As an executive recruiter, part of our mission is to identify every prospective candidate and every prospective client in your niche. All industries are constantly evolving. Candidates enter into the industry, others retire, individuals move from organization to organization, firms merge or close, people get promoted, new companies are formed; it’s a constantly moving target. Accept the fact that nothing, when it comes to the status of candidates and clients in your marketplace, is an absolute truth. Constantly seeking new information, new names, and new potential organizations shouldn’t be an afterthought, it should be a priority on each and every phone call you execute.
Name gathering can refer to various levels of information, from basic fundamental information to solid qualified referrals and warm leads. Any information is good information if it helps you better understand your marketplace and the organizations in it. Sometimes, you’ll enter in basic fundamental information, possibly just populating your database but not 100% sure you are on the right track; other times, you’ll secure solid qualified referrals and warm leads through targeted name gathering efforts.
Remember that you don’t need to know the full employment history or have an essay prepared on a client before you can pick up the phone and make a call – any information, no matter how minimal, is good information. You have a company name, but don’t know the hiring authority? Enter it in – you can call and find out later. You have the name of a candidate, but don’t know his or her title? Enter it in – pick up the phone, call that candidate, and you’ll find out their title sooner or later. It’s okay to pick up the phone and bob and weave as you go along – what you really just need is something to get started bobbing and weaving with. The Internet has prompted us to sometimes seek out information overload – you feel like you have to know the full background of a prospect before you pick up the phone and dial – not so. The most successful recruiters can be given a phone number on a piece of paper, pick up the phone, and figure it out as they go. So again, remember that initially, any and all information is good information if it gives you something to start with.
There are three areas of the NLE Name Gathering Section – On the Phone (name gathering that is done while engaged in active conversations with candidates and clients), Web-Based (simple tools and search strings), and Additional Techniques (creative or thorough ways to canvas the totality of your marketplace).
On the Phone – Learn more.
Since the majority of a recruiter’s day is spent on the phone, this is the most obvious tool by which to gather new names and referrals! Conversations can include both direct solicitations for referrals, or indirect referrals due to asking a variety of specific questions that lead to the right individual. Of course, the most obvious question to ask a candidate is “who do you know?” This can be a great question, because it’s direct, it’s concise, and it seems pretty easy to answer. However, your chances of soliciting solid referrals in the opening moments of a call where you have not yet done anything for a candidate are very low, so review this section for many additional questions to ask and methods to use while gathering new names and referrals during the course of a phone call with a prospect. It is certainly possible that you will get some great referrals by asking this question, so it shouldn’t mean that you don’t ever ask – it just means that you should have multiple ways of gathering the same kind of information so you don’t limit yourself to just one approach. Many of the techniques in this section will allow you to gather targeted names, but not necessarily rely on the judgments of your candidates to qualify ‘who they know’ for you. Making a regular habit of asking several name and information gathering questions on every call will ensure that you not only keep a strong pipeline of future candidates, but also continue to identify every prospective candidate that exists in your niche.
Web-Based – Learn more.
Doing industry research off-hours is an essential priority for all recruiters. It is a recruiter’s responsibility to leave no stone unturned, and social networking, professional association, and niche specific sites or publications are a must to master. There are copious amounts of industry and niche-specific sites that exist, should be saved as “favorites” in your browser, and revisited on an ongoing basis. In addition to those sites, the Web-Based Name Gathering section of the NLE Library will provide examples of basic search strings and universally relevant websites that could be valuable no matter the niche. Because of the constantly evolving nature of technology, please let us know if any of the links are no longer valid, search strings have changed, or websites are out of date. We have provided several examples of helpful websites and e-sourcing strings to enhance the tools you are currently using, and to dip into the vast expanse known as the Internet!
Additional Techniques – Learn more.
In addition to gathering referrals on the phone and using the Internet to source for new leads, there are a number of creative additional ways to continually name and information gather within your market. This section of the NLE Library provides supplementary techniques that can be combined with primary methods of name gathering throughout the day.
