Some businesses try to recruit themselves because they think using an external recruiter is too expensive. But there are ways you can tap into a recruiter’s expertise and still keep your costs down. Here’s 5 of them.
- Make the relationship an exclusive one
If you’re using a recruiter, give them exclusivity. There so are many advantages to an exclusive recruitment arrangement for employers and I’ve written about some of them here. But one of the big cost benefits is that most recruiters will agree to a discount in exchange for the certainty that comes from an exclusive relationship. And just because the relationship is exclusive, don’t assume the net won’t be cast widely. Many recruiters are also members of a group or network that shares their listings with other recruiters, giving you a broad reach without paying any more or having to deal with multiple recruiters.
- Offer to pay something upfront
Sometimes recruiters will offer a discount in return for an upfront “skin in the game” commitment. After all, this kind of “pay-in-advance” arrangement also gives recruiters certainty, protecting them from clients who change their minds halfway through the process.
- Set fees in advance
Many recruitment fees are tied to salary, so employers don’t know exactly what they’re going to pay until the salary offer is made and accepted. Less reputable recruiters may even talk up the salary to boost their commission. Some recruiters may be willing to negotiate an “agreed salary” up front, on which the fee will be based – almost like an insuring your car on an “agreed” or “market value” basis. This kind of certainty can really help clients with budgeting and can also save thousands. For example, we recently had a candidate request a higher offer and to protect the client we agreed to lock our fee at the original offer, saving them over $2,000.
- Pay by the hour
On certain assignments, some recruiters may offer an “a la carte” choice of recruitment options charged at an hourly rate (Elias Recruitment is one of them). For instance, some employers like to do their own reference checks or place ads under their own brand name, but it doesn’t make sense to carry through with the whole process. So they use a recruiter to do time intensive or low value parts like screening applications and notifying candidates of their application outcomes. These components of the recruitment process can be done at a cost effective hourly rate, saving employers both time and money.
- Outsource the inefficient parts
Building on the concept of going “a la carte”, another effective cost-saving approach can be to outsource the sourcing element of the recruitment process.
It’s this approach that led Elias Recruitment to develop a new service for select clients that we call “First Sweep”, which saves employers the time and effort it takes to quickly source quality candidates.
We draft and place an ad on about 20 job boards, contact existing candidates on our books, spread the word on social media and then send any appropriate CVs to the employer. And, because we already have the job board subscriptions, applicant tracking software and experienced resources to do all of this, we can offer this service far cheaper than many employers could do it in-house.
Once that’s done, employers can pay for further upgrades – for example face-to-face interviews or reference checking.
So don’t be put off using a recruiter because of the perceived expense – there are many ways to get value, use their expertise, tap into their connections and get the results you need in a cost effective way.