60-Min Sales Masterclass from a £1,000,000 Biller

Hey guys, welcome back to yet another episode of Top Billers Toolkit, where me and my twin brother interview top billers from all around the world to unlock the secrets to their success. Today's guest is Elliot Jones. Elliot is a £1 million contract biller. In just 3 months, his contract book dropped from £35K all the way down to £3K. As you can probably imagine, guys, it was one of the most difficult moments of his career that tested his mindset and it was an incredibly dark period for him, but it taught him one of the most valuable lessons that he will never forget, which is never stop doing BD. Fast forward to today, and Elliot is about to hit £1 million for the third year in a row. Guys, Elliot is truly obsessed with recruitment. He's a master at his craft, and today he's gonna be sharing his candidate-led BD strategy that fuels his entire desk. We'll be discussing why volume is so important for a top biller and what volume actually means. And we're going to be gathering insight into how Eliot consistently lands enterprise accounts. This is a banger of an episode. We hope you enjoy it as much as we did. And as usual, grab a cuppa or a glass of wine depending on when you listen to this. And let's get into it, shall we? Eliot, thank you so much for joining us today. We're so excited to have you on the podcast.

Morning, fellas. Thanks for having me on.

Awesome. I remember messaging you earlier, um, I think it was about like 3, 4 months ago, and for whatever reason it wasn't the right time. And I just remember getting a message from you recently and I was like, yes! I was like, my— I had this feeling of like, absolute, this is a, an amazing opportunity to interview you because I know you've done some amazing things. Um, we'll get into that in a second, but let's start off with the very first question, if that's okay with you, which is what's the number one tool in your toolkit? Um, whether it be a mindset, strategy, or piece of software.

Yeah, I think with it, there's two parts to this really for me, because every top biller I've ever worked with, and I think it's really kind of evident in, in my story, is mindset is the most important thing. I've never worked with a, a really high-performing biller who doesn't have the kind of hunger and steely mindset that will kind of carry you through the resilience required to do well in this, in this kind of job. So I think personally and as a biller, that's really important. But then as kind of a leader of a team and working with the wider business, I think the thing that perhaps sets us apart and has been a really key tool for Vittoria and myself has been our strategy. You hear contract billers talk till they're blue in the face about their BD strategy and how they operate, but I'm kind of hyper-focused on our candidate strategy. A huge believer that you've got to put the candidate first, and everything that you do from a business development perspective should start with the candidates. So I think certainly for us as a business, what's allowed us to build 5, 6, $20K+ contract billers on the US market has been really doubling down on our candidate strategy to ensure that the guys are spending as much time as possible on the phone to really strong candidates. We know that the best candidates will give you the best information, will have worked at the sites that we want to BD to, will be interviewing at sites that we want to work with, but also are going to be the door openers for the clients you are trying to breakdown. So if we prioritize our candidate strategy and get that right from the offset, it should feed into everything else.

Absolutely love that. It's amazing how many, uh, top billers we've had on the podcast where it starts with the BD, starts with the candidate, and it kind of feeds off from there. Um, so it's a consistent thing me and Ben are hearing more and more. Um, I would love to kind of do a bit on mindset and then go into the rest of the, the candidate strategy and just, and tuck into that nitty-gritty stuff. Um, Elliot, but in terms of mindset, I always find there's like an 80/20 rule with, with my— like with most things, in terms of like 80% of the habits that you, that you, that you have will affect your mindset. Is there any 80/20 rule for you in terms of how you develop your mindset or how you continue to keep a solid mindset? Or are you one of these people that just has quite a strong mindset, which they do exist, definitely?

Yeah, I think for me it is a little more innate. I just Absolutely, I have my off days. And you know what, if there was any 80/20 rule that runs true for me, it's just make sure you're there and on the money and doing everything you can to move your business forward at least 80% of the time, knowing that 20% of the time you may have an off day. And, and that's okay, we've got to account for that. But if you're constantly up on the ball at least more than 80% of the time, it, it's going to work out, um, you're going to get there. But I think for me it's more innate than anything. I just kind of am wired that way. But also most of the top performers I've ever worked with are exactly the same and go to sleep at night thinking about their next successes and kind of have more of an obsessive Yes, to their personality where they really kind of double down on what can bring success and then hyperfocus on that.

Yeah, that's really fascinating. It's an interesting one. It also is a bit of a— and this is just an interest for me anyway, because it's like, I think when you speak to— if we speak to people listening to this, everyone wants to become a top biller, or everyone wants to be the best they can be. Maybe, maybe not everyone's become the top biller, And it's like, I'm not sure if we have the answer to this question, but what if, what if you don't have that obsessive personality? Like, have you met any top billers who don't have that obsessive personality, or is that a prerequisite in your opinion earlier, or just a, you know, what you need to become a really good biller? What's your feeling?

Yeah, it's a really good question and something we've thought about from like a hiring perspective, because in a recruitment business, not everyone can be your top biller or be a top performer. Working at a really high level. I've worked with some incredibly successful billers who perhaps don't have that mindset, but they can compartmentalize their work and their home lives really effectively, which is probably a much more healthy way of living than how I do, kind of constantly being switched on. But I would say there is a noticeable level where they seem to stop. And that doesn't have to be specific number of billings, it might be number of deals. But those who go on and break records, it's the, the normal or what good looks like, all seem to have that kind of internal drive that, that will take you there. That doesn't mean you can't have really successful billers who are a little more kind of content to do the job and then go home and kind of compartmentalize those parts of their life. But yeah, I think that the best billers and who I classify as the best recruiters I've worked with all have that mindset of, I want to be the best, I'm constantly thinking about that. But like I said, there's some great billers that that don't have that, and there's always a place for those in a business. You can't build a large recruitment business off just top billers. It's impossible. But also, we're not always the most profitable because at the top end, you're paying— typically with most decent commission structures, you're paying a larger percentage of commission when you're in the higher brackets. Yes, if you get a team of good billers, 10 people doing well are always going to be more profitable as a business than just one person billing all of that themselves. Yes, we're going to take the best cost into account, but in reality, the spread there is typically going to be better off with people hitting the medium commission brackets. So to keeping a larger percentage of what they're billing, uh, existing. Yeah, but they can also earn really good money doing that.

