What to do when you hear “we’re not hiring right now”

It’s Monday morning and you get on the computer to check your inboxes. You messaged a few dozen hiring managers last week… and look! A few of them replied. 

First message: “We’re not hiring right now.” 

Second message: “No needs but I’ll keep your contact info.” 

Third message: “We have a freeze until next quarter.” 

Sound familiar? 

It’s one of the toughest parts of business development for recruiting & staffing agencies: that tricky element of timing. 

What’s the best way to respond here? 

You could just wait for them to get back to you… But how often does that actually happen? 

You could schedule a follow-up message. Not a bad idea, but how do you know they’ll be hiring when you reach back out? 

Or… You could come up with a way to keep in touch with them without needing to shoot them desperate-sounding follow-up messages. 

Specifically, here are 3 ways you can use content to increase your chances of closing a deal with those “we’re not hiring right now” people in your inbox. 

1. Prove to them that you can help solve *their* problem
2. Show them what it’s like to work with you
3. Pull back from the transactional approach

Let’s dive in. 

Prove to them that you can help solve *their* problem

So your inbox might be full of hiring managers saying they’re not hiring… But let’s think about what *their* inbox must look like. 

How many other recruiters hit them up this month? 

How many of those recruiters do you think actually specialize in helping that type of business? 

Business development is an uphill battle, where you don’t just have to prove you’re good at what you do… You have to stand apart from the competition that’s clogging up your ideal prospect’s inbox. 

Fortunately for you, most of those lower-quality recruiters out there have short attention spans. 

If they get the old “we’re not hiring right now” message, they’ll just move on to the next name on the list. There’s always another hiring manager to spam. 

Which is a huge opportunity for you, because you’re in this for the long haul. 

Use content to show your relevance

Those hiring managers who brush you off don’t have anything against you personally. But they’re wary of people showing up in their inbox, claiming big results. 

They’ve been burned before by unskilled recruiters who promised them the moon and didn’t deliver. 

Content is your chance to prove that you’re different. 

A great place to start is by demonstrating that you have an in-depth understanding of your prospect’s problem. 

Here are some post topics to get started: 

• Why do the businesses you work with have a hard time finding talent on their own? 
• What goes wrong in the business because they don’t have the talent you can help find? 
• What aspects of the talent search do the hiring managers you work with find frustrating? 
• How did you solve this problem for other businesses? 

You can’t shove all of this into a DM. 

But you can write a couple posts about your prospects’ problems every week. 

Over time you’re proving to those people who told you “not right now” that you actually know what you’re talking about. That you understand their goals and the obstacles they face. 

That you’re the person they should reach out to when that hiring need comes around. 

More than that, though, you can give them a sense of what it’s like to work with you. Which is almost as important as the results you can promise. 

Show them what it’s like to work with you

I’ve been helping recruiting firms with marketing & BD for the past 4 years. 

In that time I’ve worked with agency owners who I loved. Who trusted my advice. Who paid their invoices promptly and were happy to send referrals my way. 

And I’ve also… Worked with people who weren’t quite like that. 

Relationships where getting basic tasks done was like building the Great Pyramid. Where I felt like I had to “sell” them on my advice every single week. Where projects didn’t work out for reasons out of my control and everyone left feeling frustrated. 

So we don’t just want to attract any business who will work with us. 

Wouldn’t it be great to have a roster of clients who trust you, value your expertise, and are easy to work with? 

Sign me up. And it starts by building a relationship, not chasing a transaction. 

Content gives you a great chance to build a more solid relationship. DMs (the way most people do them) are more transactional. 

What to post: 

Your content shouldn’t just be about the business problems, processes, & results. 

It should be about you, too. How you work, how you view the business world, and your value system. 

If you hate working with companies that treat candidates as disposable, then write posts about how much you value candidates, and how you don’t send them to companies that you know won’t value them. 

The hiring managers in your network who feel the same way will resonate with that, and will be drawn closer and closer to working with you. 

For every problem-focused or results-focused posts, include a values-focused post.

That’s how you attract not only clients who need you, but who will appreciate you, offer referrals, and be happy to work with you again and again. 

The difference between starting a relationship and chasing a transaction is hugely important. And it’s something that real estate professionals tend to be very good at. Let’s learn from them: 

Pull back from the transactional approach

I bought my first house just over a year ago. And when we were shopping we toured about 20 houses before making an offer on the one where we now live. 

And I noticed that realtors are really good at something: 

They let you experience what’s for sale with no pressure to buy. 

It’s clear that a buyer’s agent wants you to buy a house. That’s how they get paid. 

But they also know that not every house is the right fit. 

And they don’t demand that you make a decision based on a PDF with the house’s specs and a few pictures. 

They don’t walk you through a slide deck for each house. 

And they don’t ask you “So are you ready to buy this house?” every time they show you one. 

They show you everything. Answer any questions you’ve got. 

And leave it at that. No pressure whatsoever. 

Compare that with the typical BD outreach message that crams some nice-sounding results into a paragraph or two and then asks the lead to “hop on a quick call” 

It’s nothing but pressure. 

And your prospects are sick of the pressure. That’s why so many of them shut down your conversation right away with the “we’re not hiring” excuse. 

So how can you take that pressure off? 

How can you make those hiring managers actually want to stay in touch with you, instead of being annoyed because you’re spamming them? 

That’s right… Content!

In addition to content that focuses on your prospects’ problems and your value system, you can use content to give people a glimpse into every facet of what it’s like to work with you. 

• Use content to show your process
• Your problem solving abilities
• The results you bring
• Happy clients you’ve worked with
• The way you handle candidates
• The way you protect a company’s reputation

The list goes on and on. You’re creating a virtual “open house” for your prospects to check things out and decide whether working with you is right for them. 

Conclusion

You can’t control whether the people you reach out to need your services right away. They might be hiring now, or they might be hiring next year. 

What you can control is whether they remember you when it’s time for them to hire, and whether they view you as a trusted authority or an annoying spammer. 

Content is a great way to link together your outreach messages. It gives you more opportunities to get in front of a prospect, and it’s less pushy than a DM. 

We covered three specific ways we can use content, too: 

1. Prove to them that you can help solve *their* problem
2. Show them what it’s like to work with you
3. Pull back from the transactional approach