Pushing Social Media

The necessity for business presence in social media is now commonly accepted and well-documented although a crucial starting point for any business building an online network is still their own website: the shop window to their services. We as a business work hard to demonstrate our grasp of new recruitment technology and practices and having just revamped the website, one of the key additions that has generated comment is the introduction of a Twitter feed.

The Twitter feed serves three purposes - 1) to demonstrate that we are a leading edge recruiter, using cutting edge practices to generate the best available candidates for our partner vacancies and 2) to provide a live news feed for us to advertise vacancies, links, jobs, news etc. 3) To maximise exposure of the brand across multiple channels and increase SEO.

We find this technology hugely successful and Twitter in particular has the potential to become the worlds largest job board. As a business, you either adapt to the new technologies and practices or you fall behind and use the various forms of social media allow you to push the brand and message to an audience at very low cost. Once you have set up the accounts, the feeds and branded them, the ongoing cost should be modest if not free! The key investment is time.

As a regular reader may know, we have been working closely with Sticky Media for some time and they are offering an extremely competitive deal for companies wishing to bring their website up to date and push the brand yet further.

The offer is as follows -

The offer is a Live Twitter or Blog Feed on your web site! (£75 +VAT)*

Leading Edge Recruiter grasping the power of Social Media? Want to prove to your customers that you know what you are doing with Social Media?
Keeping a website fresh and up to date can be a costly process in both time and money; particularly when also juggling Twitter contacts, Blog articles and any other online interaction. We have been busy working with our customers developing a cost effective social media strategy, maximising brand and product exposure across the various media channels.

We have developed a very cost effective product that can be added to an existing website from only £75 +vat, thereby avoiding expensive redevelopment, but still keeping your site bang up to date.

Sticky Media can integrate a live Twitter feed or a Live Blog feed to existing websites for £75. This will update automatically, keeping your website fresh, and using your company web site as the hub of your online network - exactly as it should be. Post all of your vacancies to Twitter - increase traffic – maximise brand awareness.

For an example of a recently completed client project please visit http://www.recruitment-hub.com – each page has a Twitter feed with real time vacancies and update; the 'News' page is automatically populated from the director's blog - keeping news up to date automatically, at minimal effort to the director.

We are only offering this product at this price for a limited number of clients and as a member of the UK Recruitment Directors Group, you qualify for the discount. We will even help you set up a Twitter Account if you haven’t started using one yet!

For further information and to discuss viability, please contact me via mike@stickymediagroup.co.uk or 0845 872 1942.

(£75 +VAT – subject to availability and viability.)


The Sticky Media site is http://www.stickymediagroup.co.uk where you will find further info. I dont often push another companies products, but really feel that this is an excellent offer from a reliable source and they won't be offering the £75 deal for ever!

Jonny Hiles
The Hub - www.recruitment-hub.com

The Hub - The Hub is a network of recruitment specialists utilising a centralised delivery, back office and support function – or hub – hence the name.

Through partnership, The Hub provides the delivery capability, infrastructure & support of a recruitment plc to independent recruiters utilising our significant resources.

The Hub is part of a recruitment plc – one of the largest independent recruitment organisations in the UK with a multi-discipline delivery capability. Browse these pages to learn more about The Hub how we can help you to open up new channels and maximise revenue from your existing business.

400+ Members of the UK Recruitment Directors Group

UK Recruitment Directors

The UK Recruitment Directors Group on Linkedin has today passed the 400 member milestone.
The UK Recruitment Directors Group provides a forum for Directors of UK based Recruitment Businesses to network and share views and news with fellow industry leaders.

The Group now has over 400 Directors, actively participating in discussions on the forums and has seen huge growth in the past couple of months.

Jonny Hiles, founder of the UK Recruitment Directors Group has been thrilled at the success and growth of the group and has ambitious plans to integrate the group into other Hub project and services such as The Recruitment Wave.

