Transcription
Welcome everyone to today's lunch with Haley webinar. It is my absolute pleasure to have um this this cast of incredibly talented staffing sales experts joining me for the next hour where we're going to brainstorm staffing demand generation. Can you really create demand for staffing services?
Now, I will tell you we other than kicking some questions back and forth, we did nothing to script what we're going to do in this. So, this presentation could go in any direction. So, um without too much ado, I want to introduce Tom Herb, Dan My Winter. I'm sure most of you know the names. Um, but if you don't, make sure you check them out because these guys give the best advice on how to sell, how to grow salespeople, how to manage sales, uh, for staffing companies throughout our industry.
All right. So, before guys, we get into discussing the the topic that's the subject of today's webinar, I just wanted to do a little background. So, you know, what's really going on in the industry and most of you were at the staffing industry executive forum last month. Gosh, it feels like it was last week and you saw a graph or data that sort of looked like this. So, what's going on in the staffing industry? And you see that, you know, 2019 we had about 3% growth and then we went down 11, then we had this big spike. We all panicked when COVID hit, but what do you know? It turned out that uh it's actually pretty good for our industry. Really driven by an explosion in travel nursing uh that went through the roof. I know a lot of companies that had 5x growth, but if you've been in this industry for more than 18 months, you know, it hasn't been so rosy since. So 2022 is still a really good year, but then we sort of fell off a cliff in 2023, really driven by the decline in travel. Uh 2024 was another down year. The data SIA reported was that the industry as a whole fell about 20% from the peak and I think the travel nursing fell 59%. I think I have that data in here. Now the good thing is we're not getting super excited about 1% growth. But at least SI is forecasting 1% growth for this year and 3% for next year which is a heck of a lot better than the last 24 months.
So, as I mentioned, we had that 20% decline industrywide. I think Light Industrial was right on the 20. Clerical was like 21. Um, the the numbers were really ugly in terms of job loss. This one surprised me is out of 3 million daily jobs that are temporary jobs, we lost 640,000 of them. That took us from a market penetration rate, it was at the peak around 3% but down to 1.59% which is less temps working dayto day than before the great recession. So that was one of the most eyeopening statistics at the executive forum for me. Guys, you may have some thoughts on that. We'll get to that in just a minute. Um in again repeat some of the sectors. Industrial down 19, clerical down 21, IT down 16, and our our friends in travel nursing been feeling the greatest brunt. Um, what goes up the most falls the most with 59% decline in their sales over the last 24 months. This one probably bothered me maybe the the most, maybe the second most to that market penetration rate. But what Barry A said is that based on what the GDP has done during the same time frame, staffing should not have declined by 20%, it should have grown by 6%. And this was the first time that SIA has reported that staffing's growth decoupled from the growth of the overall economy. So that was a big concern.
So speaking of the economy, I love this picture. If any of you have ever seen this skit from the Tonight Show when they drag Kevin Hart onto a roller coaster, it's awesome. Uh, but that's sort of what it feels that with what's going on this year, like just we're all in this panic mode and I don't think many of us look like Jimmy Fallon. Uh, I think we all look like Kevin Hart wondering what the heck is going to happen tomorrow because every day is a new announcement, a new challenge. And let's not just talk politics because we we're really just talking about economics. What's it going to mean to the supply chain? What's it going to mean to the cost of of goods that we're buying? What's it going to mean to pricing? What's it going to mean to consumer spending? All of those things end up having a huge impact on manufacturing, on distribution, and of course on our clients in the staffing industry.
All right. So, I'm going to stop my share, guys, because we're going to transition now and get to the good stuff. Can you create demand for staffing services? So, that's actually our first question. We're going right to the heart of the issue. And we're just gonna we're g like I want to know from you. You guys, yes or no, staffing companies can create demand. And just kind of succinctly, if they if it's a yes, how you think they can do it. So, Mark, you're in my secret square in the upper left corner. We'll let you go first.
Sure. The answer I think is yes sometimes. Uh, I think it depends on our one of the things that I've come to realize is that our customer base is segmenting itself. We can talk about that a little later, but they're they're falling into a couple of buckets. And if you hit the right bucket with your ideal customer profile, then absolutely you can create some demand generation.
Awesome. Thank you. Um, Tom, how about you? If I say no, do I have to drop off the call?
Thank you. No, we'll give you other questions to answer.
Yeah. Uh, my answer is absolutely. I mean, sure you can uh create demand. Just take a look at your best clients, your most loyal clients. Why are they the most loyal clients? You've created demand with them. You can you can do it again. There are companies that do it extremely well. It's like any other kind of industry that's out there. So, uh we absolutely can create demand and we should be creating demand and and otherwise we just become this me too. Hey, give me a chance. I'm like everybody else, you know, and that's first of all, that's not much fun. Uh, second of all, it's not very profitable because then we get into the pricing game. Yeah, we're gonna get to that because there's a lot of the questions that came in from the audience about pricing issues they're seeing.
Dan, how about you? Can we create demand for staffing? Can you create demand for staffing services?
No, you cannot.
Can
Sorry, he's out. He's out. See you guys. Thanks.
Uh can a can an individual staffing agency create demand for what they offer to their clients? Yes, they can. But it they must have a clear articulation of the value that they actually provide to a well-defined ideal client profile. Without that, no demand cannot be created.
Okay. And I'm going to I'm going to go with the yes side as well. Um, I guess I wouldn't have asked you guys to be on this webinar if I didn't think it was going to be yes. But I think one of the things you have to do is you have to think about use cases. So if the staffing use case is solely providing workers for job openings that are there, now we're doing what Tom said. We've commoditized ourselves and we're not going to create any new demand if that's all we're doing. If we're finding use cases saying hey there are problems to solve and I can think about ways to solve those problems in a different manner than companies are used to solving them and staffing is the tool for solving the problem then I think you absolutely can create demand but it's a much different much more challenging sales process especially if you're primarily selling to HR and they're not really that open-minded to bringing new tools in.
