaps can be explained away satisfactorily, but it’s your job to spot them and query them further. Otherwise, you might look a bit foolish in front of the hiring manager who does spot them in the interview! 

4. Poor formatting, spelling, and grammar. 

A CV should be well formatted with no spelling or grammar mistakes firstly for clarity, but there’s a deeper meaning here too, as it reflects how much care the candidate has shown in their application.  

This goes to their keenness for the role, but also their suitability. If the candidate has stated that they have proficiency in the Microsoft Office or Acrobat suites but have turned in a poorly formatted CV, you have reason to call their claim into question.  

Additionally, if there are spelling or grammar mistakes in the CV and the role requires a lot of communication like email or report writing, the person is probably not right for the role.  

5. The CV is too long. 

And no, this one isn’t just because recruiters dread reading CVs that are as long as War and Peace!  

An overly long CV (more than 2 pages, 3 at absolute most) shows that either the candidate struggles to recognise what is salient information, or perhaps hasn’t cared enough to cut their CV down, having just added a paragraph each time they’ve finished up in a job. Either way, it’s not a great indicator of the caliber of the candidate.  

If the candidate is applying for a technical role, an overly long CV doesn’t matter as much, but if it’s a role that requires written communication, this mistake could rule the candidate out.  

Until next time,  

Cheryl 

In a skills-short market, it’s all too easy for recruiters to get excited about promising candidates. The danger lies when this enthusiasm to place candidates makes you less discerning and thorough during the screening process than you normally would be.  

Although it’s difficult, you should be holding your candidates to the same standards as you would have done during the GFC when candidates were competing heavily for jobs. Only when they’ve passed your firm but fair requirements should they be put forward to the client.  

Without the sufficient groundwork in place, you risk recommending a candidate who either shows their inadequacies or cultural misalignment during the interview or fails to perform once in the role. Both outcomes reflect extremely badly on you as a recruiter, diminishing your professional reputation in the client’s eyes. 

Here are 8 questions that will help you determine the candidate’s suitability for the role and company, and figure out if they should progress to the client’s interview shortlist.  

1. This role will be paying between x and Y. Are you still interested in the role?  

When clients don’t divulge the salary range in the job spec, it’s best to make compensation clear to the candidate during the interview process to avoid disappointment down the line. Have the money conversation upfront to painlessly weed out candidates who will never accept the salary on offer. 

2. Where do you see yourself in 5 years? How would you like your career to grow? 

This is an important question for a long-term fit. If your candidate answers that they see themselves as sitting several rungs up the career ladder in 5 years, you’ll know they’re ambitious and expect opportunities for rapid promotion. Is the advertised role at the company likely to provide that? 

3. What kind of workplace do you thrive in? What’s the best place you ever worked in, and why? 

These are great questions to predict cultural alignment. Candidates aren’t going to be privy to the culture of the organisation they’re applying for, so they’ll find it difficult to lie to impress you. You’ll notice their eyes will light up when they talk about past companies and managers they’ve loved working with, and you’ll get a nice insight into what kinds of culture they fit well into.  

4. What’s your natural working style? How do you like to be managed and motivated?  

Again, because the candidate doesn’t know the company from an insider’s point of view, you have an opportunity to glean a tremendous amount of useful information here. Do they like regular feedback, or prefer a significant amount of autonomy? Are they responsive to bonuses and targets, do they enjoy teamwork, do they like busy workplace environments or prefer to work in peace and solitude? 

5. Tell me about a time when you’ve overcome a challenge at work/or a time when you failed. 

This behavioural question requires that the candidate looks back to a time of difficulty and explains, step by step, how they dealt with it. You should get a sense of how they respond to conflict or difficulty, and there’s also room to figure out if they tend to shift blame or accept it.  

This line of questioning can, of course, be nicely tailored to the job at hand, such as if you’re hiring for a high-intensity role you might ask ‘Tell us about a time when you were under extreme pressure and how you coped.’ 

6. Why are you leaving your current role? 

Watch their faces carefully, because this question can put many candidates on the back foot. Any cagey responses or looks of panic should definitely prompt you to ask further questions, as well as decide to do a particularly thorough series of reference checks. 