More about The UK Recruitment Directors Group can be found at http://www.linkedin.com/groups?homeNewMember=&gid=1962486&trk=

For further information on The Hub, please visit - www.recruitment-hub.com

The Hub's projects are listed on The Hub's projects page -

If you would like to discuss any aspect of the UK Recruitment Directors Group or The Hub, please contact Jonny Hiles on 0845 117 0115

New Site

With the upturn in 2010 and a general need to update what we do, we are redesigning our website. - http://www.recruitment-hub.com

The new site should clearly define what we do and include news and latest updates from our solcial media channels. We also have a projects page for ventures such as Fusion or Recruitment Wave.

The release is a test version which will be live for 24 hours to gather feedback and test links / funtionality etc. I therefore would appreciate your comments / feedback on the site - please mail to jonny@recruitment-hub.com

I have used Sticky Media Group as the designers / developers - www.stickymediagroup.com.

Hope you are all well and enjoying a positive start to 2010?

Jonny Hiles
The Hub
www.recruitment-hub.com

PS. you may need to refresh your browser if you had visited the old site recently. On the new site, there is a picture of a chain on the home page!

PPS. Still no baby news!

J

Fusion

The eagle eyed amongst you and in particular those following a link from Linkedin may have noticed the introduction of Fusion Investments to my profile.

At the outset it is important to state that The Hub is still my focus and the primary business. The Hub is a specialist split fee recruitment brand and for more details please visit www.recruitment-hub.com
The Hub provides a delivery partnership to independent recruitment businesses thereby improving their delivery capability. The Hub is growing as the popularity of split fees grows in the recruitment industry.

Fusion is a specialist investment company, specialising in the recruitment industry and investing in recruiters. Fusion provides funding to start ups and new businesses as well as acquisition of established recruitment agencies.
Fusion is actively looking for new investment / acquisition opportunities.

Fusion is an initiative that I have been involved in for some time but had not accepted a formal role with but I am providing specialist consultancy to them and enjoying it greatly. For more on Fusion, please visit www.fusioninvestments.co.uk

As for everything else - No baby news yet, even though I am asked by everyone I speak with and the market is busy so happy days!

Hope all is well and speak soon!

Jonny

PS. Fusion pays a bounty for successful introductions - for more info please call 01179 370 3077.

J

PPS. I hadnt realised that the silly pic in the last post was so big and visible! Never mind.

New Year = New Job(s)

Happy New Year!
I am sorry that it has taken me until the 12th to write an update and as you sit with bated breath, No, its not because I have been on paternity leave!

As everyone is constantly asking; Joanne is good, a little tired and very much looking forward to having the baby. She has really enjoyed the pregnancy and I am sure will miss being pregnant, but is very excited about the arrival and finding our whether we have a son or a daughter. We have names picked and the baby will arrive in the next 3 weeks or so - watch this space!

I will obviously take some paternity leave, but I shall check emails and colleagues will be able to answer any queries whilst I am away. The main line number is 0845 117 0 115 and the email address is jonny@recruitment-hub.com

I will hopefully get the opportunity to blog again before the baby arrives!

New Year = New Job is a phrase that has been bandied around the industry for years and used in numerous recruitment campaigns. There is undoubtedly sentiment in the statement and January is a very busy period for recruiters.
The weather in 2010 has certainly had an affect on the whole of the UK and the recruitment industry is as affected as any because decision makers have been absent from work or interviewees being unable to attend interviews. A busy IT recruiter that I know had 7 interviewees cancel in one day with a single client and most businesses will have lost revenues because their candidates failed to attend selection.

Most of our staff made it in last week as the majority live locally but all have been refreshed by the Christmas break so are definitely up for it. Activity levels are good and we are the market feels busy with a good supply of candidates.

We are of course looking for new Recruitment Partners and vacancies so if you have had a busy start to 2010 and are struggling to source for all your vacancies, please get in touch!

That's it for now, keep your fingers crossed for us and watch this space!

Jonny

1) The Hub is a split fee recruitment business.
2) Send vacancies that you are unable or struggling to fill to us.
3) We will source candidates and present a short list to you.
4) You brand the candidates and send the shortlist to the client.
5) When the placement is made, we split the fee.

