"We'll Never Be Royals or Loyals"

Hi Danny,
For some reason I am finding old clients going to new sources although our candidates are staying, no one left, and I can’t find any issues.

Without seeming desperate how can I ask them what happened?

I have asked one and they said it wasn’t their call and they don’t know why. We don’t work on exclusivity so I can’t understand what happened.

At the same time, for some reason some companies are still signing contracts, giving us a mandate then not replying although I know they are working with other recruiters on the mandates we were asked to work on or they leave me in the dust.

What am I doing wrong????

I feel like the market is picking up yet I had the two most terrible quarters imaginable…H-E-L-P

Danny's response:
The world you want, and think you have earned, one in which whenever there is an opening or staffing need at the clients you’ve done quality work for, they all sit in a meeting, sign off the req and then send out the Bat Signal into the night sky with your company’s logo, doesn’t exist anymore, if it ever did. One of my big “aha” moments in business and life was when I realized people weren’t thinking about me anywhere near as much as I thought they were. This is extremely liberating. You can stop worrying about what people think.

But just because your clients are not obsessing over you or turning to you proactively, that doesn’t mean you can’t drive better results. Oscar Wilde, who said just about everything worth saying, got it right: “…what people call loyalty, I call lethargy, or lack of imagination.” You need to give your clients new information, not just the usual “Checking in, remember me, I placed 3 people with you!”

You’re a blogger, and a very fine one, so try this. Put together a “Rate your Boss” spreadsheet, 5-10 different elements, with a scale of 1 = my boss is a fraud and I have a Voo Doo doll at home that I wile away the hours pricking in the groin with a long thin needle” and 10 = my boss should be made the emperor of the universe immediately and the world would be better for it. Things like “Does he/she give clear direction?” “Do you feel supported in your decision making?” “Do you feel a high level of trust?” You know your niche, make it as technical or as soft/subjective as you want. Send it to the people you have placed in the last year. Get it back and pretty it up with those writing skills of yours, and now you have a report: “What the People I have placed in the last 12 months think of their boss!”

Gold. Notice how since no one’s name is used, either the candidate or client, he has to read, wonder and interpret which if any comments are about him/her? They have to call you to ask and you get to say, “I can’t tell you that, but if you’re asking, there must be a reason you think or feel that, let’s talk about that! And when it is right you ask about current openings.

Sending them this value add will provoke them thinking about you. And that’s what today’s market demands. Loyalty is earned every day now. It is not a vaccine. The only loyalty I know that needs no maintenance is a guy at my gym, a really big scary guy who rides in on a motorcycle. On the cap of one of his enormous deltoids is the word “loyalty.” (On the other delt is the word “Maria.” I hope for his sake that is his current girlfriend.)