Good things come to those who...
What you can learn from the genius of Guinness
A pint of Guinness takes 119.5 seconds to pour. 2 minutes in old money, which is a fair amount of time spent waiting at the bar.
WKD (a bright blue alcopop, if you haven’t had the pleasure) comes in a bottle, so zero pour time - and if you put a straw in it you could have ordered, paid and necked one before your mate’s even seen their Irish stout reach the top of the glass.
But I can tell you who has the bigger sales, the loyal fan base, and can charge more for their product. In fact, the BBC recently reported that Guinness stocks are running perilously low as more and more drinkers turn to the black stuff.
Guinness has turned their pour time into a feature. ‘Good things come to those who… wait’, they told us in their famous advertising campaign. This taps into the idea that quality takes time.
Unfortunately we often forget the link between quality and time when we’re talking to potential clients. We try to introduce ourselves, learn more about the client, share some market knowledge, explain how we’re different from all the other recruiters, pick up the job, and agree a price… all in a 45 minute Zoom call.
The experience is the same for both recruiter and client. It feels rushed. Unsatisfying. The information we do manage to get across feels superficial, and there’s no time to back up our claims of adding value and being different.
The good news is there’s a simple answer:
Slow. down. your. pitch.
Tap into the idea that quality takes time. Back in the day you were probably taught to ‘always be closing’ and pushed to hit quantity-based KPIs. But things have changed now.
Clients aren’t going to pay a decent price for a recruiter unless they believe in the value they’re getting from you. A short pitch process with the aim of picking up a job as quickly as possible doesn’t give them the time to understand your value.
On the other hand, by slowing your pitch process down your client gets to go deeper and really see why they should work with you. Think of it this way: if you know you offer more value than your competitors, you know you’ll get better and better in the eyes of your clients the longer they get to know you.
So don’t rush it.
Good things come to those who wait. Once your client can see the value you can create for them, they’re more willing to pay you a higher fee. They’re also more likely to commit to you in terms of exclusivity and upfront fees.
If you want me to review how you pitch your value to your clients, simply reply to this email and we can take it from there. Slowly, of course.
Jon
P.S. If you’re looking for a recruitment pricing-related Christmas present for that special recruiter in your life (or just the one you sit next to 200+ days a year), you can still order The #1 Book of Recruitment Pricing Jokes here.
P.P.S. If you want to start 2025 with a bang, the amazing Benjamin Mena is hosting a huge virtual Sales & BD Recruiter Summit in January. I’ll be speaking alongside some truly inspiring sales experts, check out all the details here.