Of course, lots of very good candidates don’t like answering this question either as it requires them to diplomatically walk that very fine line between complaining about their last company or boss or glossing over any problems completely, so simply use this question as a guide to whether you need to investigate the circumstances of their leaving any further.  

7. What skill or trait do you feel will be of most benefit to this company? What skill or trait do you most need to improve? 

This two-part question allows the candidate to both showcase their biggest strength while also admitting their biggest weakness. Pay close attention not only to their answers, gauging just how critical these skills or lacks are to the job on offer, but also to how they react to each part of the question.  

How much air time they give to each part can be quite telling on their level of self-awareness as well as their self-confidence and ability to admit weakness. 

Do they talk in detail about what they’ll bring to the company, but almost skim over the weaknesses? You may have an ego on your hands, or simply someone who doesn’t like to admit weaknesses. Or perhaps you have someone who criticises themselves a lot but struggles to promote themselves. Either way, this question provides much food for thought for the savvy recruiter.  

8. What are you most excited about with this role?  

Genuine excitement is hard to fake, so again, watch carefully. The best placements you’ll ever make are the ones where the candidate really, really wants the job, while being highly informed about what the job really is.  

Here’s an opportunity not only to spot their level of enthusiasm but also find out if they have realistic expectations about what the role comprises of. For example, if they’re wildly enthusiastic about a task that only makes up a tiny fraction of their responsibilities, then the job may not actually be the right fit for them. 

Final steps: proceed with caution. 

Once you’ve gathered all this information, look back on your (copious) notes about the role, the team, and the company, and make a mature, considered decision about whether this candidate truly deserves to be put forward.  

Remember, your reputation as a recruiter depends on it. Don’t risk damaging your reputation in the long-term, just to put someone forward for an interview on the off chance they’ll be hired. Even if they are hired, they may not work out, risking your placement fee as well as your good name! 

And don’t forget you can have a discussion with the hiring manager about any niggling doubts you have, allowing them to make up their own minds whether to interview the candidate.  

This makes you look very professional, as you’re showing the client clearly that you’re more interested in making the right match than securing your placement fee. On borderline candidates with high potential but a warning sign such as patchy work history, this can be a clever approach.  

Until next time,  

Cheryl 

The GSR2R Easter Quiz 2018 is Live!

Would you like to indulge your taste buds in a Lindt Chocolate feast? Then don’t waste any more time. Test your skills on our Easter anagrams and a 1 kg Lindt Gold Bunny could be making its way to you.

Tempted, then email Claire@gsr2r.com with your answers to the following three anagrams.

1. Bush consorts

2. Nearby tunes

3. Separated ear

Entries with three correct answers will be placed in a hat and the winner drawn at 4 pm on Thursday, March 29^th.

Conditions apply. If you are in central London, you can pick up your prize from our office just off Oxford Circus, or we will arrange for delivery within central London too.

You might have heard that cold calling was on the way out for recruiters. You heard wrong. Cold calling is still an absolute gold-mine of opportunity in 2018…provided you do it right.

However, aren’t AI and social selling taking over all kinds of sales, including recruiting?

With the onrush of artificial intelligence in recruiting and the exploding role of social selling roles via Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, a strange thing is happening in the world of sales.

The sound of the human voice on the phone is becoming a novelty.

The key to translating cold calls into billing numbers lies in being human. It always has been.

Successful cold-calling is about the human rapport. It is the human skill of noticing a person’s voice is showing signs of impatience and changing tack. It is about making a joke or sharing your disgust over the weather. It is about knowing that the person on the other end probably has a recruitment frustration, and just figuring out how to get them to tell you.

The person who can sell well on the phone is the one that succeeds in creating a genuine, human rapport.

After all, would you chat and laugh with a robot on the phone? Moreover, do you get the same feeling of personalisation from seeing a vacancy pop up on Facebook as you would if a recruiter took the trouble to call you to talk about a role? No, didn’t think so.

Cold calling can be your ticket to an exploding talent and client pipeline. Really. You just have to put all your effort into being as good at is as you can be. And with so many recruiters happily turning their backs on cold-calling, you can stand out in a way you could not before.

So let’s get on with it. Here are some killer strategies for cold-calling.

Whether you are cold-calling a prospect or a passive candidate, you can’t behave like a robot. Don’t read off a script or you will put people off instantly.

