How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love (Tolerate) BD

Is this familiar?

Hi <hiring manager> I hope you’re well. I see you have an open DevOps role. Do you require agency assistance? I recruit DevOps engineers and have some available right now, just for you. Let’s jump on a call tomorrow.

In my experience, this kind of BD almost never works.

Most recruiters can send 200 versions of this message and maybe get one role onto their desk. Or everything just goes to the spam folder and no one sees it.

Hiring managers already know recruitment agencies exist. They are reminded of this every single day. Anyone in senior management is haunted 24/7 by recruiters hovering around like wasps. (do wasps hover?)

This is why I think brand awareness matters more than cold BD.

Nike doesn’t advertise because they think you’ve never heard of shoes. Or because they expect you to sprint to the shop immediately after seeing an ad. They advertise so that when you do want shoes, Nike feels familiar and you feel comfortable with them.

Recruitment works the same way.

When a hiring manager suddenly needs help, they don’t think “I wonder if agencies exist.” They think “who do I already know, recognise, or trust enough not to make this harder than it already is?”

Here’s the uncomfortable part. BD makes me anxious.

I am the person who will research an electronic purchase for three months. Specs. Reviews. Comparisons. Obsessive behaviour. So when someone tries to sell me something I already know exists, my internal response is basically “yes, obviously, if I need you I’ll find you, please stop”.

Which makes outbound BD mentally hard, because my brain goes “surely they’ll research agencies properly and obviously they’ll find nineDots if we’re relevant”.

Reader, they will not.

Doing absolutely nothing and waiting to be discovered is not a good strategy

So last year I removed my shame gland and just asked. I asked candidates. I asked contacts. I asked people I vaguely knew. If a role popped up and I had any connection at all, I leaned on it.

And it worked. We brought on new companies. We made placements.

But the biggest shift wasn’t asking louder. It was being visible consistently.

Posting cats and Star Trek gifs. Giving advice without expectations. Answering questions and posting interesting content. Letting people see how I think.

So when the need appears, I’m not a stranger in their inbox saying “hiiiiii do you need an agency”. I’m already there. I am familiar and recognisable.. Slightly annoying, probably. But you remember me!

Cold BD is just asking for something without giving anything in return.

Brand awareness is slower and harder to put a metric on it but it works!

If this brand awareness has made you aware of nineDots - then get in touch! We have lots of happy recruiters who will source your next hire with a minimum of annoyance.