Interview with Trusted Agencies and how they're transforming perceptions of recruitment

We were able to speak to Lucy Atkins co-founder of Trusted Agencies: a website aimed at showcasing recruitment agencies that both companies and candidates can trust.

What was it that inspired you to launch Trusted Agencies?
Both my co-founder, Martyn, and I come from backgrounds in marketing. We have worked with a variety of recruitment agencies across a range of specialisms and found that the same barrier was presenting itself each time when they came face-to-face with potential clients: trust.

Unfortunately, the recruitment industry does have some negative connotations around it, with many businesses having suffered from bad experiences when working with unprofessional recruiters.

However, for every ‘bad’ recruiter out there, there are 10 professional and experienced ones that strive for the best for their candidates and clients. Therefore, we wanted to promote these recruiters and extinguish this barrier of trust and hesitation that employers have when working with recruiters.

Our platform lists only vetted recruitment agencies that have all the criteria of a Trusted Agency and acts as a place for employers and candidates to search for recruiters that they can trust.

How do you think you’ll be able to help recruiters?
Our ethos is to work with only trusted recruiters that are doing things by the book and so, for those agencies, we will provide a platform for them to showcase themselves to potential clients and candidates, we will also promote these Trusted Agencies across all of our digital channels.

As the platform grows they will receive enquiries and interaction from both employers and applicants that are interested in the jobs they have listed on the website.

Our background in marketing means that we understand how to drive relevant traffic to a site and encourage the user to interact (such as submitting an enquiry or making a phone call) whilst they are there. We are also coming from an unbiased place, as we are not involved directly in the recruitment industry or have any interest in starting up as recruiters, our members can feel confident the website is an impartial platform.

Alongside the lead generation part of our website, we also want to make a change in the recruitment industry. As mentioned above, the industry is currently suffering the effects of some inexperienced recruiters dominating the market, especially in niche sectors.

However, our recruitment search engine will act as a community for professional and ethical recruiters to start to rebuild this industry and move towards building the trust between employers, candidates and recruiters.

How can a recruiter show they’re trustworthy?
Even the simplest of things can show potential clients that you are a trustworthy agency such as, being a registered company and having an address that you work from both show that you are doing things by the book and do actually exist.

Having public testimonials from both employers and candidates give potential customers the confidence in your services. However, it is important that these are shown on impartial websites, such as Trusted Agencies, as users are very wise to fake testimonials on your website.

Other key factors such as credit ratings show that you are trading ethically and paying your debts in a reasonable amount of time. Being members of other known associations, accreditations in the sector agencies recruit for, or have a proven track record of delivering outstanding quality and service to both candidates and employers are also key in creating trust.

And finally…be listed on Trusted Agencies of course!

Do you think recruiters get a bad rep?
Our own experience of working with recruiters shows that yes, some recruiters and the industry do have a less than favourable reputation. From aggressive cold calling through to unethical ways of sourcing candidates for roles, recruiters do struggle to build trust with their clients.

As we have helped to market some brilliant recruiters we understand that the majority of recruitment agencies can in fact be trusted and deliver excellent service and so, we are aiming to minimise this bad reputation of the industry and promote those recruitment agencies that are getting this right.

What do you think the biggest challenges is for recruiters?
As the market and industry are constantly moving and expanding, it is essential for recruiters to build strategic partnerships with those surrounding the recruitment sector.

Keeping clients is becoming increasingly difficult and so, it is important that recruiters don’t just look at the current roles on their list, but also think about what is coming next and how they can secure long- lasting relationships with their clients and candidates to ensure longevity for their business.

As technology advances continue there is also the consideration of changing job roles, especially for those recruiters that fill low-level or low-skilled roles. These soon may be replaced by technology and on the flipside of this, new roles will be created by technology advances – so how are recruiters going to adapt to these changes?

Trust is also a challenge for recruitment companies, often clients will work with several recruiters as they feel this is their best chance of filling the role, therefore it is essential for recruiters to combat this by building trust between themselves and the client. We give employers a choice of companies based on their experience, testimonials, specialisms and overall business practices that we have pre-validated for them, saving them the hassle and allowing them to make an informed choice.

What are your goals for the next year?
Across the next year we have 3 main goals:

1. Put positivity back into the recruitment industry and get clients and candidates excited about working with professional and ethical recruiters.

2. Provide more choice for both candidates and employers when they are looking into recruiting or finding a new role, as it stands choice is limited as a few national companies dominate the market therefore, we want to change this and give a variety of business sizes more exposure.

3. Give recruiters a platform to showcase their services and the fantastic work they are going within the industry. Recruitment is an extremely rewarding profession and we want to provide a place where recruiters can showcase this and be put in front of the right employers and candidates at the same time.