It's kind of a win-win, isn't it? It's like you can still earn good money, more profitable for the business, um, and yeah, it's like it's— it can be a win-win for everyone. It's just interesting because I know that, you know, that obsessive nature is really like top 1%, isn't it? And it's like most people listen to this probably don't have that obsessive nature, but they can still be really successful. So I'm just like to explore that. Just jumping, like, staying on the same topic as mindset, I know you've been through your own journey, Elliot, with kind of battling demons, because you, you went from £35,000 down to £3,000 and then back up again. Obviously now you're a million-pound biller, but there was a point in your career where your billings just dropped dramatically, and I would love to understand what was that experience like. How did you feel when it happened, and I guess, how did you turn it around? What was the process of turning it around back up to a million again?

Yeah, so that again, it boils down to the mindset thing. And as somebody who's really obsessive about the work that I do and who just really cares about providing the best service, working as effectively as a partner to my clients as possible, delivering for Venturi as a business who have looked after me for nearly 10 years, coming on 10 years now. Um, that really hurt, and I was probably throughout 2020, uh, 2023 was in a bit of a dark place. And again, there's a lot bigger things in the world than, than your billies dropping, so it's not that heavy. But at the same time, that ate me up a little bit, and I was coming in with a chip on my shoulder and almost a point to prove. I think when you get to really high levels of billings, there's always the doubters who will say you got lucky, you landed on X account, made the, the money off the back of that. Um, I think for me it was always— my mindset was always, I've done it once, I'll do it again. It's going to be shit because I've got to go through that build process again, but once you'll do it faster this time and build back up on more stable foundations. I was briefly chatting with Sam just before the, uh, um, the, the podcast kicked off about how kind of, uh, there, there's always an element of control when you're placing contractors that, that you just don't have, um, you can always be hit with a large volume of finishes. And I think for me, I constantly live in fear of that happening again. And that's what drives me to constantly be working to focus on business development and ensure that if that does all finish, I've got another client who I'm chipping away at who could be the next 5, 10, 20 placements. That will get me back up.

So interesting. Most of the people that I've spoken to who are extra cautious and motivated about BD have had a really shitty time, you know, I've had everything taken away from them, and then they're like, cool, I never want that to happen again. Whenever I speak to recruiters and they have that horror story, they're like way more motivated to, to keep going and to double down on BD, which is really interesting. Um, sorry, Sam, I interrupted you, or— No, no, I was just kind of repeating what Elliot said. I'm guessing after that experience now the BD is just consistent, and that's your like parachute just in case something bad happens. Like, you are constantly doing BD, you've constantly got a pipeline of clients you're speaking to, so if anyone drops off, you always can kind of start warming up relationships earlier. Am I right in saying that?

Yeah, but it also— I'd say definitely that, that's key and really important, but it also kind of reinstilled a level of confidence that, hold on a minute, it None of it was luck. It was all hard work, kind of dedication, and the skill of learning your market, understanding how to deliver and be a really trusted partner to the clients that you're working with. So now if that were to happen again, and full transparency, my spread wasn't that bad when it all dropped off. It wasn't like I had one huge client who all contractors was with. I'd done $2 million years, the 2 years before that, and, um, was, was, had some, some really good clients with large volumes, but multiple of them really. Um, and it just so happened that the post-COVID fallout where people had overhired and decided to, to slim back down hit me in the space of around 3 months.

Wow.

From a variety of different clients. So there's an element of me that knows that that could always happen again. Uh, but if you're constantly working to provide the best service and build the best relationship with your own clients, it's always going to come back faster next time. And the larger kind of volume and spread of clients that you work with, the quicker you're going to be to, to build that back up. If it does happen again. Yeah. So you improve on your relationships and then more conscious of, cool, how is everybody performing, to make sure that you're not filling jobs and relying on the contractor turning up and being reliable. You have your finger on the pulse for performance and you know, okay, this person is underperforming in this area, I want to speak to them and objection handle that to ensure they get their ass in gear and deliver wherever they can to support the end client. And if they can't or are not quite capable, can we look at moving them somewhere else and getting them out to market somewhere that would suit them, but also put them in a backfill and align options that would help ensure the end client deliver on their deliverables?

Can you take me back to that, uh, moment, Elliot, when, um, you were down to 3K and you were thinking, okay, I've got to build this back up again? I'm guessing if you did it again quicker, you probably drew back on some fundamental habits and strategies. Would you mind telling us your process of like how you did that, if that's okay?

