July 23, 2024 • 32 mins
In this episode, Rhona is joined by Vanessa Raath, an expert talent sourcer. Vanessa challenges traditional email outreach methods and shares her approach to crafting email campaigns that resonate with candidates. She emphasizes the importance of personalization, doing research on candidates before reaching out, and thinking like a marketer. Vanessa also discusses the power of email metrics and how they can be used to refine and improve campaign performance.
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//TIMESTAMPS:
00:00 INTRODUCTION
05:07 The Three Pillars of Talent Sourcing
09:43 Personalizing Email Outreach Beyond Job Descriptions
13:25 Using Authentic Content to Engage Candidates
17:14 Creative Ways to Stand Out in a Crowded Inbox
21:49 Common Mistakes in Email Outreach
23:06 Leveraging Data and Metrics to Improve Campaign Performance
26:46 Building Genuine Relationships with Potential Candidates
29:01 Advice for Recruiters Starting Email Campaigns
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Vanessa Raath (00:01):
Don't just go and reach out to a candidate after
looking at their LinkedInprofile because you don't get
all of the information that youwanna actually use in your reach
out campaign from LinkedIn.
Rhona Pierce (00:12):
That's Vanessa Raath, and she's about to
challenge everything you thoughtyou knew about female outreach
to candidates. In this episode,she shares her approach to
crafting email campaigns thatactually resonate with
candidates. From uncoveringhidden candidate information to
thinking like a marketer,Vanessa shares the strategies
(00:32):
that have transformed hersourcing game. You'll learn how
to personalize your emailsbeyond just using a candidate's
name.
Vanessa Raath (00:40):
I mean, I find that I have to give a good
Google search for someone tofind out things like, oh, wait,
hold on. They also run thiscommunity. Or maybe they wrote
this book or they were a gueston this blog or they were a
guest on someone's podcast thatyou could have listened to.
Rhona Pierce (00:55):
What email metrics you should be paying attention
to.
Vanessa Raath (00:58):
Definitely open rates versus response rates
because then you know that yourmessage is landing.
Rhona Pierce (01:03):
How to create engaging email content.
Vanessa Raath (01:06):
So first of all, you know, the big one, and also
I was reading in this articletoday, it's your subject lines.
You've gotta make sure that yougot your number of characters
right.
Rhona Pierce (01:14):
Vanessa even reveals a counterintuitive email
strategy that might surpriseyou.
Vanessa Raath (01:19):
You have to, as a recruiter, tell that candidate
that this is the last email thatyou are sending them.
Rhona Pierce (01:25):
That's right. Vanessa explains why your last
email in a campaign shouldactually be a breakup email,
whether you're struggling withlow response rates or looking to
build a stronger pipeline. Thisepisode is packed with
actionable advice you can startimplementing today. Let's dive
in to my conversation withVanessa. So I always like to
(01:47):
start by asking people, tell mea bit about their background and
how they landed in talentacquisition.
But with you specifically, Iwanna know how you ended up
specializing in talent sourcing.
Vanessa Raath (02:00):
Excellent question. I always ask this one
myself, to be honest, because,like, no one went to university
to study to be a recruiter.Right? There's a everyone kind
of fell into it or as I heardrecently on a podcast, they,
like, face planted intorecruitment. So I basically fell
into recruitment because I liketo eat and I was broke.
I had no money. I'd basicallybeen traveling around the world.
(02:22):
A qualified teacher. I'd spentsome time in London, had left
London, had worked as a scubadiving instructor in Southeast
Asia, and East Africa. Andliterally one morning kind of
woke up and I was like, well, Ithought it was time to go home
now.
And that was about 12 years oftraveling and living outside the
country. And I returned homewith not a cent to my name. So I
(02:42):
literally went for an interviewat a recruitment agency trying
to get into adult educationbecause I thought, you know, I
could still be a teacher, but itdoesn't always pay that well
here in South Africa, and Iquite enjoyed working with
adults. So, yeah, I went for aninterview, and they offered me
the job. And I actually said,no.
Thanks. I'm alright. I'll I'llhang out and wait. And a week
later, I realized that no oneelse was really, like, knocking
(03:04):
down my door for me to doanything for them. And I had to
live with my parents again, andI was in my thirties, and I
really needed some cash.