Sounds like all right David just to just add to that I would I would say that things are going the other way what we're seeing is that there are other services other offerings that are taking share away from us yes and so we're seeing offshore nearshore we're seeing obviously AI know we'll get into that we you do I have to take a shot do I you're first oh no that's we're not on this one But but that's that's pulling market share away from us. So we do have to have a value proposition around why staffing instead of some of these other options that weren't necessarily around two, five, 10 years ago.
Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree. I think there there are more competitive alternatives than ever. You mentioned offshore nearshare, you mentioned AI. Let's not forget about talent platforms. Seven of the 10 biggest staffing companies are now building talent platforms which is the you know simple way to think of it is it's they're building Uber. So if I need somebody for a very commoditized role I would say you know hospitality is ripe for this PDM nursing is right for this I can just get an app order the person if they meet the criteria I'm going to hire the person and do I need the staffing vendor in that situation? Where do they add their value? It's an interesting challenge.
Mark I think you were about to say something.
Yeah, I was I was headed right there, David, when I threw out that idea that customers are segmenting themselves. That's exactly where they're going. There's there's a certain amount of companies that are going to platform staffing, so I'm going to go technology first. There's a certain amount that are thinking that they can do it themselves, so I'm going to buy Indeed and hire a talent acquisition person, and we're just going to bring it inhouse. Um, in both of those case, and then and then there's everybody else, which was our remaining customer base. Uh, but that tells me that customers are prospects are are looking for solutions out there. They're trying to figure this thing out. They're just doing it without us. So, if we can be part of that conversation, we'll be a lot further ahead.
So, if you want to create demand, what would you guys say are the the core tenants of how you create demand for a product or service?
So, I'll I'll jump in first on that one, David. I I think the core tenants have to be clearly understanding the ideal client profile. You know, our buyers are more sophisticated today and they understand their business operation in a greater detail than they have in years past. So, we have to understand like downstream, what is the impact of the solutions that we're actually implementing? Like what are they trying to achieve downstream? And once we understand that, we need to actually refine what we're delivering. We need to refine our value proposition, which is how we're getting candidates from not even knowing who we are as agencies onto assignment at our clients as efficiently as possible to meet that demand, right? To meet that pain point they're trying to solve. And so that to me is the core tenant is having clarity in that area and then communicating that consistently over time to where your market starts to understand who you are. They know you exist. They know very specifically what problems you aim to solve, how you solve them. There's social proof that you do a great job solving them. And once they believe that, then they will reach out to you and you will have created that demand.
I like this guys. Anything else to add?
Yeah, I think also David, we've got to we've got to shift our focus to spending time in their business. We can't keep dragging them into staffing. They're trying to avoid it at all costs. And so when we have conversations with customers, we have to be uh we have to be thinking about total workforce management, their entire uh employee base, not just our little segment of it or they get going to get turned off and they'll, you know, they they'll try to figure it out themselves.
Yeah, I got really that we got to speak their language. You know, we we talk staffing terminology, but you know, manufacturers have a language, fulfillment centers have a language, IT companies absolutely have a language or IT departments, technology companies, and the most successful staffing companies tend to speak that language really well. I remember a client of ours in Charlotte that um they wanted to move upscale from doing light industrial staffing and they actually wanted to get into helping companies run their production lines. And I talked to the owners of the company after they were successful in doing this and and I said, "How hard was this?" And he goes, "We got in thinking it was going to be easy because we knew how to supply the workers. We had already done that. We knew how to supply the supervisors. We had already done that. We did direct hire for the managers. We knew that. And then we realized we didn't speak their language at all." And it took them a while to to actually learn to talk like somebody who works in manufacturing running a line. But once they learned that, they were no longer a staffing company. They you can just take staffing completely off their website because they changed their business model to be something else. Much like management consulting firms. I mean, they're staffing companies. They're just doing it 300% markups. Yeah. So they but they don't define themselves the same way our industry does.
All right. So guys, where do you see staffing companies struggling right now with demand generation?
I'll jump in. I that it's the same thing it's always been, which is most people have no idea how to sell their the value of their company versus everybody else. We sound the same. Yeah. And I listen to recorded live cold calls all the time and they're extremely generic and you can you can just replace salespeople in there. You just replace the name of the staffing company and the name of the salesperson and it sounds exactly the same. there's there's no um there's no focus on really trying to distinguish yourself and to be able to show them that you can help solve their problems. And so it that's the biggest issue is just differentiation and and just focusing on it.
It's funny you say that you share that story. I was literally reading a a newsletter that comes to our industry, a guy who does consulting for marketing firms and he he got sort of asked to do a workshop presentation at a at a large conference and he wasn't scheduled to be the workshop presenter, but the workshop presenter got sick and they asked him to fill in. So, the first thing he did is he asked all of the owners of the businesses to write down your positioning and what makes you different and write down what really makes you stand out in your market. So, everybody took five minutes and did that. He said, 'N now take the paper and hand it to the person on your left and I want the person on the left to read it out loud and say if that also describes their business. He said to a T. Every single person in the room said that's us too. So folks, it's not just staffing companies. Every industry struggles with this challenge for differentiation.
Um Mark and Dan, what else do you see as some of the struggles of how staffing companies are trying to create demand?
I I echo Tom's thing. I I it really is that is the core issue right there is that staffing agencies don't fully understand I think inherently they know but they don't fully understand the value they provide and the way they provide it that makes them unique right and they haven't really looked internally enough and analyzed it to say how do I communicate this how do I communicate this and how do I connect the dots to why my best customers as Tom mentioned are sticking with me like if you have customers that you've retained over year, you've created demand. You've just done it in a market where they're not they're already aware of you. If you want to create demand for your services, you have to figure out how to take that message and put it further upstream up the marketing channel so people can find you sooner, learn about you sooner. So, it really does come down to what do you do and how do you communicate that to your prospective clients? If you nail that, you can create demand.
I think that ties to a related question and Mark I apologize if I just interrupt but let me just share this question. I think it's very related is I think the a lot of the buyers of staffing services would rather see us as a commodity. It's easier for them to buy. They can beat us up on price. It's easier for them to justify their existence if it's a commodity versus having to differentiate amongst 100 200 300 staffing providers in their community. So related to creating demand, how does our industry avoid being commoditized?