Show that you have done your research. Nothing puts people off more than a generic opening. If you are calling a client, show that you already know what vacancies they have right now, and have a suitable candidate ready to offer them.

If you’re calling a passive candidate, figure out an opening that will make them more receptive to your call. Look at their LinkedIn to see if you have similar contacts if you know any of their past employers or anything else where you can find a common bond.

Remember to make it about them. A savvy recruiter never makes their pitch about themselves and how good a recruiter they are, but instead asks searching questions to identify the client’s most significant business need when it comes to recruitment or the candidate’s true career desires.

Show off your knowledge of the sector. The best recruiters are knowledgeable about the trends in the recruitment landscape. If the skills shortage is biting in the client’s industry, it will pique the interest to mention data on the average of how many jobs offers a good candidate gets. If your company has a white paper or blog about how to attract candidates, offer to send that through.

Make sure you are taking complex notes. If you get a second call or meeting lined up, you do not want to embarrass yourself by having to go over the same ground twice.

Be ready to counter any objections they have. You should know exactly what to say if they mention they are happy with their current recruiter or are trying to do everything in-house.

Follow up via email straight away. Don’t put it on tomorrow’s list; they must receive an email when your conversation is fresh in their minds. This immediacy also shows that you consider them a priority.

Ask the person if there are any other departments within the company who might have recruitment needs or anyone in their circle. Referrals are a powerful way to make cold-calling work for you.

Set yourself targets for every day, and every call. You might set aside an hour every day purely dedicated to cold-calling, or you might do more significant blocks a few times a week.

Know your strengths and fill your gaps. You will have already noticed that you seem to have more success with individual businesses. Why do you think that is? Do you have a stronger knowledge base in that sector? Personal experience even? That is great, but now it is time to figure out how you can beef up your knowledge about other niches or industries so you can maximise your results.

Finally, lots of people do not like cold calling. However, remember this:

1. The more cold calling you do, and the better you get at it, the more confident you become. Confidence is a billings-magnet, you know this!

2. The very same phone skills that you build cold-calling…are the same phone skills that you will be used when closing a deal over the phone with a CEO. Every minute you spend on the phone makes you better at it.

So follow these steps this year and learn to LOVE cold calling. Just remember, don’t be a robot. Be real, because that is the human connection everyone is looking for.

Until next time,

Cheryl

Culture, culture, culture. Company culture is again hitting the headlines as the critical driver of employee attraction and retention in 2018.

According to a US study by Fidelity, Millennials are willing to sacrifice up to $7,600 (£5,600) for a job with a better work environment, with ‘culture factors’ such as work-life balance, meaningful work, sociable workplaces, and career development increasingly driving candidate decisions and engagement.

Which means that recruiters like you need to consider culture as one of your core focuses of the coming year.

Candidates will be asking about it. Clients will be telling you about it. Moreover, you should be learning about it.

Here are four steps to use company culture to your advantage as a recruiter in 2018.

Step 1: Learn about your client’s company culture.

Your first step is to sit down with the client and find out what the existing culture is- digging down into their highlights as well as some aspects that need to be improved. Impress upon them the importance of being honest.

Find out how the advertised culture impacts on the role in question. If one of the company values you have been told about is teamwork, does the company work hard to reinforce that? Is the open office plan, with great meeting rooms and a lovely lunch room where people chat and spend time? Will the person be required to engage in much teamwork, or is there a lot of room for autonomy in the role?

If another value you have been told about is transparency, ask for examples of how that plays out. Find out how their culture buzzwords translate into reality. Words are just words without real examples to back them up!

Reach out to people in your network who know about the company, such as ex-employees, to get a more unguarded viewpoint of what it is like to work there. Take a (cautious) look at review sites such as Glassdoor to ascertain any common culture pressure points such as a tendency towards micromanagement or authoritarian leadership.

Also look at public records of any history of sexual harassment or discrimination claims that could indicate a problematic culture.

When you have a broad view of culture, consider which of your candidate pool could be well suited to the culture dynamic you have discovered, and how you can portray the best of the culture to candidates while not being dishonest about the negatives.

Step 2: Find out what candidates are looking for in their expectations of culture

This will differ between candidates, and you should be asking specific questions of your candidates to find out which kinds of company cultures they personally thrive in.

