No matter what niche you are in, knowing how to communicate to your target market, promote your services to potential candidates, partners, clients, and make your business recognizable through a well-thought-out brand strategy will help you build a successful recruitment agency.
Consider for a second the competitive environment that blue-chip recruitment agencies operate in these days. Their brand strategy includes anything from document formatting to huge sponsoring events during the FA Cup or Formula 1. So, setting up a growth-promoting brand strategy for your recruitment agency should be the first thing on your list if you want to make a name for yourself.
If you want to start or grow a recruitment agency, you may have already poured through hundreds of pages on how to get more exposure and drive growth for your recruitment agency, but none of them covered the exact elements you need to take into consideration when crafting one without getting a degree in marketing first or spending thousands of pounds. And of course, there is also the risk of coming up with a brand strategy that doesn’t yield the desired results and doesn’t help you win any market share.
So, while marketing isn’t our specialty, we’ve had our fair share of ups and downs while building Human, which makes us living proof that our brand strategy works and that we are on the right path.
The fact of the matter is there’s no cutting-edge ultra-innovative method to creating a brand strategy that guarantees a successful recruitment agency, but if we had received some marketing support and guidance when we were starting out, it would have spared us a great deal of effort, time not to mention money.
There are many elements that make up a brand and contribute to a successful recruitment agency.
The logo and website are the most popular things people think of these days when they define a brand strategy. But before creating a logo and a website, an entire thought process takes place.
In our journey, we’ve identified a few key elements that define a well-thought brand strategy that might be a good idea for you to incorporate:
In marketing, the term target audience refers to the ideal customers of your business. People who are likely to be interested in buying your recruitment product/service based on certain demographics and psychographic indicators like age, income, education, and others.
For the recruitment industry, the target audience can be divided into B2C and B2B, which represent the candidates placed and the companies looking to hire the candidates.
It’s important to understand your target audience because, depending on the unique traits and buying behaviors of your target audience, you can then craft unique messages that speak your audience’s language and appeal to their interests. This is especially important, as both candidates and decision-makers are busy these days. So, getting their attention through the right messaging and channels is no easy task.
People these days tend to jump to conclusions based on incomplete data and to make uninformed assumptions to save some time. The reality is that what we see unfolding may not actually overlap with what your potential clients consider their best interest. So it’s critical for you to see things from the same perspective as your target market and be on the same page with your customers, to ensure brand continuity and that the message you communicate is the same with the message perceived. A good way to do that is by surveying your clients and business partners.
These days, when people choose to work with a brand, they look beyond pricing and services. What makes you you is of great interest, especially if let’s say you’ve been shortlisted by one of your customers and asked to submit an offer.
This might vary a bit depending on the client’s budget, industry, vacancy requirements, and the decision-makers involved in the purchase, but a key part of the buying decision is centred around one question “why you and not the others”.
This is an important question, which left unanswered can set you back big time in the eyes of the client. Yet, when addressed, it can lead to incredible opportunities.
Some good questions that can lead to the right answer are. “What makes you special?” “Why should the clients buy from?” “In what ways are you better than the competition?” These are simple questions that once answered can give you an idea of what your brand positioning statement should sound like.
When trying to develop a brand strategy for a successful recruitment agency it’s of utmost importance to deliver your message in such a way that it resonates with your audience and helps them easily recognize it over time. Thus, your branding strategy must be inclusive of your clients’ desires and needs in such a way that it still maintains your identity and values and allows you to take your brand further. One way of achieving this is by exposing your audience to elements of your brand across different channels to solidify your position and gain exposure.
Now that you have an idea of what you need in order to develop a powerful brand strategy, perhaps you are thinking… “Ok, great but do I have to do this on my own?”
Well, not necessarily. You see, the way we work is by empowering people to build something for themselves but not by themselves.
As the needs and requirements of the industry and the recruitment process are constantly changing, making room for even more confusion, it’s important to stick together and share our wisdom with like-minded individuals.
We get it… You are at a certain point in your life where you’ve already taken a few risks and can’t afford to make any mistakes.
Which is where we can help.
So, if you want to make an impact and a name for yourself, perhaps it would be a good idea to partner with someone who already did it.
Creating a brand strategy that transcends time, space and culture is no easy thing and to build a successful recruitment agency you need to surround yourself with the best people.
Human offers you the opportunity to work with an established brand, with established processes and systems, as well as accessing your unlimited earning potential while enjoying the freedom of flexible work hours.
We offer full access to industry-leading recruitment training material for you and your team, together with a suite of videos, checklists, and tools to help you succeed.
But even more so, one of the most important reasons why you should partner with us is the fact that competition is fierce among recruitment agency start-ups and businesses that are targeting the same market as you. Under no circumstances is it a good idea to jump in the ocean without knowing how to swim first.
Drop us a line or contact us if you feel like this might be the answer for you.