I've got thoughts, but Mark, you were about to say something, man. So it's it's probably brilliance penned up right now.
Well, I don't I don't want to drag us back, but um so David, ask that question again. I'm sorry. Hit hit me with that question again.
just I I think there's a lot of pressure uh that the buyers would rather see us as commodities. And so what I what I'm asking about is what do you think staffing companies can do to avoid commoditization to avoid the trap of looking and sounding and acting too much like everybody else.
So So we we trained them to buy that way by the way. I mean let's just call that out. Uh no other industry that I'm aware of gives the customer control of both the wholesale and retail pricing. and we taught our customers to do it. So we had easy markup calculations when it came time to do bill rate increases. So um be careful what you wish for, right? So there's there's that we have to acknowledge that first. Um and and then I think part of it is around expectations. We we have begun as an industry uh I'm generalizing here but as an industry we have become a fulfillment organization where we wait for the phone to ring. Uh we expect customers to give us an order. We expect one call closes sometimes when we go to a place like how many people do you need? I saw a sign up front. What do you need from us? And um it's really kind of unrealistic expectations. We we have to shift our our thought process on the long game. Demand generation is strategic as well as tactical. Um and we've been playing tactics for a long long time. And we're really good at that reaction and tactics. We've got to we got to shift it though and think more around the long game and and the strategic side of things.
I like that. To me, the commoditization starts right off the bat from the first phone calls and emails and all of that is is most the overwhelming majority of salespeople are completely unprepared to have a conversation when somebody answers the phone. Completely unprepared. And so we immediately revert to the most the lowest common denominator, which is, do you need help with temps? Are you happy with your staffing provider? what can I do to to earn your business? How you know, some a lot of people are out there saying, I'll I'll meet or beat your your current rates. All of those different things are are commoditization. Not to mention, it's just unprofessional because we're not ready when they answer the phone. And so, we've got to be ready to answer the phone. It's it starts with that. And then most sales people tend to let the the prospect dictate the terms of the sales process rather than leading them through the sales process. And what I mean by that is, you know, we'll be talking to the prospect and we'll talk to them a little bit and they'll say, "Yeah, you know what? I'll I'll reach out to you in a couple weeks when I have needs." As opposed to saying, "Let's schedule a time for us to have a follow-up. let me come and sit down with you and walk through the proposal. All of these different things where we're we're leading them through in a polite and professional way, but we're showing that we're different than the others. So, we we really start commoditization at the very very first contact that we do. We also are so heavy on email conversations and we want to focus so much on emails and that is by itself a commoditized utilitarian method of communication and so it we to Mark's point we do it to not only have we done it to ourselves we continue to do it to ourselves every single day.
Yeah. Pick up the phone.
Yeah. Seriously. And one thing I'll add to that, David, is that there are some buyers, they're commodity buyers and they they hold on to that belief that's what they're looking to buy. And I think what needs to happen in our industry is we need to understand how to determine the difference between a commodity buyer and someone that really wants to buy based on value, but we've not allowed them to do so because we keep self-inflicting this wound of commoditization to us, right?
Identify that. And I saw Jennifer mentioned it, Michael mentioned this in the chat. We need to say no more. We need to understand what is what is the good criteria for our business that actually fits our ICP. And if it doesn't align with that, especially on pricing, we just got to say no and walk away. Because as soon as you accept low markup business, you're going to get low margin business. It's going to overconsume those resources to serve that client; you won't have resources left to actually serve a good margin client, right? And that's a problem. So, we continue the cycle to do it to ourselves. So, understand that there are two types. And if it's a commodity buyer and you don't want to be in the commodity business, walk away. Just turn the business away. And and commod Oh, go ahead, sir. No, go ahead. I want to hear this. And commodity buyers are the low-hanging fruit.
That's the other thing too is if I if I'm supposed to be doing 200 phone calls a week to really have a chance to be successful and I'm only doing 50 calls a week, the couple of people I get hold of that actually will talk to me probably are the commodity buyers that are always willing to shop around. And so pretty soon I extrapolate that out to the entire industry and then I start to in the entire market and then I start to act as if everybody is a commodity buyer and they're not. There are plenty of people that want to have a solutions provider that can partner with them and really fix the problems that they have that can actually be strategic. But the problem is they're harder to get hold of. They're not as open to talking to us and like the commodity buyers are. Commodity buyers will always talk to you. Yeah, tell me what markup you get. I'll switch because I look at all you guys the same. If I can save a nickel, I'll I'll switch. That's an awesome point. You actually stole my next question. So, let's let's keep let's keep going down this path because my next question is going to be is there an opportunity to create demand by selling more strategically? But let's let's take that a step further because you just said that's exactly what people need to do. How do staffing companies make that transition to selling more strategically?
So, I've got all the thoughts on this one. Uh so, it starts with training internally. Honestly, what what Tom mentioned earlier about sales people are ill-prepared to make that phone call. When they show up, they bite at the first indication of pain. So, a client will be like, "I'm struggling with turnover. Oh, I can solve that for you. We've got all these people blah blah." And the reality is is if we want to stop being a commodity provider, we have to take a step back, slow down the process a little bit, that which is counterintuitive to every sales manager that wants to drive results, and say, "Interesting, tell me more about that." And we have to know what is the what is the downstream impact of turnover in that business and is that the problem they're really looking to solve. And then more importantly, we have to have quantifiable evidence of how we solve that problem for our current clients and what that outcome looks like. And if we can actually consult through that process and really understand it, we're going to sound different in that sales process. And the buyer is going to look at us differently and not like a commodity. We're going to be like, "Wow, this is a different agency." So, it starts with training on that side. So, your sales people sound different and can lead that process differently and better connect with your clients.