Yeah, absolutely. And you're spot on. Like, for me, it's— a lot of the analogies I use is sport because that's kind of my passion. I always love football and in sport in general. But when you're down and things aren't going your way in any kind of walk of life, you've just got to return to the basics. 5-yard pass and build. And for me in our industry, it was a case of, cool, you're down on your luck, get back to basics. Get on the phone and speak to all of the best contractors that you know, understand how things are going for them. Work them out to market, understand where they're working, how many contractors are on site. Could there be an opportunity to, to deliver into those clients? If they're on the market, where are they interviewing? What other companies are growing in the market? What companies do I know have a large volume of contractors? Um, and how can we work to kind of build this back up as quickly as possible? Equally, reach out to all the clients I'm working with and have worked with in the past and get a taste for, or, or a temperature check on their growth plans over the next period. Unfortunately for me, when that happened, the market was in a bit of a decline and there were a lot fewer companies hiring. So my strategy at the time from a business development perspective was very mapping-focused, and I'd work to identify the best contract hirers in the market by speaking to people who work there and understand the challenges that they're overcoming, and then work to deliver the best similar resources to support those engineers on their teams. In a down market, that can be quite challenging because there's nothing to say that although they have— may have 20 to 100 contractors on site, in a down market they might not be hiring for more. So again, you've got to return to basics and do the fundamentals of contract recruitment, understand who is interviewing, what companies are hiring and growing, and double down on delivering into those firms, um, candidate side, and trying to find out as much information about that as possible so you're not throwing a resume at somebody that could be right or could not be right just based on the core skill set. You try to understand what problems are they— what problem are they looking to solve, and how can I deliver a profile or resources that are going to help overcome that challenge? Hopefully I've already overcome that same problem for other firms in the past.

Makes complete sense. Interesting. Okay, it's your turn. Go ahead. Um, I would love to jump on to question number 3, which is you're on track to do your $3 million year, which is amazing. And one thing you've said is your top revenue comes from a completely different client each year, if I'm, if I'm correct, Elliot. So every year you're looking to add another core client to your database that can bring in a significant amount of revenue. I'd love to understand what's your secret to developing— you kind of touched upon it there, I believe, but what— let's imagine you're in BD mode and you're looking for a key account. What are the steps that you take? In order to get that conversation and then eventually get them as a client?

So, and again, just to preface, like, that's not intentional, uh, and of course it's intentional that we want to bring on big clients every year, but it's just so happened that every time I've had a significant year of billings, or over 3 out of the last 4 years have been, have been great, It just so happens that a new client that I bought on, I did the most volume hires with that year and were the client who we supported most. And I kind of— I only realized this recently because I think sometimes you bring on new recruiters on the team and they just assume that you've landed a really big account or a couple of really big accounts and then delivered into them consistently, and they've been your safety net throughout all of these large billing periods. But For me, companies kind of demand ebbs and flows, so we've got to make sure that we're constantly looking to provide services to as many large contract employers as possible. And ultimately, the more you support, the easier it is to support others because you've got case studies and testimonials and a reputation to back you up. But in terms of process, for me, it all boils down to the fundamentals, and this is why I'm I'm so hot on our candidate strategy and making sure myself and the team are spending the vast majority of our time speaking to the best candidates in the market. Because I think most contract recruiters are so hyper-focused on their client strategy that they're just trying to speak to good candidates, get some leads that they can chase up for quick wins and spot business while BDing the best profiles that they stumble across. To the end clients that they're trying to place with. But for me, if we start with our candidate strategy and make sure we're spending our time sending recruiter messages to those candidates who work at the sites, who have what I call the highest bar to entry, uh, that's the only way I can truly prescribe to my team as a non-technical recruiter. Uh, I don't code, I would be kind of clueless if you put me in front of a load of JavaScript code and had to add to it. So we can't contribute on that side, but what we can do is understand who the best hirers are and understand who have the most kind of challenging interview processes that do hire a volume and consistently pull out of the same companies. So I know if somebody's worked at Company X, The likelihood is they've passed a really grueling interview process, so they're likely to, one, be a high-level performer, two, nail any interviews for me because they've already passed a more grueling interview process for the client that they're at now, and three, they're going to be those top-end engineers who are getting approached about the best work, and that information feeds into my business development funnel. Well, then of course, if I'm doubling down on pulling kind of candidates out of a certain site, my call with them is to understand their level, understand what challenges they're looking to overcome, because then I want to match that candidate with the challenges that my other target clients are looking to overcome so that they can clearly be a front-runner and a candidate of interest for that employer. But equally, that gives me the data on what this big contract supplier over here are looking to, to do. So I'm constantly then able to just cross-sell other candidates who overcome those same challenges, um, building a really detailed market map on what challenges they overcome what the kind of hiring structure is, how many contractors are on site, what's the split between perm and contract, who the decision makers are and who I need to build a relationship with to deliver into that firm so that my candidate work is forming my business development work more organically because I'm intentional about the candidates that I'm messaging and then scheduling calls with.

It's really interesting. I know that every recruiter would love to speak to the best candidates on the market because who wouldn't? You know, that's your product. And if you find good candidates, typically it's a lot easier to start conversations. I'm curious, Elliot, how are you starting conversations with these amazing candidates? There must be something you're saying, offering, or doing that is getting them on the phone and making them want to spend time with you. So what is the— what are you doing out of interest?

Yes, we're in quite a fortunate position. We've got an established desk and I think the challenge to get them on the phone for me 5 years ago when I started the US market is very different to the challenge now because we work with a market leader in pretty much every industry. If they are heavy e-com, I can talk to them about the work that we do with large-scale e-com businesses.

Cool, cool, cool.

They can just look at my LinkedIn and see that I've got recommendations from people working at these huge sites. So I have the reputation to back that up. Initially it was probably a bit more far-fetched, and you'd then have to spend the time to personalize your message a little bit and reference what they've done. Equally, I found the more you focus on pulling out companies from the same sites, the easier it is to get recommendations. Because if I build a really structured market map on Company X, I've got a list there of 10 to 20 other candidates who work there, teams that they've worked on and the challenges they've overcome. So when I'm speaking to a different candidate about the challenges they've overcome, It's very easy to go, oh, I'm guessing you worked with Ben or Sam, and they did. And that instantly builds your credibility because they know that you're— you've not landed on a good candidate. You speak to other great people that they've worked with and then are so much more likely to recommend others who may not have a very well-detailed LinkedIn profile that I didn't find organically. So you're going into those calls with a referee kind of.

