The Duplicate Outreach Problem

The Duplicate Outreach Problem

A Recruiter’s Worst Nightmare. Recruiters everywhere know the importance of building a pipeline of passive talent. Inbound and referrals work for smaller companies but, as you grow, so does the need for passive candidate outreach. One of the problems that comes with a larger team and extensive candidate messaging is the danger of touching the same candidate multiple times unintentionally. As the messaging and methods of outreach increase, the risk of contacting someone who was already dispositioned as a bad fit grows exponentially.

The Pain

Duplicate outreach can damage a recruiting organization’s reputation. Let’s look at some of the scenarios:

#1 – It makes the recruiter/team look incompetent.

While there is certainly a tough logistical problem to solve when handling extensive messaging campaigns, the candidate doesn’t have that top of mind. From the candidate perspective, they’re dealing with one of two things. Either they have been messaged by a single recruiter who doesn’t value them enough to remember that they had already reached out before (often with identical messaging); or, they are dealing with a recruiting team that doesn’t communicate with each other enough to keep from stepping on each other’s toes. Yuck.

#2 – It damages the company’s brand.

Since the recruiting brand is an extension of the company brand, each employee, especially those involved in the people side of the business is responsible for reflecting the company’s culture and values. Inattentive work runs the risk of being misinterpreted by people outside of the organization, putting the company’s brand in peril.

#3 – Risks repelling a great prospect who is already engaged.

Sending duplicate and undifferentiated messages also runs the risk of putting off a candidate who may be otherwise be engaged and interested. Candidates who are the absolute best fits for any given role are certainly going to be on the radar of multiple recruiters on the team. An engaged prospect, who may be highly desirable to a hiring manager, could think twice about continuing with the process if there are significant missteps along the way.

#4 – Exposes lack of visibility into your funnel.

What does unintentional duplicate outreach reveal about your recruiting team and your funnel? Some evergreen roles may have high turnaround or there might be multiple openings within the company, and a need to keep a solid funnel of candidates moving through your recruitment process constantly. If you don’t have enough clarity around your funnel to be able to prevent duplicate messaging, what else are you missing?

#5 – Sometimes we DO want to re-engage.

There are cases where duplicate outreach is warranted. Oftentimes, reengaging candidates that never responded or those who wish for you to circle back at a later date can be important. Recruiting outreach is more than just creating immediate hires – it’s about creating relationships with passive candidates that may pay off in the next quarter or next year. However, it’s important in such cases to be able to reference the previous outreach. This not only protects the team from the dangers above but also shows a team that is on the ball and remembers the people with whom they are speaking.

The Solution

With Teamable, we’ve thought long and hard about the problem and we’ve solved it with engineering ingenuity.

Don’t get caught sleeping. Don’t get lost in spreadsheets. Ask what Teamable can do for your team.

Start scaling today

Get started with Teamable and take your recruiting and hiring game to the next level.