The Hub is part of a £100m + recruitment group and uses their combined delivery capability and infrastructure to deliver applications for our recruitment partners. Our recruitment partners generate the vacancy, we find the candidates, the partner maintains contact with the client, we speak to the candidate and split the fee when the placement is made. If that could be of use, for any vacancies that you struggle with, then please let me know.
Info about The Hub can be found at http://www.recruitment-hub.com

t'was the week before Christmas............

.........and the recruitment industry was winding down, except we aren't! It's mid December and we are having a good month taking new vacancies and enquiries from prospective Recruitment Partners.


Infact we have a couple of interesting initiatives running over the Christmas and New year period, which we are looking forward to as a direct result of http://www.recruitment-wave.com, Twitter and the UK Recruitment Directors Group - proof again that professional / social media works. More about these in future posts if all works out in the way that we anticipate.

So what will you and your business be doing over Christmas? We will still have plenty of staff in to help with any vacancies between now and January 4th, therefore if you need extra resources over this period, contact me in the usual way and we have plenty of resources available, especially with contract vacancies which tend to be the urgent requests. We have seen a big rise in perm vacncies and have received fewer contract roles recently and I would love to re-address the balance!

I will be taking a few days out over Christmas, but as I live near the office, can and will be around if needed. I will access email etc regularly and so either I or a colleague will respond to all requests.

I hope that the baby doesn't arrive over Christmas! We wouldn't want him or her to arrive to early, although we can barely contain our excitement as January approaches. The due date is mid / late January so not far now and if he or she arrives over Christmas, they may always feel unrewarded in the way that people with birthdays over the Christmas period often do.
My present is of course a healthy son / daughter and Jojo and I have cut back on present buying this year. We have also entered into a secret Santa deal with family this year as we know that everyone will want to buy lots of gifts for the baby when we find out whether beanie is a little boy or girl. At the moment, everything is neutral in colour and we are looking forward to adding some colour to the nursery and outfits.
I have to say that the recent pinkstinks campaign to disuade parents from dressing little girls in pink seems ridiculous and there is no way that Jojo or our mothers / aunts, sisters etc will not be buying pink outfits if beanie is a little girl! Surely, aaspirations are inspired and encouraged by parents, family and surroundings and we intend to provide the very best we can.

We had a great day in Topsham again at the weekend and will be spending the odd day down there over Christmas as we have some jobs to do on Domino while she is on the hard. I will have finished the nursery over the coming weekend so will have a bit of time to relax and have my last drink somewhere between Christmas and New Years so I intend to make the most of the time I have left!

For further information, please visit www.recruitment-hub.com or http://jonnyhub.blogspot.com/

If you would like to discuss further, please give me a call on 0845 117 0 115 or send your details to info@recruitment-hub.com

1) The Hub is a split fee recruitment business.
2) Send vacancies that you are unable or struggling to fill to us.
3) We will source candidates and present a short list to you.
4) You brand the candidates and send the shortlist to the client.
5) When the placement is made, we split the fee.

The Hub is part of a £100m + recruitment group and uses their combined delivery capability and infrastructure to deliver applications for our recruitment partners. Our recruitment partners generate the vacancy, we find the candidates, the partner maintains contact with the client, we speak to the candidate and split the fee when the placement is madeIf that could be of use, for any vacancies that you struggle with, then please let me know.


I am also the owner of a Linkedin Group, specifically for Directors of UK Recruitment businesses. To join, you must be a Director of a UK based recruitment company - Simple!

It provides a great opportunity to network and share views.

Link can be found here - http://www.linkedin.com/groups?homeNewMember=&gid=1962486&trk=

Info about me can be found at http://www.recruitment-hub.com or http://jonnyhub.blogspot.com

UK Recruitment Directors

Hello! I hope that you enjoyed the guest blog from Mike Wedge of Sticky Media last week. If anyone else would be interested in guest blogging, please let me know!

The Hub continues and despite the blip a couple of weeks a go, November has been a busy month. A number of new partners have joined the network and we are very active with live roles which we hope will resolve before Christmas. We have this morning, taken another 7+ IT vacancies from a new recruitment partner and December is looking good. Just as well that we are expanding our team! One of our partners has even informed us that from January, he will begin to use The Hub for all candidate delivery to his agency, allowing his employees to concentrate purely on business development!