Interesting. Yeah, brilliant. What would you say— I think I might have asked you this in the last call, but, um, so that makes sense. Reputation. You've built this reputation up to a point where they can check you out and they're like, yeah, obviously Elliot knows this stuff. Um, what are some of the problems that these— like, if you were to— let's say you're talking to a top like a 1% candidate, what are typically the things that they're looking for in their new role? Is it purely money? Is it, you know, is it the type of project? Is it a better brand? Is it, is it the bosses they're with? And I'm sure it varies, but have you found there's like one or two things that keep cropping up for these like top performers?

I think ultimately everyone's different and has different preferences. They're saying you find consistent themes and they want to You get people either end of the scale who perhaps want the influence and want to have input, um, who may be more suited to SME or startup-sized businesses versus those who— and these are who I probably predominantly speak with— work with enterprise businesses, household names, and all like the, uh, I'm an IC, I don't want to deal with the kind of challenges that come with management and leadership, but solve heavyweight problems. So when I can bring large-scale enterprise and clients to them and say, well, this company, I'll place a couple of people with who are doing this. Again, you're building credibility and get a gauge for what's important to them. You've got to ask. You can't sell any form of solution or role or kind of candidates at any one, be it candidate, a client, hiring manager, until you understand the problem. And it is a contractor who's— I mean, in the current landscape, there's a lot of people who are on the market. So that's a slightly different conversation when they're actively looking and have finished their last engagement, it's straightforward because you're getting their expectations, understanding what's important to them, and they'll be very free coming with that information. Versus if they're in a contract that may be winding down, or they're happy for now, but that— there's some great top 1%ers who I catch up with regularly who are engaged on contracts and not interested in looking, but I want to stay close to them so that when that does end Next time I'm able to present something that's going to be specifically relevant. One recent example being one of the strongest engineers I've worked with for a while, who very much has always fit into my kind of core patch of a true kind of JavaScript specialist, has wanted to look into another technology. Now, as uh, market expert. Typically I would only share a profile of somebody who's used the technology my client are looking to use consistently to present them for a role. However, I know this guy's incredible at what he does and has a little bit of experience in the technology stack they're working for. So I was able to sit down with the client and say, look, I know the skill set doesn't match how most of the profiles would. But if you were to consider this guy for something that he's done for the last 10 to 20 years, you'd be 30% too cheap for him, effectively. You'd be able to get him for the rate he's willing to come over at because he wants to increase his kind of hands-on experience with the technology you're using. That worked out for both parties. They interviewed him, loved him, said he's incredibly sharp and will pick the technology up like that. But also, I think the relationship with that candidate for the last 4 or 5 years, and he trusted me enough to say, hey, this is what I would like. It's probably a bit of a gamble. I might have to take a slight pay reduction, but I only found that out by listening. And I got that job on, I would never have called him for it. Because he's not plug and play, like the perfect profile for that position. But I know that he will deliver because he always does, and his references are incredible. I know hiring managers who worked with him before who all rave about him. So it was a calculated risk, and I only found that out by uncovering his kind of main motivators and what it was.

Really interesting. Um, one thing I'm really fascinated about in the contract world is maintaining candidates, because you're in an interesting position compared to perm where, you know, anyone could drop off at any point, anyone can stop performing, there can be issues with management, there can be issues with internal stuff. And you— correct me if I'm wrong, but I've heard that the recruiter can sometimes get the brunt of this as well, not just the manager. Um, am I right in saying that managing your books are just as important as getting new BD? And if so, how do you go about managing it, um, Elliot?

Yeah, definitely. And this is kind of a, a real ongoing challenge. Uh, when you've worked with a company for a while, you understand the feedback loop and how regularly you're going to hear on your candidate's performance. So employers are very forthcoming with it. Others will hold back and only loop you in when there is a major issue. Equally, you've got to— the consistent theme is just staying on top of the candidates and your clients and ask them how they're doing. If you're speaking to your client, how's Sam doing? How's Ben getting on this project? The recruiters are often scared to ask the question because, you know, it could be bad news. Philosophy that one of my first managers always instilled in me is like, ask the question that you don't want to know the answer to. And if you get the, if you get the answer you didn't want to hear, you at least now know and can action that versus doing the old kind of ostrich approach and burying your head in the sand. That's going to fall back on you. And I've kind of been burnt by that in the past, not knowing what's going on with, with my contractors. So it's as important as ever just to stay in touch with them regularly, understand how they're feeling, how they feel the work is progressing. That also is a business development opportunity. If a project is struggling with something, there's an opportunity to sell a solution. Knows that they're hiring or going to be hiring, it's an easy job to then pick up the phone to the client who you've worked with before or placed with and say, I heard about this, can I help?

Yeah, that's wicked, right? Absolutely love that. And do you have a system for following up? Is it kind of a feeling, or you like, okay, I'm going to call this candidate on this day, this client on this day? Is it like a system that you've got, um, Elliot?

We talk— we try and We try and kind of monitor our contracts on a— every 2 to— between every 2 to 4 weeks, basically. But I also know that some of my candidates don't want to speak to me. Some of them love a catch-up. Some of them do what they do, and I find just being on text terms with a lot of them really helps. Cool. A couple of weeks and how things going. Been a month since we last called up, how are things going? I know you mentioned this when we spoke last time, how are things going? But then there's always a reason to call. Yeah, they're submitting timesheets on a weekly basis. Every contractor I work with at some point will be late with their timesheets, and it's a reason to check in. So I try not to be overkill, and you've got to kind of be mindful of which ones want to speak to you that you can connect with very regularly, But also, there comes a point where if someone's been contracting for me for 2 years consistently and they don't really want to speak to me for the same client, I can rest assured that they've been there 2 years now, they're doing a good job. If I catch, I'll ask how they're doing. If they're late on their timesheets, I'll put a call in. But those in the first 18— 12 to 18 months of, of their engagement you need to stay on top of. After that point, they tend to be slightly more settled and reliable, but it's still important. So you, you might catch up with those every 6 weeks rather than every 2, um, but just making sure you understand that everyone's happy. As a contract recruiter, your job isn't just to fill a role and then move on. Like, your responsibility is to fill it and then stay on top of them throughout that process and ensure they're delivering to the best of your abilities. So yeah, really, really value that.