And Dan, it's not just the um it's not just a salesperson's responsibility. This goes all the way up the chain. There's there's a number of companies where the executives are like, "Okay, well, let's see what the salespeople bring back and then we'll make decisions on how we're going to align to our customer base." That's backwards; we we should be deciding who we want to have as partners uh and chasing them from the top down as much as we are from the bottom up. You know, it's a I can't even count on one hand the number of sales managers that I see that um the sales reps will bring the deal back and I'm like, "That's a horrible deal. Why would you even look at that?" And they're like, "Well, we don't have anything else. This is the best of the worst." So, we'll say yes to it for now. Just gums up the system. One of the things Dan mentioned I want to reiterate is the real need to differentiate not just your service delivery but differentiate in the sales process because if you create the beginning of the relationship looking and sounding like everybody else you've put yourself in a box that's very hard if not impossible to get out of. But if you can open the door in a completely different box than everybody else is in, now you have an opportunity to educate. You have opportunity to sell value. You have an opportunity to solve problems. Um, but that comes with other challenges because a lot of the buyers may not perceive they need what's in your box. And so now it's a very different type of selling.
One of the things that I've seen a lot of our clients do is the salespeople are really driven for metrics that are sheer volume. How many cold calls can you make? Sometimes how many appointments can you get? But guys, do you see anybody who's measuring the quality of those interactions? Are you having the right conversations? And and how do they measure that? Yeah. One of the things that we look at u is I have sales reps all the time look back at calls that they've had, look back at meetings and go scale of 1 to 10, how'd you do? And you know, the most common answer I get, especially when we're talking cold calls, is about a four. And that's with seasoned sales reps. Yeah. About a four. And I And I also I preface. I go, "Listen, a 10 doesn't mean you walked away from orders because Mark, I think, touched on it earlier about this ridiculous idea of the one call close." And and it it just doesn't happen that much in our industry. It happens less now than it used to happen. Um so it's a 10 is not I got an order. A 10 is not even I got an appointment. A 10 is that I was able to articulate what makes us different. I was able to build some rapport and I was able to hopefully have some sort of a next step with them that that I I have made some progress on here and I am in a more positive light than I was before I picked up the phone. Okay, most people give themselves a four, but you can do the same type of exercise for every meeting that you have and then you talk through and go, "Okay, it was a four. Why was it a four? What would have made it a seven? What would have made it an eight?" And then you can start to really build on the quality of it. If you make 200 phone calls in a week and your ratio of call to connect is 25 to 1, which is what we see a lot, somewhere between 20 to 25 to 1, you're talking to 8 to 10 people. That's all you got. You left 190 voicemails and you're talking to 8 to 10 live people. So, those need to be as productive as they possibly can be.
Mark, anything you want to add to that? Yeah, I I would also say that um when we're thinking about measuring the quality of sales interactions, we have to look at the the buying cycle as much as the selling cycle. Like what is it that we're able to get people to do on the buying cycle? Are we getting them to move through? Because it doesn't matter how far we think we are in the selling process. It matters what actions the customer or prospect are taking when we interact with them. Uh, and so that's what I look for immediately as as signs like when what's your what's your show up rate to set appointments? Um, what actions are scheduled after next appointments and are people showing up there? Are you getting the if if you're getting the buyer to kind of follow you along through the selling process, that's a high indication of quality, but that requires preparation. Yeah. Related to that, you just made me think about really focusing on what door am I going in. Yeah. So, if I'm going in the HR door, the odds are pretty good that it's going to be a staffing conversation and it's likely to be commoditized. If I'm going in the hiring manager door, maybe it's a staffing conversation, maybe it's a conversation specific to the challenges of that department. If it's the CFO conversation, the CFO door, the CEO door, now I'm talking business strategy, now I'm talking cost management. Now, I'm talking risk management. So, I'm having very different discussions. And if I want to differentiate my services, I have to figure out how to go in different doors that my sales team may not be trained to go in. But there's also levels within each of those areas, too. Because the conversation I'm having with the HR manager is much different than the call conversation I'm having with the VP of talent acquisition. Yeah, I can still have a very strategic conversation with a VP of talent acquisition. uh I can have a strategic conversation with a VP of operations versus an operations supervisor. So, it also is the level. And what I find when we talk about selling strategically, the biggest mistake we make is we go in too low. And when we go in too low, we're talking tactical and we're talking with people that that they just want they just want a body. They just want somebody to and they also will revert to price. They will.
And here's the other thing, too. They get the most phone calls. Why? Because so many sales people have an inferiority complex when it comes to actually reaching out to executives. They don't feel that they are worthy enough to go to that CEO, CFO, VP level. And so instead, they go to what they consider as peers. And and I'm not putting everybody into this category, but I'm putting in an awful lot. Uh when we look at the lists that sales people put together, almost every time I go, you're not going high enough. You got to go higher. You got to go two levels, three levels higher than you're going. I see lots of generalists, recruiters, supervisors, managers. I don't see as many directors, VPs, and chief executive officers as there should be. It's interesting you say that. I was thinking of a of a client of ours who had spent a lot of time, I mean, months and months and months training their salespeople how to go in at that higher level, Tom. And then we talked to them after they had been implementing for a while. And we talked to the salespeople without their managers there. And everybody was calling on HR and and I remember literally telling the CEO of this company, please don't shoot the messenger, but all this effort you just put in isn't being implemented. People are afraid. They're afraid of calling on the executive. And I don't remember exactly how we got them to start making these calls, but I remember the first salesperson who was deathly afraid of calling on a seale executive came back after a week of doing that saying, "These people are so much nicer. I have really good conversations with these people. They're not just beating me up for the whole meeting. This is completely different." So the the perception versus reality in that sale was so different. All right, guys. But I want to transition a little bit and we're going to talk about a few specific sectors and see if we can have any ideas for uncovering opportunities. So we'll start with the biggest one that's probably on today's webinar. Uh people in light industrial commercial staffing. Do you guys see any untapped or or lesser targeted segments in commercial staffing? See this is why we should plan some of these questions ahead. I'm processing that, David. Yeah. Yeah. I'm still spinning on the last thing. I just I there's a a simple fix to Well, well, go ahead, Mark.
