Considerations when starting your own sales recruitment agency.
Will you be able to find clients to service from the day you start. Nothing is impossible, but unless you have some kind of foot in the door before you start, generating clients from nothing is a tall order. Most companies operate a preferred supply list which is a genuine barrier to entry, and cracking these is not a short term task. Essentially you need to have some contacts in place, perhaps you are a manager with friends who will sponsor you into their company. Or perhaps you are already in sales recruitment and have clients who you can take with you, although you need to check your present contract for 'non compete' clauses.
What will your brand look like? What will make you stand out? Where will you advertise? What will you spend on advertising? This is perhaps one of the most difficult things to judge. Your finds are limited so the temptation is under spend. However, if you are to effective compete with established companies, you will need to consider at least matching their advertising spend if you are succeed. It's better to seek extra cash to set up than to launch without sufficient weight behind your new campaign.
How much money do you have and how much do you need? This really is the proverbial piece of string. Again your instinct may be to limit start up funds to keep borrowing down, ultimately protecting against losses should your sales recruitment agency fail. However, in many cases, the causes of failure are insufficient funds to do the job properly. After all, if you are doing this because you have been successful in recruitment already, there is no reason, providing you do things properly, that things should fail again. Be bold, start with enough money to trade for at least six months, if it works, you'll get it all back.
Can you achieve any grants from local authorities. Sadly, despite governments pledges to help small and new businesses, it does often seem like the grant money is only available to large and established businesses. However, every area is different, it's worth looking into local government assistance as it may help your business plan if you can get some funds this way.
Geographical location. Many sales recruitment agencies start at home, but even here, they are likely to have to leave home as soon as the company starts to grow. Geographical location effects many things such as how easy it is to recruit people, prestige of address, cost of rent, and indeed whether it's scalable. Having to move after a couple of years is not a simple task. There are many considerations from having to change phone numbers and stationary to whether you will find somewhere close enough to take staff with you. If you know what your future growth plans are, build these issues into your decision making.
Are you made of strong stuff? Anyone who has set up a business from scratch will tell you it's no picnic and sales recruitment is no exception. Be ready of failures and disappointments, it's a necessary part of success! If you are the sort of person to fight harder the harder it gets, then you will succeed. If, however, you struggle to keep things together under pressure, think twice before making this jump.
Setting up a new sales recruitment agency is an exciting prospect for anyone with the ambition and drive to run their own company. Spend time in advance of committing to the project looking at the tips above, this will increase your chances of successfully negotiating your first year.
About the Author: John Bult runs an internet job site for sales recruitment agencies in the UK
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