Very interesting. Um, I just want to go back to the approaching side of things because it sounds like obviously you've built up that reputation earlier, so I guess it's— there's a lot less friction. Do new recruits have, have the same kind of Um, do they benefit— I'm guessing to some extent they still benefit from the brand and from the, the image that you guys have built, but do they have a harder time of starting those conversations? Like, is there a, is there a different path you may advise newer recruits to take that don't have the, you know, the luxury of that brand to, to fall back on, if that makes sense?

Yeah, so the new recruits for Venturi, if I'm working a job, I work with my team. And I want their help to fill it. So they have brand names that I am recruiting for to, to carry a bit of weight, open those conversations up. Um, it might be harder for them because they're not already known to those candidates. A lot of— for me, it's at the point when 80% of the candidates I'm working with, people I've either placed before or they've interviewed for me before. So just recycling a lot of great guys, and I can trust that they're going to do a great job, which is awesome for your interview-to-placement ratios and that kind of thing, because you can trust that they're going to deliver. For the newer guys, they may not already know that individual, so it is a case of being specific. And I find authenticity is your best bet to get someone on the phone if I was recommending or giving advice to a recruiter starting on a fresh market to try and get hold of the best people, I'd say take your time and review their profile, reference something specific that they've done, or, um, a common connection that you've got, or something from their recommendations, or ideally, and my favorite approach is something that they're actually interested in. They're a big Bill's fan, reference the Bills to them when you send them a message. I know, result, just be an authentic human being and people buy into you way more than just hitting them with content or being overly persistent. And that's the same on the business development side. Some of the best kind of clients I bought on have been through noticing something in their personal life interested in. They might have a kid who's just had their birthday, or a wife who does— this is a job that they were really proud of. And if you're an authentic human who references that, people are going to relate to you.

Really interesting. And with that, because I've heard that before from another £2 million builder, that actually the beginning of his conversation with candidates and clients is sometimes not about business at all. It's just like about life, about football, about jiu-jitsu, whatever it is. I'm guessing, is that similar with you? It's just like you're just speaking about that personal thing for a bit and then it slowly transitions to business, or is it a bit more, um, nuanced than that?

I'd say that part is really important. Um, I listen to Ash's podcast and found it quite interesting. I had never put two and two together that most of the relationship building content I cover with candidates is often on later calls because they trust you and their barriers are lower at that point. And he said it on, on his part, and I was like, well, that's funny he says that because I never realized, but it's all— it's never the first call because unless your message references something like that, then it's a really easy opener of, I noticed this on your profile, I wanted to kind of Um, show you that I've done my homework and looked into you. Um, and then it's a conversation opener. If you're not using that as your conversation opener, the personality kind of side usually comes either at the back end of your call just to understand who they are and who you're doing business with, or on follow-up calls afterwards because their kind of guard is lowered. Um, So the, the more you can talk about their personal lives and not about business, the more people are going to relate to you and, and trust you and buy into your services. Um, but again, sometimes that can almost be inauthentic because I wouldn't call somebody I don't know and ask them about their personal life in the first couple of minutes of a call. Um, So you need to kind of, particularly with Americans, they love to chat but also want to understand, like, cool, why are you calling me? What are you selling? In the UK, I found typically people are a lot more resistant to cold calls. Americans are a little more open-minded to a cold sales call, but they point to, yes, the point, like, why are you calling me? Exactly. In the first part, you've got to show that where you can add value, any value to them. But then if you can bring in that kind of personality and authenticity and build a relationship with them throughout that process, you're going to have a notably better kind of relationship with that candidate. And same with, with the managers or clients that you're working with.

I'm gonna put you on the spot a little bit, Elliot. Don't worry, I'm not going to ask you to role play, but what I am curious about is let's imagine you are making a cold call. Maybe you don't do as many cold calls these days and your team are doing more of it, but let's say you're jumping on a call and you're calling someone of importance and they're like, hey Elliot, get to the point, I'm busy. What, what are the first few things— you don't have to say it word for word, but what are the things that you know are gonna hook them in straight away and pique their interest? Like, what are you what's going through your mind and what have you got kind of prepared for them to, to make sure they stay on the phone and listen to you?

Yeah, so with my team, I have a very kind of— and, and we sat down recently as a contract team, um, and kind of just spit ideas around cold call openers. If you reach out to a hiring manager, what do we do? Because I wanted to make sure everyone's on the same page and knows how to effectively sell. Um, for me it's really simple. Your call has to start with, I know, I heard, or I saw.

Love that.

You're starting with data. And again, boils back to where I think a lot of particularly contract recruiters go wrong, is they don't— they just hone in on the clients and they don't have a candidate strategy. If your candidate strategy is right and your conversations and questions with candidates, all right, uncovering problems, new projects, um, specific tooling that they're using, and you can then match that with a solution. Your opener is instantly adding value because I know you're doing XYZ, or I heard you're doing XYZ, so wanted to introduce you to XYZ, who is— who has this experience delivering this. Typically, if you have done your research and you have— and your data is right, that lands, and you either get the time of the day, that, that time of day, or you get, well, we filled it, or we're not using external recruiters. And then it's just your typical recruitment objection handle call, um, to find your way through. But if you lead with specific relevant information, you're going to come out on top. Um, I think if you're going blind into a call with no 'I know' information, you're already starting on the back foot and you're likely to get told to do one.