Yeah, I will say this. Uh I think that I think I'm thinking about the new salesperson that joins an organization. Um the tendency is so let's assume the salesperson's well equipped. They've got Zoom Info or some other tool to curate lists. Uh and they go out and hit the street. Um, they're looking for they're looking for big logos. They're looking for known entities in town. They're they've got their Zoom info list, which every other staffing agency has also printed out. Uh, and so they waste a whole bunch of time. They go out there for the first 90 days and they're knocking on the same door as everybody else. So, so I don't know that it's a a missed segment, but uh my recommendation would be start start a little lower. You you don't Yes, the company that you're chasing right now with that big flashy sign out there uses a hundred people a day, but uh boy, I bet you'd be pretty happy with an order of five. So, maybe you go down a couple of back roads or start with the B list and go after some uh customers that that don't have their door knocked on 20 times a day by staffing companies. Yeah, you made me think of my middle kid first time he went to a job fair and we like, "How was it?" And he goes, "Well, there were long lines. Everybody waiting to talk to companies like Microsoft. I went to the tables where there was nobody and you know I had like five people that wanted to schedule follow-up interviews with me and the people in the long lines none of them heard anything back and I see you're exactly right Mark in sales we do the same thing we want the home run instead of saying well where are there a lot of singles we can hit and winning teams hit lots of singles well it's we do the same thing on the recruiting side everybody posts on Indeed everybody. So it's, you know, whereas there's other places that you're not going to get as many applicants, but you're going to get better results. So I I agree with Mark. I think that the the opportunity is to look at the companies that are are smaller, not as well known. Uh, a lot of those also can be the up-and-comers, too. You know, that's where you get in uh and you get onesie and before you know it, you got 50 people out there because they've been growing and you've grown with them. So I do think that that is that is an opportunity certainly in industrial to go after. The the other thing too is to just be, you know, just just be aggressive in going after ones that you think are all locked up. You know, a lot of times there's ones that we ignore. Oh, so and so ABC staffing's been out there for 10 years. They're they've got a great relationship. Nobody's getting in there. Well, maybe 10 years they've reached the end of their run and people are just dismissing it. So I think that's another way other area to take a look at. I was going to say or maybe it's a new HR manager looking to make their mark. So I can be monitoring let's look for trends where people are transitioning in roles because every time there's a transition the new person coming in has to prove their value and sometimes they want to change things up. Yeah. Anything for you on uh uncover opportunities?
I'll echo I'll echo Mark's piece as well. I don't know if there's really untapped markets for commercial staffing because of the way that we are just kind of commoditizing our prospecting outreach with our Zoom info list. Like we are just kind of spamming the market uh very generically. So to think that there's a stone that hasn't been turned over by a staffing salesperson, um it would be a very small unique thing, but I do think that people are more apt to chase the big logos. And I think there's a lot of small like small to mid-market companies that get neglected. And the nice thing about it is like if they're not getting called on all the time, it is a less commoditized sales cycle, you know, and I I would say I mean we honestly we actually just segment our market A, B, and C and we build our campaigns based on that model. Uh so Mark hit the language that that we speak is that we go after the B markets. Um because you really will find less competition there because everyone's chasing those big those big logos. And if they do have 100 people and that's really attractive, they probably got 10 agencies, too. You know, I would rather be one agency supporting a company with 10 people than one of 10 agencies supporting a company with 100 people. So, um I think that's really my my approach to to that. Although the other thing that you can do with those that most staffing companies don't do is that company that has a hundred people out there with 10 staffing companies is go as high as you possibly can in the organization and pitch a solution to take all of that, right? And and package it in a different way. Most staffing companies don't do that. It's more of a give us a chance to beat one of those 10 or now one of 11, right? Yeah. So I I'm also thinking about uh um the a missing portion that we don't chase enough is what's coming. You know, in the spirit of uh if if we if we uh go to a company and we ask about the roles that are open right now, fine. But assume that five other staffing companies are also chasing those roles that are open. We're too late at that point. If the roles posted, if the banner's out there, we missed it. It's too late. We're playing catch-up. Uh so I like to I like to talk to companies about, hey, tell me about some of your mission critical roles that you haven't posted yet. What's coming up this year. And again, it's in the spirit of playing that long game. Uh don't don't tell me what's open. I assume you already have a solution for that. Tell me about what's coming. Uh so that we can get ready for it. Somebody asked or mentioned in the chat like what about things like return to work? And I think if you look at return to work and AI and any ch trends that are dramatically impacting workforce management, those become staffing opportunities if you can become an expert at supplying the talent, managing the talent, retaining the talent who fit into those particular trends.
All right, I want to jump to one. I I think this one's Can I can I can I just share two quick action? So to comment on something Tom said about thinking like a different talent workforce management like thinking more strategically with those companies that have multiple vendors, think about offering a VMS service. You know 80% of the enterprise employers use some sort of VMS with an MSP mid-market companies that's actually a bit of a blue ocean right now. So you can actually partner with a VMS software and go in and offer that and aggregate that. And if you look at it, MSPs is actually one of the fastest growing markets in the staffing segment because they're aggregating staffing services and they got the great tools. So that's that's one piece on on that side that I I wanted to share. So the one I want to jump to, although you actually took one that's two bullets down for me, Dan, I want to follow up on that. So I saw at SIA one of the speakers who scaled her company from 3 million to 900 million did it by following MSPs. Um she she went after the biggest of the big employers for her business and then she learned to work with MSPs. So for most of the people listening to that, they're probably not really that happy with dealing with MSPs and VMS systems, but do you see opportunities to scale growth by changing your model to be more of that fulfillment engine, the MSPs? I see it. I mean, that's why we had Kim Henderson come out and talk about that at the staffing sales summit. And if you think about it, MSPs have a great value proposition that they're communicating to our customers when they are basically saying, "We're going to come in and fix all of those problems that are left in the wake of working with an individual staffing agency. You know, we're going to show we're going to give you visibility and the tools and all that stuff to find the top performers. We're going to weed out the poor performers and we're going to make them pay for it." Like there that's the value prop. That's really attractive because there is demand for our services. That is undeniable, right? So, we have to get better at selling it. So I do think there's a massive opportunity to to sell to and through MSPs and also sort of alongside them if you actually can get
A good VMS software can be that aggregator, because customers do like working with the direct agency. They just don't like being let down.
