How can you get help attracting your own talent but avoid paying costly recruitment agency fees?

Recruitment agencies have been around for a long time and there’s no denying they can do a great job. But they’re not for everyone. The cost of hiring using a recruitment agency can be eye-wateringly high – typically in the region of around 15% to 30% of a successful candidate's salary. And some companies want to retain more involvement in their recruitment process anyway. But they would also like to have some cost-effective support doing it. Is that possible?

Yes. It is most definitely possible to opt for a blended approach that enables you to take an active role in recruiting candidates but have some of the load lifted off your shoulders - all while attracting the best people on the market in a cost-effective way. But how?

By working with a recruitment business partner like JVP Group

Knowing where to start when it comes to directly attracting talent can be daunting. But a recruitment business partner will help you in a number of ways depending on how hands-on you want to be. You might want support getting a standout job advert crafted and posted in the right places. Perhaps you need help handling the volume of applications that you receive. Quite simply, there are many ways recruitment marketing specialists can provide you with help. Here are some of them.

1) Sharing your employer brand

Did you know that around 75% of job seekers will research a company’s reputation and employer brand before even applying? According to Glassdoor, that’s the percentage of active job seekers who are likely to apply for a job if the employer is managing its employer brand well.

But what would you say your employer brand is? It’s a really important aspect of a successful recruitment marketing campaign. But trying to describe it can leave many employers lost for words. When you’re living it, it can be quite difficult to take that step back and work out what it is that makes your company different, and what all the big selling points are that you should be shouting about. And that’s where a recruitment marketing company such as JVP Group creates real value by helping you pin down exactly what your employer brand is and what you can do to make sure you’re promoting it well.

2) That brand needs to be reflected through your job adverts

And that brand really needs to shine through – including in your job adverts. Agency-branded adverts that talk about ‘our client’ don’t appeal to potential applicants anywhere near as much as those that share who the employer is and exactly what it is that makes them great to work for. 

A recruitment marketing partner will make sure all that is coming across loud and clear in your adverts along with the key details about the position itself. Job adverts should talk about what the company’s culture and values are, the training and development opportunities available, the flexibility that there is, the environment the successful applicant will be working in... essentially, the “why” – the reasons why someone would want to work for you. And a recruitment marketing specialist will also make sure the critical keywords are in the copy too – so your job advert comes up in response to the relevant searches.

This is all hugely important – because straight away it means the advert is targeting the type of candidates you want. You’re not going to end up wasting time and effort on applicants who aren’t suitable.

3) Getting your job adverts seen

Your recruitment business partner won’t only help you write the job advert; they can ensure it’s in all the right places to increase the likelihood of it being seen by the right people.

It’s incredibly easy to waste money by posting adverts on sites where your candidates are unlikely to be. A recruitment marketing company will know which are the best job boards for the kind of candidate you’re targeting – and they’ll also be able to help with your social media strategy too, to ensure maximum cost-effective exposure for your vacancy.

4) Dealing with the applications

Sometimes when you’re working with a recruitment agency, you’ll be presented with a bunch of CVs and need to spend a lot of time then ploughing through them to decide who makes the shortlist.

There are far simpler options – like using an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) which holds all the applications in one central online location. There are loads of advantages to managing your applications this way. It saves time shortlisting them. You can quickly respond to all applicants, keeping them informed about their application’s progress and organising interviews using the interview scheduling tool. Our system lets you build up a talent pool of applicants too – at no extra cost, unlike recruitment agencies. It’s your information to do with as is appropriate – so it's fine if you decide you’d like to contact applicants who might suit other roles that are coming up. It will make sure you’re staying fully GDPR compliant too.

And depending on the amount of help you want, our experienced recruitment specialists can work as an extension of your team to carry out pre-screening activities like filtering your applications, conducting telephone interviews and arranging your face to face interviews. They can also help you avoid the risk of making a costly hiring mistake by carrying out pre-employment skills and knowledge testing and psychometric testing to get insights into their skillsets and behavioral style.

Do you want to keep control of the recruitment process while attracting the very best talent in the most cost-effective way?

We collaborate with employers to deliver successful in-house direct recruitment strategies that enable them to get whatever support they need while retaining involvement in, and control of, the whole process. So if you like the prospect of attracting the best talent on the market, saving yourself a vast amount of time and also avoiding spending what could be thousands of pounds in recruitment agency fees – then talk to us.