I love the 'I know, I heard, I saw.' I think that's absolute genius. No one's ever kind of systemized the intro like that. Absolutely love that, Elliot. Um, Ben, we're gonna ask a question on that. 'I know, I heard.' Yeah, I was gonna say, I'm like, I'm just— I'm, I'm sorry, you kind of gave us a little bit of an example I just want to dig a little bit deeper. That's okay, Elliot. So I know, for an example, like, let's say we're role-playing and we're trying to figure out what to say. I know you're using— would it sound something like this? I know you're using X software. I heard you're going through this problem. I want to get to X, Y, and Z with your company in the next few years. And I've got this candidate that might be able to help you. Would it be something like that? Or am I missing a couple of gaps? Am I missing a few things?

When I say, I know, I heard, I saw, You don't have to include all of those.

Okay, cool.

Okay, one of those is your opener. And to me, they're almost the same thing, but in that order. Because if you know, yeah, something is happening, you've got more confidence. Yeah, with that, if you've heard something that you think is right, it's probably a softer way to go into it. But also, if the information that you got was wrong or you're on to the wrong person who's not involved in that, You don't sound as much of an idiot. And then I saw, is your lowest level of data, because you might have seen they posted a job that they had just started implementing a new technology. But the, the, the content there for me needs to be centered around a problem that can be solved. Mm-hmm. Or an issue that they're facing right now. 'Cause if you are going in and saying, I know, so one good example, I got in with a quite large enterprise company because a candidate whose friend works there told me that a consultancy contractor had left an API open and it had cost them six-figure, like over $100,000 in cloud fees because the API was left open and that was calling consistently and costing them money up until the point where they closed the API. So that was my open. And that wasn't, I heard, but I heard one of the ex-consultancy contractors left an API open and it cost you, I can't remember the number on the top of my head, but circa $200,000 in cloud fees. I'm sure that's proven an issue for you. Um, a lot of the consult— a lot of the, uh, the clients I'm working with partner with Venturi because we do our due diligence with XYZ. One of the contractors I've placed before actually worked on a similar project to what you guys are doing, and he— their integration platform where it managed things He would love that.

Like, so once you do that, it's like so hard to say no to you, do you know what I mean? It's like so relevant, brilliant, relevant opener. It's like, oh shit, how can I not say no? How can I say no to Elliot? And when he's just presented a solution to this really bad problem— and this is why I'm now getting the full picture of why the candidate information is so important, because I'm guessing the candidate information fuels every single I know, I heard, I saw. And if you keep speaking to candidates, you have an endless amount of I know, I heard, I saw, so you can keep doing amazing BD with relevant targeted conversations. So am I right in saying that it just fuels each other?

Exactly. And that's why it all should boil down to candidate work. And there's some examples day to day. One of the biggest kind of training activities with new hires, or we've got like a team here in the UK at the moment doing the US market who all had significant experience on other markets for us and are now trying to get their head around the US. And it's just embedding the process and the questioning on the candidate side to extract the, I know, I heard, I saw information so they can just deliver solutions rather than just aimlessly skills matching and selling candidates that you think are going to be relevant.

Yes, I absolutely love that system. That's brilliant. Um, I know we're coming to the end of the pod, Ben. I don't know if you have any more questions. I do, yes. Okay, go ahead. As long as you're okay for time, Elliot. You're okay? Awesome. Yeah, what I'm curious as well, so I love— we've got kind of got a very broad structure of how we're penetrating accounts and speaking to the right clients. How do you figure out who's going to be the best accounts and the most profitable and the best to work with? Is it as simple as just like going after the market leaders and looking who's growing? Are there more nuanced things you're looking for when you're trying to go after a good account? What's your feeling?

Um, so for me, and again, I feel like I'm banging my head against the wall just saying this over and over, but it all starts with the candidate. If you're speaking to the best candidates who are on that higher rates, and again I say higher because the highest rates typically aren't those that you can open doors with because they're a little overpriced for the best customers you might try and reach out to.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But if you're having conversations around volume of contractors, but also if you're speaking to the best guys about what's the— what are the engineering standards like, uh, are you an outlier and do you struggle with the others, or are a lot of other strong guys too? Um, that's usually pretty good indication that they value that. And if they value the engineering standards as a specific kind of area of focus, it's going to be a lot easier for me to break down doors by presenting the best people. First, there's some companies out there who are huge enterprise businesses, but I know that they don't value the standard of engineering, they would rather have more lower-level guys delivering the work to get shit done versus placing the best guys to build the most robust solution for them long term. They might not be the best solution or the best client for me, or I might have to pivot my BD approach to get in with it. But if it all boils down to the candidates and you're making sure you're asking questions around headcount, hourly rates, skill set, tooling— are they working with the latest and greatest? If so, they're likely to need support delivering, um, kind of code on that technology. Uh, It's— yeah, all that makes sense.

So you're, you're asking candidates, you're fishing for, are they being paid well? Are they working on interesting projects? Do they like their environment? Do they have good bosses? You're basically just trying to suss out, do these candidates like where they work? And then if so, you're like, cool, I should probably help these companies, help this company solve this problem. Is that, is that, is that right? Is that kind of an honest—

to be honest, a lot of it boils down to volume as well, because a lot of what we do is specifically geared around our candidate strategy. The sites that we focus on have to have a large volume of contractors there to even warrant spending any time pulling people out. Yeah, to place with our existing clients. Yeah.

Okay, interesting.