Yeah. My philosophy is you can either bring customers the change that they're seeking, or you can be a victim to it.
Yeah. So, you may as well be at the front end of that, uh, and have a conversation about the solutions they're exploring and help them partner with something that's beneficial to you, as opposed to just waiting for them to tell you what's happening next.
I love that. You know, you have to be willing to disrupt your own business, because if you're not willing to do that, you're right, somebody's going to do it to you.
All right. Speaking of disrupting businesses, the one I wanted to ask about is healthcare staffing. So, obviously because of the costs of travel nursing, the rising bill rates, um, staffing companies were blamed; they're the victims. So, if you're working for a healthcare staffing organization and trying to drive demand, how do you deal with it in an environment that is so anti-staffing right now?
I would say it depends on the segment. I think you got to let the travel nursing market cool off a little bit. There's a negative sentiment there because of the cost. A lot of people jumped in, and they gouged a bit, and healthcare agencies, you know, they had to pay.
Um, but I think on the per diem side, I, you got to look at platforms; like you have to look at tools to be more efficient at getting the talent to those healthcare organizations faster and more cost-effectively. And if you can do that through a platform, and you can bring that and then bring your expertise as a QC middle person, making sure that the right person is getting to that healthcare organization client of yours the right way, that's a great way to do it. Contract. You could still use some of that, but I really think it's about having a stronger relationship with your providers and making sure that you actually have a stronger relationship with a candidate and a stronger network of passive candidates that you can put on long-term contracts that will actually learn the institutional knowledge of the organizations you're placing them.
But that's my two cents. And back to your comment earlier, David, about starting at the right level of the organization, um, this is a place where CFOs are showing up more than most other industries, right? The CFOs are getting involved in those decisions. We don't talk to them often there, uh, but I assure you they're looking at your deal and inking your deal if there is one. And so maybe taking a different approach and starting there, or at least preparing to have that conversation, would be a wise move.
Yeah, I think you, I think you got to approach it from the standpoint of letting, letting the ones who want to vent, vent. Uh, not trying to change their mind immediately. Acknowledging that, yeah, there were probably some bad players out there. We've all got them in our industries, and there certainly were, and there were also a lot of healthcare professionals that were taking advantage of things as well. And and so there's a lot of different factors that go into it, but um, you know, don't try and talk them out of it on the first call. You want to start to build a relationship and build some trust.
The other thing is is that as many people that have a bad taste in their mouth about healthcare, there's just as many people that don't, as far as healthcare staffing. We're seeing healthcare staffing companies land new clients all the time.
Yeah. And and then the last thing is there's a big difference between um, not wanting but needing, and right now a lot of these healthcare facilities have been more successful at recruiting on their own. It's not going to last. It's, you know, we continue to have healthcare professionals, nurses, doctors, CNAs, everybody leaving the workforce, whether they're retiring or they're going and doing something else. And we continue to have an aging population that needs more and more healthcare workers. That is great for us. It just isn't necessarily here today for everybody. But I, I certainly think that it's a matter of you've got to, as hard as it is, you got to be a little bit patient with trying to win some of the people back over, but don't extrapolate out that the entire healthcare industry hates healthcare staffing, because it's it's not the case out there.
Yeah, good point. That's a good point.
So something I, I want to add, kind of to tie back a piece that Tom mentioned earlier about how do you actually, how does a salesperson interact, and how do you, you know, what's the language you're using. We have to understand how our solution connects to the person we're talking to. If you're talking about labor shortages, like one of the biggest labor shortages is obviously nurses and medical assistants, very hard to fill, and the impact of that is that the actual providers become less efficient; they have lower capacity because they don't have that support system helping them get as much work done. If you talk to a department head, they're going to see that as a staffing issue. They're going to be like, "We don't have the right coverage. It's causing a capacity issue. It's causing like, uh, basically not being, uh, having, uh, continuity through the charting process, and like it's a very," If you talk to a chief administrator, right? You get up into the administrative side of it, they're going to think it's an efficiency issue. They're going to say, "Hey, our producers are not, they're not seeing enough patients, or our patient press gainy scores are going down, so we're not getting the financial reimbursements from the insurance companies or Medicare, whatever." Right? They're going to see that and they're going to think it's an efficiency issue. So, what are they going to do? They're going to try to solve it with new tools, training, new resources, and they're going to keep throwing new technologies, new tools at the providers, and they're like, "It's not this. It's like we physically don't have the manpower to do the work, right?" So you have to understand like how do you speak that language and connect the dots from an, what looks like an efficiency issue to a chief administrator and tie it back to a staffing issue so they understand that you are the solution that they really need, and it's not a new shiny software tool.
Yeah, that's a great point. Uh, many, many years ago, I remember a case study, and it was not from the United States; it was from Sweden, and it was a hospital that was bleeding cash, and make a long story short, what they found is the reason they were bleeding cash is they weren't doing enough surgeries, and they weren't doing enough surgeries because they actually were understaffed. Yeah. So while the knee-jerk reaction was cut costs because we're losing money, it turned out what it really was, they needed more nurses, and they needed more janitorial staff to clean up surgical suites so that they could keep them operating more hours of the day. And it was so the staffing company that figured this out actually generated a lot of demand to show people you are cutting costs by hiring more people because your labor as a percentage of your revenue will decline.
Yes. All right. We're going to go about four more minutes before we get to some questions from the audience, which we've got a ton of them. So for everyone who submitted them, thank you. There's no way we're going to get to everybody's questions because there were too many. But our team has promised to do our best to turn those into some blog content after this. But let's go through some of maybe more rapid fire. And this is questions about the sales process. What are the most common mistakes you see staffing companies make in their prospecting? Who wants to go first? Okay, go ahead, Dan.
I will. The most common mistake starts right at the beginning. They lack a clear target. If they're making 200 calls a week, are they really calling 200 of the right people? I have seen salespeople that actually can make a lower volume of calls and outreach attempts and prospecting behaviors if they're operating from a better refined list. If they have, again, I know I keep chanting it, and it's really is this simple. If you have a clearly defined ideal or client profile and you know exactly who you're looking for and you know they're a buyer of your services and you can clearly articulate your unique value proposition and how you solve their problem and you can bring testimonials and social proof to prove to them that you can do it. Like if you start with a better targeted list, you will have better results. So that is one thing that I see salespeople doing all the time is they start too generically, and then they sell generically through the entire process, and then they complain that they get generic results.
