Picking The Right Recruitment Channels For Consultancy

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Picking The Right Recruitment Channels For
Consultancy A Summary of Our Findings From Our
2003 Channel Survey
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The last years have seen an increase in
recruitment channels
1996
2003

• Press
• Agents
• Personal referrals

• Press
• Agents
• Personal referrals
• Public Job Boards / Newsletters
• Corporate web site
• Online CV database

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But with options comes increased complexity of
decision making

• Why are some channels so much more expensive than
  others?
• Which are the most cost effective channels?
• How many campaigns would I have to run to get
  enough candidates?
• What should I pay for my internet advertising?
• How do I avoid the costs of screening out
  hundreds of unsuitable candidates?

4
Our suggested answers

• Head-hunters referrals access passive
  candidates who are much more expensive to reach
  than active candidates
• Corporate, then major public internet sites such
  as top-consultant
• 1 newspaper campaign, 2 web campaigns
• As a rough guide 1 per unique visitor per ad
  per month
• Pick industry focussed sites such as
  top-consultant

• Why are some channels so much more expensive than
  others?
• Which are the most cost effective channels?
• How many campaigns would I have to run to get a
  reasonable shortlist?
• What should I pay for internet ads?
• How do I reduce the costs of screening out
  unsuitable candidates?

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To provide these answers we conducted market
research and analysis of channel performance
Profile of Respondents
Approach
of respondents

• Link to questionnaire sent to our 50,000
  newsletter subscribers
• 965 respondents
• Asked
• What channels they used
• What they liked / disliked

Experience with current firm
Source 2003 Consultant Survey
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• Why are some channels so much more expensive than
  others?
• Which are the most cost effective channels?
• How many campaigns would I have to run to get
  enough candidates?
• What should I pay for my internet advertising?
• How do I avoid the costs of screening out
  hundreds of unsuitable candidates?

7
Two distinct classes of candidates emerged in our
survey, those who are actively looking at ads and
those who need to be approached to move
Breakdown of All Applicants

• Personal Referral
• Head-hunter

• Web ad
• Press ad
• Corporate Ad

Source 2003 Consultant Survey
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With the 34 of the market which is passively
looking for a job the effort required is
substantially greater than with the actively
looking candidate
Breakdown of All Applicants
Direct request

• Craft role/pitch
• Database search
• Cold pitch calls
• Follow up with referral
• Interview
• Offer

• Selection
• Interview
• Offer

Advert responders
Source 2003 Consultant Survey
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• Why are some channels so much more expensive than
  others?
• Which are the most cost effective channels?
• How many campaigns would I have to run to get
  enough candidates?
• What should I pay for my internet advertising?
• How do I avoid the costs of screening out
  hundreds of unsuitable candidates?

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The three main ad channels have roughly the same
channel penetration
Channel Penetration
of candidates using channel
Source 2003 Consultant Survey
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However the internet has a much greater share of
applications due to its greater number of jobs on
offer
Share Of Applications
Applications Per Candidate Per Month
of applications from channel
Applications per Candidate per Month
Source 2003 Consultant Survey
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A newspaper campaign will still produce
substantially better results than internet
campaigns due to its smaller number of competing
campaigns
Estimated average campaign performance per channel
Shortlistable applications per campaign
Source 2003 Consultant Survey, Top-Consultant
Analysis
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However, newspapers superior performance is
expensive
Estimated average campaign costs per
shortlistable candidate
Cost () per shortlistable application per
campaign
Source 2003 Consultant Survey, Top-Consultant
Analysis
14
The 2 larger internet sites top-consultant and
monster, can deliver much more than the average
3-4 good applications per month
of respondents who regularly reviewed a web
site for job opportunities
Source 2003 Consultant Survey
15
A large proportion of the 66 of advert reading
candidates can be accessed with the big 3 papers
of respondents who regularly review a papers
consultancy opportunities
Source 2003 Consultant Survey
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• Why are some channels so much more expensive than
  others?
• Which are the most cost effective channels?
• How many campaigns would I have to run to get
  enough candidates?
• What should I pay for my internet advertising?
• How do I avoid the costs of screening out
  hundreds of unsuitable candidates?

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When deciding roughly what to pay for an ad slot
on an internet site you need to estimate how many
people will truly see your ad
First Pass Ready Reckoner
Example
1 1,000,000 20,000 50
Price For Each Visitor

Total Ad Cost per Month
x
expected Total Visitors Per Month
Total Competing Ads On The Site
What is the Price Per Visitor ?
Source 2003 Consultant Survey
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1 per unique visitor per month per ad slot is a
good initial guide for what you should pay for ad
slots
Premium Listing Sites
500

• Gold/SilverJobs
• Top-consultant

Multi Sector Site
Publication Sites

• FT
• Telegraph

Cost per UK ad slot () per month

• Monster
• TotalJobs
• GoJobSite

Focussed Site

• JobServe(IT)

50

• GAAPWeb(AC)

200
30
500
Visitors per Month per UK ad slot
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est Page Views per Visitor isnt the major driver
of slot price
Page Views /Visitor
Source 2003 Consultant Survey
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• Why are some channels so much more expensive than
  others?
• Which are the most cost effective channels?
• How many campaigns would I have to run to get
  enough candidates?
• What should I pay for my internet advertising?
• How do I avoid the costs of screening out
  hundreds of unsuitable candidates?

21
The cost of screening irrelevant applications is
a significant additional cost in internet
recruitment
Typical Consultant Spec
Average Job Site Visitor

• 55 no degree
• Only 8 seeking senior position
• 44 have been in the workforce for ten years or
  more

• Top degree
• Strong career
• World class knowledge
• Proven business leader

High rejection rate
Source 2003 Consultant Survey, iLogos entitled
"Perception vs. Reality Jobseeker Behavior
Online,"
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Of the three broad classes of job site, the
Premium or Niche Site is best suited to reducing
irrelevant applications
Type Description
Premium Listing Sites The advantage of these types of sites is that they attract very targeted traffic. You won't receive the same volume of traffic as a multi-sector site but the traffic will be more relevant. Example top-consultant.com
Publication Sites A growing trend is for offline publications to now include a jobs section on their web-site for their members. Example FT, Telegraph etc
Multi-Sector Sites These types of sites tend to cover the whole of the country and typically have the highest traffic figures. In addition, they mostly cover all of the industry sectors and will list jobs from both companies and recruitment agencies. Example TotalJobs.com
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Addendum Salary Surveys
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We have surveyed over 2,000 consultants to build
a new service benchmarking salaries for
recruitment staff
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Hot off the survey machine
Bonuses 2002
of Base
Average 11.4 No Bonus 38
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Backup
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Hot off the survey machine
Bonuses 2002
Business Analyst
Consultant
Senior Consultant
Project Manager
Principal
Partner
Average 11.4 No Bonus 38
Source Bonus Survey
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The lowest cost channels for accessing the
actively looking candidates are the public and
corporate internet sites
Backup
Public Internet Sites Newspapers Corporate Sites
Total share of applications 51 1020 p.m 12 240 p.m 10 200 p.m
Number of campaigns 300 20 200
Expected number of shortlisted candidates 3-4 p.m 12 p.m 1 p.m.
Cost per application 50 800 50
Source 2003 Consultant Survey