You
may be an experienced recruitment consultant looking for adventure,
or a Director looking to 'go it alone' or perhaps a manager in an
industry on the receiving end of recruitment services. If you are
considering setting up your own sales recruitment agency there's
plenty of things you'll need to think about to plan for success, or
indeed to decide if it's the right move for you. Here's some of the
most basic areas you should be thinking about to avoid unpleasant
surprises.
Where will you get your initial clients from? You may be the
greatest sales person in the world, but building clients for a new
sales recruitment company from scratch is a tough task. You really
need so form of a head start, whether it be industry colleagues who
can give you a foot in the door, or existing recruitment clients
that you can 'legally' take with you when you go from your present
company. If you can create any immediate cleints, you will need
some associate arrangements with other sales recruitment agencies
with whom you can split fees if you fill their vacancies.
Where and how will you advertise your new sales recruitment brand?
Advertising is always a major recruitment cost. Remember, you will
be trying to compete with companies already established with a
database in place, who are also advertising. If you under cook your
advertising budget this is likely to be a fatal mistake. To reduce
risks, your business plan should be bold with initial advertising
rather than timid.
How much money will you need to get started, and how much have you
got, or can you get? You need to be honest here. You need to work
out how much money you would need to run the business for 6 months
without much income, and run it properly without short cuts. If you
can't raise this amount of money you're taking a huge risk if you go
ahead. Most new sales recruitment agencies that fail, do so because
of cash flow issues early on, not becase they couldn't do the
recruitment.
What grants can you get hold of? If there are grants available you
need to get in early, it may effect your whole model if there are
finds available, it will very much depend upon your area and local
government policies.
Where are you going to run the business from now, and in 3 years?
Many sales recruitment agencies are born at home, but you do need to
consider future plans. If you plan to grow and want offices, where
will they be. Should you start with portable phone numbers (eg
0845) and a BO Box address to avoid having to pay for a whole new
set of stationary. If you need staff, where will you look to
recruit? Is your geographical location going to be limiting?
How well do you handle pressure and failure? Starting any new
business is tough and sales recruitment is no different. No matter
how successful you are going to be in the long run, you will
experience a whole load of difficult emotions in the early days.
When candidates turn down jobs after they've been offered, and you
needed that placement to pay the gas bill, it can all get really
uncomfortbale. You need to be the sort of person that digs deeper
in these situations rather than one who folds up.
Starting
a sales recruitment agency may well be the most exciting and
rewarding thing you've ever done. As with so many things in life,
success, or not, is often determined before you start through paying
attention to the right things and planning properly. Hopefully these
tips will give you some ideas as to where to start. Good luck