Recruitment Partners typically find out about The Hub via referral or via our now establised social media channels and I am a big believer in the value to be gained from social / professional media, once you get your head around using them. The vast majority of our business has come from a free source - i.e. we havent paid to advertise! I am by no means an expert in social / professional networking tools and because we didn't want to spend loads on advertising at the outset, we had to find alternatives. There are a host of mediums that a business can use nowadays to advertise their wares and some are industry specific whilst others work for general cross market services.

My preferred network tool is Linkedin which is widely used by the recruitment industry. Linkedin allows you to build a network of colleagues, clients and associates and once established with a decent sized web of 1st degree contacts, search for other users that are linked to your contact (within a couple of degrees).
Once connected you are notified of status updates and able to search for contacts by job title or by company or organisation. - Its easy to see how why this is of use to recruiters!

One of the things that I set up a few months back was the UK Recruitment Directors Group. The UKRDG is a space for Directors of UK based recruitment businesses to network and discuss news, experiences and issues. We have a diverse membership and some interesting debates. Members include IT, Finance, HR etc agencies but also plenty of niche companies including a lift (Elevator) specialist recruitment business and, a helicopter pilot recruiter. We now have over 300 member companies and new membership applications every day. The group has been a success and we are currently considering replicating the group out of linkedin, onto a dedicated forum.
If you are not a member yet and would be interested in joining, please let me know.

http://www.linkedin.com/groups?homeNewMember=&gid=1962486&trk=

Christmas will soon be upon us and things will be slowing down over the festive period. It is always difficult to predict what Christmas will be like for a recruitment business and some years i have sat around twiddling my thumbs whilst I also remember placing 7 SAP contractors between Christmas and New Year! I hope that we will be busy but also get the time to relax with family.

It's going to be a bit of a funny christmas this year for the Hiles household. Jo will be 8 months pregnant and have finished work, whilst I will be reactive to Hub requests and slightly unsure of whether I will be at home or in the office. Jo is of course not drinking and our focus is really January and the arrival of the baby rather than Christmas day. Christmas day, we are going to Browns for lunch so no washing up!

My weekends have gone from sailing Domino in Topsham and a few drinks to buying baby stuff and decorating. The past few weekends have been spent decorating the nursery and hall, whilst the next couple of weekends will be spent decorating our bedroom. We have even replaced the double glazing and spent goodness knows how much on goodness knows what! Thankfully, we have some very generous parents, greatly looking forward to the arrival of the 1st grandchild on both sides.

Yesterday, after fitting the new light in the nursery and attempting to hang a blind, Jo and I unwrapped the new Bugaboo Chameleon. I cannot believe how complex and expensive buggies are! - especially when you spend just under £1000 in John Lewis on the buggy and car seat and then have to assemble the buggy as its flat packed.

Bugaboo do very nicely out of John Lewis. It seems that you cant have something cheap, practical and lightweight when it comes to buggies. The staff at JL in Bristol appear to take every set of new parents through the same circuit when showing the buggies, starting at the cheaper but heavier / less practical ones and eventually arriving at the bugaboo. As a father, you of course do not want your wife / partner to struggle with a heavy buggy and so you end up by buying the expensive bugaboos or icandys.

The really strange thing though is that you dont mind and want your baby to have the best buggy they can and nicely decorated nursery. It must be that something is built into us all about wanting the best for our children, even before we meet them.
Beanie is due January 23rd and I can't wait!

More about me on this blog - http://jonnyhub.blogspot.com or about The Hub at http://www.recruitment-hub.com

1) The Hub is a split fee recruitment business.
2) Send vacancies that you are unable or struggling to fill to us.
3) We will source candidates and present a short list to you.
4) You brand the candidates and send the shortlist to the client.
5) When the placement is made, we split the fee.

The Hub is part of a £100m + recruitment group and uses their combined delivery capability and infrastructure to deliver applications for our recruitment partners. Our recruitment partners generate the vacancy, we find the candidates, the partner maintains contact with the client, we speak to the candidate and split the fee when the placement is madeIf that could be of use, for any vacancies that you struggle with, then please let me know.