Awesome. Anyone else? Biggest mistake?
Uh, I think I think we waste a lot of time and and throw out wasted questions. Yeah. One of, one of the most common questions I hear staffing salespeople ask is, "Do you need staffing?" Who cares? That's a wasted question. It, yeah. If, if, if they say yes or no, it's not going to change what you ask next. So, stop wasting people's time. Tell them, tell them what you want. Uh, you know, be direct. Share how you can create value. Um, and it that comes down to preparation. I also have to just give a high five, verbal high five to Michael in the chat who says lack of follow-up and expecting to close the deal on the first call. So, I'm with you, Michael.
Yeah. The number one thing to me, hands down, is lack of activity. Is just not doing enough. I always tell people it's you got to have enough swings at the plate to get hits. And we talked about earlier about quantity versus quality. You got to have both. I mean, here's the, here's the thing. If, if we're getting a 25 to one connect or call to connect rate and we make 200 calls and we talk to eight. Well, if we did 250, then we would talk to 10. 10 is better than eight. 12 is better than 10. It, the, if it is amazing that over the last couple of years that staffing companies have struggled with sales and yet I have not seen any real increase in sales activity. And when I see sales reps that are struggling, I don't want to see a sales rep that's struggling that all of a sudden goes, you know what, I'm going to double the number of calls I make because that gives me twice as many chances to have success. So it all comes back to to activity. Um, and a byproduct of that to me is this idea of research. Is this because research is good, but usually when somebody's talking about research, they're talking about avoiding what they really should be doing because research is easy for pretty much everybody, right? But what they really need to be doing is going after as many people as possible. They need to be blanketing the market, saturating the market as quickly as they can. Everybody needs to know who you are in the market. However many, you're absolutely right, Tom. However many prospects people think that they need to have now, it's probably double that number. I mean, you've just got to increase the volume.
So, for me, I, I'm going to go with big shocker here, guys, a marketing answer to this one, but I don't think they're doing enough in the marketing to differentiate the sales process. So by the time the salesperson reaches out, they're, they're not doing anything to have teed up that person for success before the call. And probably the bigger fail is actually after the call that they're not doing enough to think, how do we nurture the relationship long term till that buying need happens? Because I've maybe got a 3% chance that the person's in the market, but 60 or 70% of the people I'm calling on will be in the market in the next 12 to 18 months. Yeah. How do I stay top of mind?
All right, we're going to switch over to some questions from the audience, and let's see one that came up several times. Uh, pricing. How do we deal with the low ballers in our market?
All right, guys. How do you take on the low-ball pricing?
Just go lower.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we're doing 18% markups now on temporary staffing. That's what we do. No. Um, I so first and foremost, you need to know what are you willing to accept and what are you not, like you have to know where you're going to walk away, and then you got to, you have to, and again there's a, there's a longer workshop in here that I'm sure Tom, Mark, or I could be happy to teach someday, but you have to be able to qualify like is price the thing that matters, right? And then another thing too, you have to actually understand most people, especially in the buying process of HR services, are not great at math, right? If you look at the difference between a 35% markup and a 50% markup, right? That seems like huge. Like that's like, holy cow, 35 to, that's huge, right? But if you actually quantify that, it's not that big of an expense. And if you actually help people quantify the, the, the difference from 35 to 50 and say, "Hey, this is all you're paying more. Would it be worth it to pay this much more and get exceptional service that will solve your problems versus ending up feeling regret for getting what you paid for?" Right? And like once you sort of teach that concept that really the more that you're asking isn't that much more financially, and you help with staffing math, I think that, uh, that's, that's the way that we approach it. But then again, if people are commodity buyers and they want to grind you down, walk away. Say no. Know your value and stand, stand your ground.
Yeah. The difference between, I there's so many people who think the difference between the bill rate and the pay rate is the staffing company's profit, right? It, they don't, they don't, they don't bother taking out any of those other things that come on top of the pay rate.
Um, can I, can I add to that real quick? There's a, there's a, there's a statistical term called, uh, the law of small numbers, and I've been dying to talk about that on this. And basically what it is is that, um, in many cases we get a couple of, of pieces of data and we extrapolate it out to the entire population. And it's, it's a huge mistake that people make across the board. One of the areas that they make a mistake in is pricing. And we see this all the time where the sales rep will say, "Oh, the market's ruined. The market's ruined. We've got these low-cost, uh, providers that are out there just do that are throwing these numbers around and all the markups I need to be in the, I need to be in the low 30s." I've even heard people say, "I need to be in the 20s, um, consistently." And I go, "Well, when you say that, how many people are you talking to?" And it usually boils down to one or two. Yes, they've talked to one or two companies that have said, "Can you match 32%, 36%, whatever it is," and they extrapolate it out to the entire, entire market. Um, you got to keep going. When I go in and I see larger sales teams and we take a look at what their gross profit is, the ones that have been in the industry the longest have the lowest gross profit because we're constantly getting beaten down, and the bar doesn't rebound; it doesn't bounce back. The ones that are new where you go, okay, don't do anything less than 60% or whatever the number is you give them. They go out and do that and they came back and they go, well, I talked to one and they wouldn't do that. Okay, we'll keep going. All right. And they keep going. So, so much of it around pricing is is our own mindset, and we do it to ourselves.
Yeah. And I think you also need to decouple price and value in that conversation. And it's okay if your buyer jumps right to what is this going to cost me if you can do this. If they jump right to the price before you've really established the value, take a step back, be like, "Hey, can, let's before we even talk about price, let's figure out if I can even do what you need me to do, right? Can I even solve your problem? Because if I can't solve your problem, no price is worth it." Right? And and decouple price from value. And then focus on selling value in that moment and get them to understand that you're a better partner. And then say, "Okay, based on what we've covered, what do you think this is worth?" Right? And then you, then you align your price with the value you've established. You got to decouple that early on.