So if the volume's there, we know that they're right. But then you're also going to just follow your nose with spot business and leads. And if someone tells me that their manager is interviewing for another member of their team on a contract basis, paying, well, the contract fees, whatever, whatever the rate is, the likelihood is I'm going to chase that and follow it up because there's business to be won and business to do. They might not be like a long-term strategic play to get in with X client. But you've also got to have a split. You can't build a successful kind of contract book off just the big boys because in the time that it takes to break down those doors, you've done no business. So you've also got to be reactive and able to win business off the back of sites that you know are hiring right now. And it might just be one or two.

Yeah. Interesting.

But yeah, from a business, like from a strategic perspective, targeting sites should be easy if you know who the best candidates are. And for our guys, it's always cool. Go and speak to the best candidates. You know, they'll typically work for this cohort of companies. So that can be your recruiter search. So you're not wasting your time sending loads of messages out to people who could be crap or not have the visa that we need for the roles that we're filling, um, or be really low pay. Um, so they're spending more time speaking to those guys, and it's from those candidates that will tell you who are the best employers and who do we want to be working with.

Amazing. You've given us a ton of gold in this session, Elliot. Um, so thank you so much. I'm just going to ask one last question, and you may not have anything about this because you've already given us a ton of stuff, but is there anything in terms of your approach with BD, with starting conversations, with getting in with the right people? Is there anything that we missed that you think will be valuable for people that might be struggling with getting in with people and/or starting conversations? Maybe we haven't, which is cool, in which case we can, can say we've done our best. But is there anything we've missed in this conversation, do you think?

Um, nothing. I don't Off the top of my head, I don't think so. We've covered quite a lot.

Cool, good. I've actually got a question. Sorry, Elliot, go ahead.

That's what I was going to say at the same time, like, you can't hide from the numbers. If you're looking around, uh, there are crew either side of you and you're not doing the largest quantity of, or the most volume out of the three of you, you're not going to win.

That's interesting. That's a great, great piece of advice. And a massive debate, uh, like something that we talk about as well Because it's true, whenever we look at billers, I remember there was a guy from Metric that I did a post about that absolutely popped off, and I think he, he did his first million. I think he did something like 6,700, something, a ridiculous amount of calls. I think it ended up being like 25, 30 calls every single day for the entire year. And there was just a massive debate that, um, well, there's a reminder for people that these top billers do a silly amount of volume, not just strategic thinking and, and, you know, actions, but they're actually just doing a hell of a lot of work. So is, is that an indicator for you? If someone isn't billing the level they are, can you normally resort back to their numbers and be like, you're not doing enough volume? Um, Elliot?

Yeah, I think the— that there's two responsibilities here in my eyes. We often talk, um, internally around hires and people that we're looking to bring on is, are they up for it and are they up to it? It's the team's and the consultant's responsibility to be up for it, making the calls, doing the volume. It's our responsibility to ensure they're up to it. So, love that. I'm sitting with them and making sure that their candidate strategy is right and they're not speaking to crappy candidates all day. And then ensuring that they're executing when they're on these calls and finding the information that we need to map out the clients that we're looking into, but also finding out the information that you need to credibly sell that candidate to other clients. That's the part that we're responsible for. So if I can see they're speaking to and they're doing the volume, but the candidates they're speaking to are crap, If I haven't given them the guidance, I mean, if they've ignored it, that's a different problem altogether. But if we haven't gone, cool, this is our— this is your candidate strategy and this is how we're going to make sure the guys you're speaking with are high level, um, off you go. If it's an execution problem, again, that's our job to make sure they're up to it. They're doing the calls but not getting the information, that's a training opportunity missed. But if they're just not doing the calls, it's, uh, give them a kick up the ass and they do the volume. Um, and then you work out what, what the plan is.

That's a really good response. I'm just going to ask as well, because I think people's definition of volume is so varied. Volume, you know, that's— so it does tend to vary. Like, is it 100 calls a day? Is it 20? Is it 5?

Is it—

it all varies. So if you were to look at a top biller in your— or it doesn't have to be organizers— if you just look at a top biller and, and, you know, an average biller or a poor biller, what's the difference in volume? What should they be doing on a daily basis? Just very high level, not, you know, to go too specific, but just a ballpark of, you know, either calls, time invested, just some— something that people can take away and be like, cool, I should probably aim for something close to that. That makes sense.

It is difficult. So we target as a minimum 5, 5 candidate calls a day, which is pretty low in my eyes as a market norm. The best billers, or those pushing the standard for me, should be 7, 8 a day, uh, if you really— but again, it's, it's market specific.

And is that calls, as in actually being on the phone with them and having long conversations, or is that—

and that's just the candidate side, yeah, including the, the BD side. Yeah, but that's ultimately the main metric we should look at. You can boil that back, particularly in our market. Um, I know different markets in different regions will, will have different preferences or, or needs, but for us, if they're not speaking to enough candidates, I'll just pull up a recruiter email report and see, cool, we've not sent enough recruiter messages, or your response rate's really crappy. Yeah. Response rate's crap. Cool. Let's work on tailoring these messages so you're hitting the right people and they can see you've taken the time to read the profile and being specific. If you're hitting the wrong people, it's a training area. This is how we run our search, um, to ensure we're finding good people. And if they're just not sending messages, then you can be completely asked. This is what we do daily. Um, yeah. and then you review. And typically the right people will get there and will up it and see the value in that. Then the calls will come, then the info will come, then you'll have enough leads, clients, and hot info to chase with your 'I know, I heard, I saw.' Wicked.

Love that. And so, so good. Um, no, just for those— you said 7 to 8 for the top performers, and like you said, I'm guessing that's conversations How many calls do you think they need to make in order to get 7 to 8 solid conversations? I'm guessing like 30, 30 calls.