So, yeah, I kind of went for it.And, the rest is history. 2
years in agency, then the 10years internal, and now I've
been running my own business forjust over 5 years. So, I haven't
worked all over the place,haven't had many different
(03:25):
roles, but I've experienced kindof like the length and breadth
of what recruitment can offeryou, which has been great. Yeah.
And I'm sure sourcing piece. Letme explain the talent sourcing
piece as well before I forget.Rona, to be honest with you,
that was out of pure desperationbecause here I was internal. I
was at the same company for 10years. It was a tech company,
and I realized I wasn't findingthese people on LinkedIn and
(03:48):
local job boards.
So I had to start thinkingdifferently. And And it was
really weird because being stuckin South Africa, talent sourcing
wasn't a thing. And, I mean, I'mgoing back 10 years now. It
really and truly wasn't a thing.And I actually taught myself how
to source talent on the likes ofGitHub and Stack Overflow and
how to write Boolean and how tox-ray all from YouTube.
Because, you know, back then,there wasn't much happening. I
(04:11):
was an avid follower of all theSourceCon conferences. So
whenever there was a conferencehappening, I mean, it was hugely
expensive for me to try and getover there from South Africa to
the US side. I'd sit on thathashtag and I'd learn as much as
possible, even to the point towhere people would say, hey,
Vanessa, you're very trippy. Youknow, are you at the conference?
Can we meet up for, like, adrink for the next break or see
(04:32):
you for a coffee or then I thenhad to explain, actually, no,
I'm sitting on the other side ofthe world. So, yeah, that was a
lot of how I learned waslistening to these conferences,
watching YouTube, and doing allof those, interesting things.
So, yeah, it was a journey, butit was great. I absolutely love
it.
Rhona Pierce (04:49):
Amazing. Amazing. So we're in 2024. Everyone talks
about sourcing on social mediaand just all of these modern
things. Why do you think emailcampaigns are still a relevant
and powerful way to sourcetalent?
Vanessa Raath (05:07):
So it's really interesting because this is
actually one of the courses thatI train people on because
there's so many differentaspects to recruitment. And then
you can even say there's so manydifferent aspects to talent
sourcing. So, when it comes tomy talent sourcing philosophy, I
literally have 3 pillars, andthese are the 3 pillars you have
to get right. It doesn't matterwhat your job title is. If
you're involved in HR,recruitment, or talent sourcing,
(05:29):
or executive search, or whateverit is, is this is what you have
to get right.
So let me share them with you,and then we can talk about why
the the email campaigns areimportant. So first thing is
your brand. You know, how didyou find me? You're sitting in
the states at the moment. I'msitting in South Africa.
How did you find me to be aguest on your podcast? It's my
brand. Right? So the first thingis having a strong digital
footprint, great online brand.Those kind of things are
(05:52):
important.
2nd is where are you looking? Solet's not go and look where
every other recruiter in theworld is looking, and I refer to
LinkedIn and job boards. Youknow, let's go and think out of
the box a little bit. And thenthe third thing is your
outreach. You know, what are yousaying to people?
I mean, please tell me you'renot using templates of messages,
same message to people, 0personalization, all of those
(06:13):
things. And for me, if you cancrack those three things, you
are going to be you're sorted.You know, that's exactly what
you're looking for. So to answeryour question around, you know,
are email campaigns, you know,successful? Why are they
successful?
It's because I think that wehave to have a multi pronged
approach these days torecruiting. You know, it's it's
about finding the people. Imean, the next step is actually
(06:36):
finding contact details, phonenumbers, or email addresses.
And, I mean, that's a skill initself. And then sending the
message and realizing that we'vegot to think like marketers.
It's a campaign here. It's not aonce off email where a lot of
people make the mistake of thatfirst email is the whole tldr
because it is too long. And thenyour second and third, what have
(06:56):
you actually got to say? But,oh, you know, did you get my
first email? It was quite long.
Did you read it? You haven't gotmuch to say in emails 2 or 3.
But if you think like amarketer, basically what happens
then is that you actually startsending that information from
the very long first emailacross, like, 5 or 6 emails. So,
(07:17):
basically, you are drip feedinginformation to your candidates
and your clients, which worksway better than bombarding them
with a really long emailupfront.