It is also worth doing some more general research into cultural trends, and what types of organisational culture are attracting or deterring candidates.

It is worth thinking about generational differences here. Millennials will often be extremely interested in matters of culture, as they exhibit a strong preference for flatter hierarchies, quick career progression, constant learning, opportunities to travel, being valued, and a good work/life balance.

Step 3: Teach your candidates to learn about the culture for themselves.

You can only tell a candidate pardon you know, but it is essential to educate the candidate on how to find out about culture for themselves. Give them a guide on what questions might be useful in the interview to determine culture.

You can also point them towards other ways to discover the culture, such as Glassdoor reviews. However, teach them to be wary of believing everything they read as the preponderance of reviews will almost certainly be left by disgruntled ex-employees, as that is the way of review sites, unfortunately!

The point is, not helping them find out about culture only plays out poorly for you, them, the client in the long run. If the candidate quits after a month due to a culture mismatch, you won’t get your fee, they won’t think well of you for not telling them about the poor culture fit, and the client will be frustrated with you for not providing candidates that stay (even if it’s their culture that drove them away!) That’s what we call a lose-lose-lose scenario.

Step 4: Advise your client on culture matters.

You may need to advise your client about steps they could take to improve the culture in a way that top talent will respond well to.

The decision to improve culture must be taken within the company itself, as it is a huge step that must be ‘lived and breathed’ by senior management to make it work. However, that is not to say that as a recruiter you do not have a tremendously important role to play, by impressing on your clients what is driving candidate behaviour, and just how much culture factors into the decisions of top talent to accept or reject a job.

You can also suggest ways to improve their culture, from renovating the office, starting a work sports team, engaging in charity work, throwing a work party, or creating a new incentive scheme. These are just ‘band-aids’ though: the real work must come from within the company as they nut out the values and goals that matter to the company, and issue to its employees.

You can share your expertise in this regard, by revealing what you have learnt about the positive culture from your candidates and other clients.

Culture is vitally important, and in a candidate’s market, it can make the difference between a candidate accepting your client’s offer, and rejecting it outright. Your job is to know everything there is to know about the culture from both the candidate and client’s perspective, so you can match top candidates with a workplace culture that suits them, keeping all parties happy in the long run.

Until next time,

Cheryl

A recruiter who has significant weaknesses in their sales call process, style, or delivery will struggle to achieve greatness as a recruiter. It is that simple.

Most recruitment consultants do have these development areas, In fact; we would go so far as to say nearly everybody does have specific weaknesses in their phone manner or phone pitch. Nobody is perfect—and that is ok, as each sales call you make is an opportunity to learn and get better.

Here are some of our top tips for nailing your sales calls this year.

1. Adapt your style to your different audiences.

A recruiter who speaks the same way to clients as they do to a candidate may well end up losing both. Moreover, passive candidates often take another approach altogether! A good recruiter must be a chameleon, building rapport based on the situation of the person they are talking to.

2. Nailing Sales calls with active candidates

A talented recruiter understands that when they pick up the phone to a candidate, it is about winning hearts and minds. You want them to like you, to trust you. You want to make them feel like you are taking them into confidence when telling them about plum roles, that you genuinely care about their career aspirations, and that you alone are the recruiter that will work tirelessly to find them the right opportunity.

This relationship is about a candidate’s career dreams and your ability to fulfil them.

3. Nailing Sales calls with leads and clients

When it comes talking to clients on the phone, you should remember that this relationship is about business outcomes. It is much more transactional, and you need to quickly prove how your services fulfil a business need for them while confirming that you have the necessary expertise in their sector to outperform other recruiters.

4. Nailing Sales calls with passive candidates

Passive candidates are different again. They are often cautious and even looking for an opportunity to shut the conversation down, mainly if they are quite content in their current role. Here, your phone pitch must lead with an exceptional hook that you have tailored to their specific situation.

‘There’s an EA role at a blue-chip IT company offering an exceptional package, and your impressive tech sector background made me think of you immediately. You were recommended to me by X, who worked with you at… (You may have found this candidate on LinkedIn, but you have done your extra homework and made contact with one of their connections to create a link between you.)

With the passive candidate, you need to have something very attractive to offer them on the very first call.