Do you know what, it, it depends on your market and where your candidates come from. I was speaking with another million-dollar bill last week who started on new market, um, and it was interesting because he was saying how everything that he'd done historically was a large volume of outbound calls to land a small volume of connected calls where you get good information. But the, um, margin for error there for me is quite high. If my guys come into their day with 5 calls booked back to back every morning, they should only make 5 calls. If you, if you've But then the volume comes from the recruiting messages before to make sure you're speaking to the right candidates. If you get that kind of resumes or really thoroughly review their profiles prior to the call and just make sure they're a visa holder, their rates are in line with the kind of rates that we typically fill, fill roles with, and the skill set is aligned, and they've worked at these companies who we know have a high bar to entry. 5 calls should be fine. If your messages are good and specific and relevant, that might push it to the 6, 7, 8 calls, uh, which will then give you the BD information to spend your afternoons delivering into clients. And that's probably where the volume of calls needs to be higher because you can't guarantee you're going to connect. Yeah, but if you're placing people and working with the team, there's your reference calls to up those numbers because we've got to do our due diligence and make sure if I'm placing someone, their previous manager needs to tell me they were reliable, they turned up, and they were technically competent. Uh, but then you're also going to ask the question of, cool, how do you guys typically recruit? What are you looking for right now? Is this person someone you'd hire again? I'm working with someone very similar. And that's a BD call. Um, because on the candidate side, all right, and you're delivering them into clients and jobs that they might not be working, but I might be working, or one of the other bigger builders might be working. It's their opportunity to go, cool, I've sent this candidate to earlier, I'm going to be responsible for doing the due diligence and making sure I've referenced them because they're likely to get this job because we know they've worked at the high bar side. So they only have to send 2 resumes to almost guarantee we do a deal and made the placement. Um, so again, that's where the volume comes in, and the more you do and the higher quality your work is, the more your calls will be booked and scheduled. And it's really easy. I might do 5 candidate calls in the morning that are all booked, and then have 3 scheduled calls with clients in the afternoon, and my day's taken care of. I've just got to execute on each call and get everything out. If I've only got 2 candidates booked in And when I get in in the morning, I'm like, right, okay, I'm gonna have to pull up our hotlists, look at who we've got numbers for on my LinkedIn searches, call back candidates that I've— that I know are high level and I've worked with previously. So the amount of work that goes into getting those calls, if you're organized and structured, should be minimal. It's just get the messages out and do what you need to do. If it's If it's not, then you've kind of got to work hard to get them on the phone. Um, and then the same on the client side. If you're constantly— like, I use the analogy bam-fam quite regularly. You're constantly booking a meeting from a meeting. If I speak to a client, it's not— now's not the time, cool, bam-fam, I'm booking a call in later down the line from an existing meeting. 2 weeks later, I'm going to be reconnecting with them. So my calendar then is scheduled, and I'm spending the majority of my time on the phone, on calls, not scrapping around trying to find people to speak to.

It makes sense, man. Makes complete sense. I feel like we're probably coming towards the end of the pod, Elliot. I feel like this is an absolute masterclass, and I feel like you've given some insanely valuable tips. I've just got one last question, if that's okay. Um, and you've done really well. We've peppered you with all these different questions, and we've gone completely off course. You've done amazing, mate. You've responded really well. I'm just curious now, so because it sounds like the core, like, I guess there's multiple levels to, to have a successful day, successful week, successful month, but it does start, or a lot of it starts with that in-mail, I'm guessing. Like, if your in-mails are crap, you're just going to be spending a lot of time and wasted energy. If, if you were to compare again, like, if you were to look at your best in-mails from your best consultants and your worst in-mails I'm sure you don't have any bad consultants, but if you look at your best in-mails and your worst in-mails, what's the biggest difference between them? Do you think you mentioned specificity?

Yeah.

Can you just go into a little bit more detail? What do the best in-mails typically have?

I think it's really easy to look at the in-mails, but actually, if you look at the search first, if you're running a search, if you can be really specific with your search, if you— and only bring back 30 to 50 candidates that perhaps have worked at one specific site. It's really easy to be specific because then you can hit volume whilst also referencing, I noticed the work you did at XYZ.

Ah, got it. Okay, great.

With a specific bit of content, but you can do that at volume.

Mm-hmm. So clever.

Like a list of 2,000 candidates and having to go through each one and add something really specific and relevant. First of all, there's no chance all 2,000 of them are going to be any good. Secondly, you're going to be spending tons of time personalizing everything specifically. You should be actively reviewing every profile that you go past. And if you can see they've worked somewhere or they— we do business with or are mutually connected with somebody who we've placed before or is interviewing for us, reference that and just be specific and authentic.

So you're trying to find one— as well as being specific about the personal problems, you're trying to find something that's generic enough where you can maybe target anywhere between, I don't know, 20 to 50 people and make it a little bit more efficient and hook onto one big thing. That's really clever. That's really good advice.

But that one thing that you're hooking onto should be the differentiator between, uh, mediocre candidate and a good candidate. Again, all boils down to your candidate strategy.

Yeah, really interesting then. There's so much gold. When people are going to listen back to this, I hope they listen to this and implement some of these strategies, because honestly, you've given us some gold today, Elliot. So thank you, mate. Done amazing. Yeah, really appreciate it. How did you find it, mate? Did— are you, are you okay?

I wish I, I wish I'd chosen a cooler meeting room. Don't worry, mate. Very rosy over here, but no, I enjoyed that, Jez. It was really nice and free-flowing, felt kind of, um, just good to get into things. And it's also a good refresher for me on best practice. And every time you have conversations like this, it gives you ideas and reminds you of what good looks like and, and what standards we need to kind of uphold. So yeah, I really enjoyed it. Thank you for having me on.

Thank you, mate. Hey guys, thanks for tuning in to this episode. If you enjoyed it, please don't forget to subscribe on YouTube and Spotify. Tune in for another episode next week, and we look forward to seeing you again very soon. Peace and love.