So, another question that came in is, um, challenge companies are seeing of more companies taking hiring in-house. Um, less demand for temporary staffing and even on the direct hire side, they're, they want to do it themselves. How do you advise companies to deal with that trend? Mark, you want a chance to speak? I feel like we've been drowning you out.
Yeah, sure. I, I would say that that kind of ties back to this idea that they're being thoughtful and planful about, uh, what's coming in the future and try to join that conversation. If they, if they see you as a fulfillment organization where they can just call you when they need you, uh, and you're not having longer-term conversations, they're not going to involve you in that TA conversation either. But that's what they're doing when they're bringing somebody in-house. They've, they've created a job. They've thought about the future. They've estimated their headcount, what that person's return is going to be. There's a lot that went into the planning behind that role. And, um, the best thing you can do is think about trying to join that conversation. For me, one of the things I would look at is what are they not getting when they do it themselves? So I, I know for small business owners, if you ask them that what they dislike most about their jobs, the number one answer is hiring. People don't like the whole HR side of running their businesses. And if you ask hiring managers about the pain, I'm sure their feelings would be similar. But when companies are hiring on their own, they may be giving up something. They can't recruit from a direct competitor. It's harder for them to do things confidentially if they're top-grading. Um, they are going to see the best talent that applies to the ad, not necessarily the best talent in the market because on the recruiting side, they're probably not hunters, and the recruiters in the organization know how to go hunt for talent. It's a symptom of a soft job market and more candidates right now. You just got to keep talking to them. You got to keep being a thought leader and being consultative and and tell them that, hey, listen, yeah, you're probably getting some maybe some better quality candidates when you're posting those jobs on the job boards. Um, but it's going to turn around here. Might be next month. It might be next year, but it's going to turn around. So, let's just keep talking. Let's keep talking and let's, let's talk about the ways that maybe you could use us strategically moving forward when you need us.
All right, we're at, uh, two minutes to go, so I want to wrap things up with one final question, which is one piece of advice that you would leave everybody with about what they should do to help drive demand in their business going forward.
I'll go, uh, sit down and thoughtfully think about your and define your ideal client profile. It's probably changed from the first time that you did it when you opened your doors. Uh, and really think through, look at the clients that you're best equipped to service and you're most successful with. That's your framework. And then really look at your UVP and align it. What are you doing to really meet their needs to why they keep coming back and using your service, right? Like really take time and thoughtfully think that through and then articulate it. And if you're not good at articulating it, work with a great marketing partner because they, and this is not obviously I love what Haley does, this is but this is not necessarily a plug specifically for them. Work with them because marketing are experts at taking complex ideas and turning it into understandable messaging to influence an audience to do something. And then once you do that, all demand is created upstream from the sales process. All demand is created before the salesperson is really reaching out. Salespeople can help, but you really got to go further upstream. So it is a marketing play. You do have to have clear ICP, clear UVP, and clear messaging in that market. So do that, and you will.
Be far ahead of the competition. Awesome. Thanks, Dan. I would also—I would say—stop selling people. We have to sell what the people do. People are a commodity. If we're—if we're selling people, we're going to get commoditized. If we provide business solutions based on what the people do, then we're in a much better place.
And um, David, I've got to throw one more little plug in there. Uh, since you started this with—um—with the state of the staffing industry, one of the things that's happened through those squiggly lines you showed is that there are a lot more players in the game. We have a ton of competition out there. And you may see that as a threat, but I would encourage everybody on the call to see that as an opportunity because here's the—here's the mantra in the winter household: As long as I have a bunch of competitors, my kids are never going to go hungry. Uh, my job is to find them and kick the snot out of them and take their business. So, uh, know your competition. Awesome. Tom, how about you?
Role-play live calls as much as possible and score yourself on a scale of 1 to 10 and be brutally honest with yourself and figure out how to get better and better and just keep role-playing and role-playing and role-playing until you're so comfortable when you get somebody live on the phone that you are able to have better conversations and you get better results. That's where the bottleneck is in sales more than anything else—is being able to get from that live cold call to an appointment.
All right, and I'll wrap it up on my end. It would be—uh—really looking at having a systematic process that's going to integrate different types of communication, different touch points into a plan sequence so your salespeople know who they're calling on, know what they should be focused on, have stuff to talk about, and it helps them stay top of mind after the call.
Guys, I want to thank you all so much. Before everybody goes, I do have a couple of parting gifts at the end of this. I'll put the slides back up, but I just want to say a huge thank you to Dan and Mark and Tom for volunteering their time to come be part of this webinar. Um, we could have gone for another hour, even maybe two or three. This was super fun. Um, for those who have asked, this was recorded and the recording will be put up at Lunch with Haley, hopefully by tomorrow sometime. So you can listen in and—uh—take all these nuggets of wisdom back to your companies going forward.
Let me just—uh—do a quick share before we say goodbye. A couple of things for everybody today. So, uh, one of the things we put together is we knew it's going to be a hard year to sell. So if you have not already received or been part of this, um, we have a limited edition email marketing campaign. So it's 30 sales ideas in 30 days. Um, you can take a picture with your phone or just go to haleymarketing.com/30salesideas and—uh—fill your month up with inspiration for what you can be doing. We also have, let's see, some special offers going on. So, a lot of the stuff that I talked about here, you can go to haleymarketing.com/staffing-sales and get some special goodies that we have going on throughout the remainder of this quarter.
All right. Lastly, uh, mark your calendars, cuz our next Lunch with Haley event is coming up in about a month and we're going to be doing show-and-tell. So, this one was all sales tactics. We're going back to marketing to do some show-and-tell and staffing websites, but we're going to take a look at trends, technologies, and why staffing industry analysts consistently say upgrading your website is your highest return on investment marketing that you can do. So, join us on Thursday, May 22nd. You can reserve a seat at lunchwithhaley.com.
From all of us at Haley Marketing, uh, a huge thank you. Really appreciate everybody joining us for today's webinar and we look forward to seeing you again on future Lunch with Haley events. Thanks, David. Thanks, all.