Why recruitment advertising gets a poor response and 'offers' keep getting rejected.

Why 'Job Adverts' Usually Fail

Advertising has the potential to be fast and cost-effective. After all, it's where recruitment agencies get the vast majority of their candidates.

When we bring this approach up to clients, we usually get the same response - they tried it and it didn't work. The same two issues keep coming up.

Poor Response From Advert

As with most standard recruitment solutions, it can work well in the right conditions. Unfortunately, recruiting in-demand candidates this way presents unique problems. (Click on the tabs to read more.)

Why in-house advertising is difficult.

Most adverts don’t work for in-demand candidates. The vast majority of job adverts are for generic recruitment – not specifically for in-demand candidates. That’s why most advertising training is dedicated to that sector. Unfortunately, those strategies and techniques don’t work with in-demand talent. In fact, the approach, tone and message can put your ideal candidates off, rather than encourage them to apply.
The wrong media plan – Advertising is not cheap and it is easy to make a mistake. The wrong choice of media or the wrong analytics strategy can lead to overpaying and still getting nothing in return.

...and Agency Adverts Attract The Wrong People.

‘Poor’ adverts are more profitable for agencies. It probably won’t attract the in-demand candidate you want, but by being broad and non-specific it will generate many more candidates for the agency. In turn, this generates more fees for the agency – at your expense.
Advertising that’s in their interest, not yours – Branding, spending commitments and commercial relationships play a huge part in where an agency decides to place advertisements. This seriously affects the success of the job advert.
Cheap or free adverts they know won’t work – With ‘No win, no fee’, agencies can’t risk spending the money needed to attract the right talent. The role of cheap ads is more to keep you ‘loyal’ for a little bit longer, just in case a miracle happens and the right person magically spontaneously appears…

Offers Keep Getting Rejected

Of course, getting the candidate to apply is only the beginning. It doesn't mean a thing if they won't accept your offer.

In-House Is Full Of Nasty Surprises

It’s next to impossible to know what a candidate is thinking. As you’re the ‘employer’, they will be understandably reluctant to voice concerns to you that might go against them. You might only get the whole story when it’s too late to do anything about it.

Why The Agency Won't Help You Get Offers Accepted

You’re not the client (you just pay the bill!). Unlike standard recruitment, the candidate is the real client. You become just one of a long list fighting to meet the candidate. Unless there are good reasons, your offer won’t get priority over anybody else.
It was never ‘Your Advert’. Even if it has your name on it, you can be sure your recruiter will also be sending responders to your competitors. At best, the advice they give to the responders will be influenced by other roles they could send them to. The ‘better’ a candidate is, the more competition gets introduced and the less likely they will accept your offer.
There’s no financial incentive to help you finetune an offer. If the candidate is accepting an offer from another of their ‘clients’, they may decide you would only ‘confuse’ the candidate. There’s also the fear that by lengthening the process they could let in a rival agency and lose the fee. (Read “Why your agency won’t help you get your offer accepted‘)

A Cheaper Approach With A Higher Success Rate.

Our approach is designed to address the obvious weaknesses in the traditional approach. It is a faster, more focused approach which is designed to attract the right candidates and increase the chances they accept your offer.

Although maximising the success rate was always our primary aim, it's a significant side-benefit that our approach usually works out cheaper than doing it yourself and around a quarter of the price of using an agency.

You can read more about DFSelection, our advertising and candidate management approach here.

Recruitment Solutions That Work

Increase your success rate, lower your costs and make the next time even easier.

DF Selection – Recruitment Advertising Management

Better Candidates, Increased Offer Acceptance And Less Than A Third Of...

DF Selection - Unsure if it will work for you?

How Can You Be Sure It Will For You?

If you’ve suffered disappointment before, it’s understandable that you might be...

How We Make Recruitment Advertising Work

We’ve helped clients find the right person when other approaches have...

DF Selection – A Third Of The Cost Of Alternatives

A Clear, logical explanation on how we can do it and...

Recruitment Solutions That Work

Increase your success rate, lower your costs and make the next time even easier.

Recruitment Solutions

A suite of solutions to overcome the problems you face when trying to recruit 'In Demand' candidates.

What's Different About Us?

We focus purely on helping you recruit 'in demand' candidates. Nothing else.

Our approach is unique. It comes from analysis of over a decade's worth of recruitment campaigns all aimed at recruiting in-demand candidates. We kept what worked and we learnt from what didn't.

We constantly test against the latest corporate and academic research to make sure we keep you ahead of your competitors.

LATEST NEWS FROM DFHUMAN RECRUITMENT SOLUTIONS

How Recruitment Agencies Can Make More Money From Bad Adverts

You probably think you and the agency are on the same side. But this isn't necessarily true.

WILL THE LATEST TRENDS REALLY HELP YOU RECRUIT IN-DEMAND TALENT?

We constantly test new ideas that claim to help you recruit in-demand candidates. We evaluate how successful they are in a real-life, UK setting. Reports have included reviews on ways to find hidden talent, methods to keep ahead of your competition and interview strategies that are meant to increase your success rate.

If you would be interested in taking part, contributing your opinions or maybe you would just like to receive the findings, then please click here.

HOW WOULD YOU MAKE RECRUITING & EMPLOYING DISABLED STAFF EASIER?

WhatMightWork.co.uk and the resulting initiative is the 'Not For Profit' arm of DFHuman. Our goal is to make recruiting & employing disabled staff easier.

Whatmightwork.co.ukRead More

A Different Approach to ‘In-Demand’ Recruitment

Who are ‘In-Demand’ Candidates?

What’s Going Wrong?

The Easy Way to Stop Recruitment Disasters

Disabilities (Our Not For Profit Arm)

Better Value With an Increased Success Rate

Will Our Recruitment Approach Work For You?

Solutions

Recruitment Solutions That Work

Recruitment Solutions That Work

Intelligence Led Head-Hunting

DF Selection – Recruitment Advertising Management

One Hour Recruitment Solutions

Internet and Social Media

Recruitment Systems

Recruitment Agency Management

A Different Approach

A Different Approach to ‘In-Demand’ Recruitment

Free Recruitment Reports

Exploring ways to make recruiting In-Demand Candidates Easier

Recruitment Strategies (REGISTRATION NOT REQUIRED)

New Ideas In Recruitment

New Ideas In Recruitment Archive (REGISTRATION REQUIRED)

Why 'Job Adverts' Usually Fail

Poor Response From Advert

Offers Keep Getting Rejected

A Cheaper Approach With A Higher Success Rate.

Recruitment Solutions That Work

dFSelection Advertising

DF Selection – Recruitment Advertising Management

How Can You Be Sure It Will For You?

How We Make Recruitment Advertising Work

DF Selection – A Third Of The Cost Of Alternatives

Recruitment Solutions That Work

Recruitment Solutions

What's Different About Us?

How Recruitment Agencies Can Make More Money From Bad Adverts