5. Getting over your fear of phones!

It is many recruiters’ dirty little secret: you actually really don’t like cold calling, and will often spend extra time social selling or managing your database rather than picking up the phone. Yet how good you are at this one skill will reflect in your billing numbers, and every single time you get on the phone, you get better at it.

We have written an entire blog post on why cold calling still really, really matters in today’s recruitment landscape, with plenty of tips on how to be good at.

6. Don’t try so hard.

By this, we do not mean put your feet up on the desk and take the afternoon off. We suggest that you need to stop radiating desperation down the phone.

This often takes one of two forms: either you talk nineteen to the dozen about all the services you offer (forgetting to tailor your pitch to the customer’s specific needs), or you spend the five minutes telling the lead about your amazing success as a recruiter, in the hope that they’ll be so dazzled by your accomplishments that they’ll take you on as their recruiter immediately.

Both of these approaches are common and understandable—you want to hook them and prove your worth before they hang up. However, both forget the first rule of sales calls…

7. Remember, it is all about them.

Sales call success in recruitment comes from the simple understanding that:

1. Every company has business needs to be filled, and

2. People like to talk about themselves.

As a recruiter, you need to do your research before you call so that you understand their position and can speculate that they may have business needs they need filling, or what kind of jobs a candidate might be interested in. Moreover, then you have some searching questions ready!

‘I have seen that you have just moved to new premises. Are you expanding your team?’

‘I notice that you have had a couple of vacancies advertised for some time, are you interested in a new recruitment approach? I have some suitable candidates ready for interview.’

I see from LinkedIn that you have powerful experience in the retail sector. We have multiple exciting opportunities, such as…’

Additionally, rapport is created when you ask people questions about themselves not necessarily related to recruitment. If there’s just been a bank holiday, you can ask them if they had a good one, or if you are calling a repeat client, ask them about their family. This stuff matters, particularly in a world where the actual human conversation is being superseded by social media and AI!

8. Use your industry knowledge to impress the (or get some, quick)

Peppering your pitch with interesting information tailored to the client or candidate’s sector or position is a powerful way to advertise your expertise.

What do you know about recruitment trends in the UK that might be relevant to them, or what have you read about the economy that might lead to a boom in a specific sector? You should always be reading recruitment news and current affairs with an eye to how you can use this information to help your candidates and clients.

9. Be yourself.

Have you noticed your ‘phone voice’ is quite different to your real voice? Do you find your voice rises an octave when you get on the phone, your heart starts beating faster, and you start to talk very rapidly?

If so, you have not quite nailed talking on the phone just yet. No doubt you have also noticed that when you do have a sales call where you are feeling comfortable and relaxed, things are so much more enjoyable and smooth!

It is a great idea to get relaxed before phone calls you are nervous about. Take a walk round the block, do some deep breathing, and run through a mock phone call with a friend a few times. Practice does make perfect—as long as you are noting what you do each time differently, and see what works.

Remember, even top billers (perhaps especially top billers) work to improve their sales calls. It is an ongoing process that you will become better and better at throughout your career, as long as you are willing to adapt your approaches and never stop trying.

Until next time,

Cheryl

The simple, glaring truth that none of us can get away from is that recruitment is intensely competitive and that savvy recruiters must always be looking for ways to stand out in the eyes of candidates and clients.  

Clients are coming to a recruiter to find top-tier candidates to fill their role, and candidates are seeking you out to see suitable vacancies to fit their skills and career dreams.  

But on the surface, that doesn’t make you different from any other recruiter, who are all claiming to be able to provide the same high-level candidates and roles.  

So how do you make them choose you? And when a client isn’t happy with the crop of candidates you’ve presented, or the candidate misses out on a significant role or two you’ve put them forward for… 

How do you keep them from going elsewhere? How do you stop them losing faith?  

The solution is also glaringly simple.  

Your customer service is what makes people stay  

In recruitment, you must be a bit of an amateur psychologist: you must understand how personal connections and loyalty drive human behaviour and decision-making. When you take extra time with a client or candidate, really listen to their needs, and take time to follow up, you are; 

1. Showing them that you care about their success, above and beyond your placement fee.  

2. Getting to know them better, so you are genuinely being able to provide a better service with a higher success rate. 

3. Building loyalty! It’s this loyalty that stops them from moving to a new recruiter at the first hiccup.  

Whether candidate or client, you should be building a relationship for the long-term, not the short term (even if you think the candidate is so amazing they’ll land the first role they interview for. If they’re that amazing, you want them for their whole careers, not just this one placement!) 

