Sales skills that recruiters can bring to secure talent

Employers and recruiters might still believe that they have an abundance of choice when it comes to recruiting the right candidates. However, with UK employment rates at their highest for decades, and record numbers of vacancies, it’s now a highly competitive candidate market. 

Promoting the benefits of the job

Most strong applicants will now be offered a number of interviews and will then have to choose which ones they accept. It can be difficult to get time off work to attend interviews and expensive if this means unpaid hours or significant travel. Of course, they need to perform well at the interview stage, but this is not a one-way assessment.

From the very outset of a recruitment process, employers and recruiters need to be mindful of promoting the benefits of their job and working at the hiring organisation. 

Many line managers simply underestimate this and approach the interview process with all the emphasis on the process of assessment and not enough on engaging the job seeker, who will often be evaluating a range of opportunities with several organisations. First impressions really count and that starts with the way in which the applicant is engaged and how they feel throughout the interview and recruitment process. Job seekers are increasingly placing a higher value on the type of organisation that they want to work for and in understanding the values, ethics, and purpose of a business. 

The importance of your employer brand

There are very few organisations with an employer brand which is so strong, that they can source all their applicants directly. Typically, they will be unable to drive huge volumes of job seeker traffic to their ‘current vacancies’ pages. Most visitors to their websites will be interested in the service or product which they sell, not necessarily in finding a job. 

Our brand is synonymous with recruitment, so people almost exclusively approach us to discuss job opportunities and to discuss the employers that are hiring. As recruitment consultants, we receive lots of feedback from job applicants. We get their feedback from the interviews that we arrange, the ones that our competitors arrange, and the ones that clients arrange directly. We have the opportunity to compare feedback and experiences to help build a picture of which organisations are successfully engaging and exciting applicants.  However, we also get feedback about the ones who have a less favourable employer brand and these impressions are often based on the quality of that organisation’s recruitment process and feedback. By working in partnership with our clients we can help them to either stop, start, or improve upon, doing the things that help sell their business to prospective employees.

To summarise, organisations hiring directly can have a huge blind spot if they approach a recruitment process without a strategy to ‘attract’ as well as assess.  We will all need to compete to secure talent in 2019.  

A good recruitment consultant is usually in a position to discuss all of the jobs being considered by an applicant. They will have taken time to understand the personal drivers behind the job search and will help by providing advice, guidance, and benchmarks so that the candidate can choose the right organisation for the next stage of their career. They can also provide their clients with valuable market insights and help them promote their employer brand more successfully.

If you are looking to hire professionals with the ability to drive your business forward, please get in touch with us today. Here at Page Personnel, we can help you find the best professionals that fit within your organisation and vacancy.

Ian Teagle
Operating Director, Page Personnel
T: +44 117 906 5153
E: [email protected]