When something goes wrong, you want your client or candidate to immediately think:  

‘They’ve been really good to me. All that effort they’ve made that they really didn’t need to. I’m going to stick with them; I’ll give them another chance.’  

Loyalty is the most precious commodity in business.  

And ‘above and beyond’ customer service is the way you build it.  

It’s also the way you grow your reputation so that other clients and candidates hear about your unusually excellent customer service, and approach you. 

Too Simple to Be True?  

And while you think it might be a solution so simple that everyone is doing it, that’s where you’re wrong.  

I cannot tell you how many times I’ve heard candidates shocked to listen to me call after hours to follow up on the success of their interview or thanking me profusely for offering the little bit of time it takes to run through their CV or some likely interview questions.  

I’ve also been delighted to find that dormant clients are always happy to speak to me when I call to check up on how they’re doing- even if I haven’t placed a candidate with them for a year or more.  

This check-up call sends the message that you don’t just care about the clients that spend big, it keeps you fresh in their mind for when they need placements, and it also encourages them to help you out by recommending you to their friends. It’s a virtuous circle.  

Why is something so fundamental, so compelling?  

Recruiters are busy, busy, busy. So naturally, the first thing that falls off their to-do list is the discretionary effort (that is, they don’t have to do it). And customer service—at least at the level where you’re going the extra mile and doing things that aren’t actually crucial tasks—is the very definition of discretionary effort.  

We help those that help us, and we like to do business with those that we like. Again, core human psychology. If you understand that and act on that fundamental principle to make your clients and candidates feel special, you will be a wildly successful recruiter.  

So, what can you do to give candidates and clients the ‘special treatment’? 

1. Make your commute work for you. 

It takes surprisingly little effort to wow a candidate by calling them on the train on your way home from work to run through some interview prep or request a client to check in on that candidate you placed last quarter. 

2. Take an excellent candidate to their interview.  

This one for the recruitment superstars. It takes more effort to accompany a promising candidate to their interview but believe me; you’ll have them for life when you do this (and increase the chances that the hiring manager will take the candidate seriously when you introduce yourself before leaving them to it.) 

3. Schedule reviews with your client.  

In your initial meetings with the client, you should have discussed their recruitment goals, and taken copious notes. After some time has passed and you’ve placed candidates with them, you should request a follow-up meeting with them to discuss how their hiring strategy is paying off.  

You should also wow them with any specialist industry knowledge you have, such as any recruitment trends, or new employment regulation that applies to their business. 

4. Work on reducing your email response time.

Everyone is impressed by prompt response, and everyone is frustrated by a slow one- mainly when a job hangs in the balance! Learn better skills to get to ‘inbox zero’, whereby your email is under your control.  

5. Set one customer service task as one of your MITs. 

MIT’s, for the uninitiated, are Most Important Tasks, the critical tasks that you must get done in each day in order to be a productive recruiter. The unfortunate thing is, that customer service often ‘falls off’ this list, as it is often discretionary effort. But as we’ve discussed, it is this discretionary effort that sets you above the other recruiters—ones who are just attacking the crucial day-to-day tasks. So make sure you include at least one significant customer service action in your MIT list for each day. 

There are so many ways to build client and candidate loyalty. We know it’s a lot to ask of busy recruiters, but the unfortunate truth is that you’ll be a lot less busy if you lose your biggest client or top candidate to that other recruiter that’s sniffing around! 

And your job will genuinely be more satisfying (and more profitable) when you provide better customer service.  

Until next time Cheryl 

We all know someone who knows how to roll with the punches, who has the resilience to get back up and keep fighting after a setback at work or in their personal lives. 

In 2018, that person could be you.  

The recruitment landscape is competitive, hard-working, and often stressful, and success in this field requires a mental toughness that can sometimes feel a bit out of reach.  

But it’s not out of reach: Far from it.  

Mental toughness is a hot topic in the corporate, military, and sporting worlds, and a great deal of research is being poured into discovering what mental toughness is, and more importantly, how it can be built. 

What is Mental Toughness? 

Mental toughness, often called resilience, is basically your level of ‘grit’. It’s your determination to keep going and reach your goals, even in the face of significant obstacles.  

Mental toughness is what often makes the slightly less naturally talented person, that hardworking B-grade student, end up eclipsing the effortlessly straight-A student when they get out into the real world. 

In fact, intelligence or raw talent often doesn’t correlate with long-term success.  

A great deal of our success is down to sheer, mule-stubborn effort. Mental toughness—perseverance and passion in pursuit of our goals— is what matters in the end.  

The ‘Beast Barracks’: Why Grit is the Route to Success 

A great example of the power of mental toughness is to be found in the cadet program at West Point, the famous US military school. West Point has a ruthless training regime for its cadets, to test the cadet’s physical, mental and emotional limits. The program is so gruelling that it’s called the ‘Beast Barracks’, and many cadets never reach the end. 

When researchers studied the cadets who entered the program, it wasn’t the strongest or the ones with the Best SATS or leadership aptitude that blitzed the field. It was the ones who had scored well on ‘grit’: that is, the ones that displayed strong traits of passion and perseverance for long-term goals.  

People who scored highly on ‘grit’ were an astonishing 60% more likely to complete Beast Barracks training.  

So, how can you build your Mental Toughness in 2018? 
1. You need to care deeply about your goal.  

It’s tough to persevere when you don’t have a real passion for your goal. You need to figure out your WHY, that is, why are you doing this job? What does succeeding at this job offer you? Is it a feeling of mastery of your skills, helping others find great careers, or perhaps something more pragmatic, like being able to pay off your mortgage 5 years early, or go on holidays to exotic destinations? Work out your why and use that to fuel your determination.  

2. Make no room for excuses. 

Set your goals in terms of ‘No matter what’. ‘No matter what, I will call an extra 20 leads each week’. ‘No matter what, I will attend 2 networking events each month.’ Write it down, and religiously track your progress.  

Also, notice when you’re making excuses or blaming others for getting in the way of your goals. Regardless of external forces, (even that terrible manager) only you can use your grit to rise above challenges.  

3. Turn up. 

Make an unbreakable habit of turning up and putting in the effort, even when you really, really can’t be bothered. And attack the problematic thing first- even when you’re feeling run down and beaten down by life. That’s the route to success. 

4. Celebrate the little wins. 

Mental toughness is just like a muscle. It’s built through a thousand repetitions, getting stronger every time. The brain is extraordinarily malleable and adaptable- each time you force yourself to persevere when something is challenging, the more your mind finds it easier to take the difficult path… because it remembers that you succeeded last time.  

Therefore, it’s so important to acknowledge your successes, however small. Give yourself a pat on the back, get yourself a new outfit or a massage or tickets to see your favourite band.  

5. Exercise.

For once, we’re not going to talk about how good exercise is for you, either physically or to reduce stress. This time, we’re going to talk about how character-building it is, and how essential for a habit of mental toughness.  

Because exercise hurts, right? And every time you do it, you are overcoming your mental resistance to something challenging. The more you do it, the more it becomes a routine occurrence to ignore the voice in your head that tells you to give up when the muscles start to burn. That is power. That is mental toughness.  

Break up your long–term goals.  

Remember our gritty cadets in the US? The ones that succeeded were able to maintain their perseverance for long–term goals (after all, most of us can sustain our energy to reach a short-term goal, that’s not so difficult). 

Yet long-term motivation isn’t really in the human character; we’re overwhelmingly short-term thinkers. What successful people can do is firmly recognise how their efforts today are short-term wins that move them ever closer to that long-term goal.  

So, you need to break up your big goals (for example, become billing manager by next Christmas) into short-term goals: (request performance review/find a mentor/build leadership skill etc.). 

Be kind to yourself. 

This is perhaps the most important of all. You will find it extremely difficult to succeed over the long-term unless you can find a way to encourage yourself. Notice how you talk to yourself, and about yourself. Do you put yourself down? How can you succeed if you’re your own worst enemy? Give some thought to how you can retrain your brain to be kinder to yourself.  

Mental toughness is out there, but you must reach out grab it for yourself. This is something that no-one can help you with. No-one said that building grit would be smooth. After all, how would it build your resilience if it was? 

Good luck! 

Until next time Cheryl