Rhona Pierce (07:26):
Yes. And it's always interesting to me how
much we can learn in talentacquisition from marketers and
how much we, as an industry,neglect to learn from them. They
are marketing to people. We aremarketing to people. So there's
a lot to learn about howmarketers do things and a lot
that we can adapt into what wedo in our day to day jobs.
Vanessa Raath (07:50):
Yeah. Absolutely. And that's why it's becoming
like a little bit of a gray lineblue line, isn't it, between
what does marketing do in acompany? What does talent
acquisition do? Because, I mean,we're all marketing to get more
people on board.
Rhona Pierce (08:01):
Yeah. We just have different audiences. So do you
have any stories? I know you'vebeen doing this for a while and
you've worked with a lot ofcompanies. Do you have any
stories about a time when aemail campaign helped you or
someone that you know connectwith a hard to reach candidate?
Vanessa Raath (08:19):
So I've got lots of stories. I mean, I don't have
one that's really springing outto mind now, but I will tell you
what what does spring to mindwhen I think about email
campaigns. And I alwaysemphasize this in my training,
is that I always say put yourcandidates or your clients into
a 4 or 4 or 5 email campaign. Sothere's 4 or 5 emails. But the
key thing is that last email hasto be your dear John.
(08:43):
Now those of us who were around,you know, in the eighties,
Ronan, I don't know if youremember this. Dear John was
that sitcom, and the person, hiswife or girlfriend broke up with
him by leaving him a Dear Johnnote on top of the fireplace one
day and, you know, off she went.You have to, as a recruiter,
tell that candidate that this isthe last email that you are
sending them. So it's your dearJohn email. You're breaking up
(09:04):
with them.
So saying things like, you know,I really I realize that you are
super busy, and everything'sobviously going alright in your
job. You don't need my services.This is gonna be the last email
that I'm gonna send to you, butyou are welcome to stay in
touch. And if you've written agood email campaign and you've
given them lots of informationand, they've enjoyed it, that is
(09:25):
the email that they they answer.So a lot of the times you've got
to get to, you know, that secondor even 3rd week in your email
campaign before you startgetting answers from people.
And that for me is always areally good tip.
Rhona Pierce (09:38):
Yeah. So how can recruiters craft emails that go
beyond just the job descriptionand actually connect with
candidates on a personal level?
Vanessa Raath (09:50):
So there's a couple of things there, but the
first thing that I actuallyreally recommend is don't just
go and reach out to a candidateafter looking at their LinkedIn
profile because you don't getall of the information that you
want to actually use in yourreach out campaign from
LinkedIn. I mean, I find that Ihave to give a good Google
search for someone to find outthings like, Oh, wait. Hold on.
(10:11):
They also run this community. Ormaybe they wrote this book, or
they were a guest on this vlog,or they were a guest on
someone's podcast that you couldhave listened to.
So it's it's about Googling thatperson before you actually reach
out so that you could mentionsomething that they've done.
Maybe you were at the sameevent. Maybe you've got friends
in common. For me, that'sreally, really important because
(10:33):
you want to, you know, really upyour personalization. So I'm not
meaning go on to Facebook andsay things like, Hey, I saw your
daughter turn 1 this weekend.
That's amazing. I hope the partywas good. Like, that's freaky
stuff. Like, you don't wantthat. But, I mean, if you've got
kids, you could always saysomething like, I'm just out to
do the school run or, you know,just be personable.
They've got kids. Theyunderstand. So for me, that's
(10:54):
really, really important is thatyou've got to do a little bit of
research. Yes, it does takelonger, but it does help. And
that for me is what isimportant, is that you've got to
make that connection withsomeone.
So I always advocate to have a50% template because, you know,
like, what are you telling themabout the job and the company
that potentially won't change?You need to tweak it a little
bit to why it's a good move forthem, but the information about
(11:17):
the company, their mission andvalues, their CSI or CSR,
whatever it is, is pretty bogstandard. But the rest of the
email, the other 55%, it'sreally important that you then
make sure that the person knowsthat you've done your homework
about them. I mean, isn't itbetter to reach out to someone
and say, I listened to yourpodcast or, you know, there was
a fantastic presentation thatyou gave straight away before, I
(11:41):
came across your CV on LinkedIn.
Rhona Pierce (11:44):
Yeah. As you're saying this, I'm remembering I
always remember this LinkedIn.It was a LinkedIn message that I
sent. But to someone that waseveryone on the team had tried
to reach out to her. We reallywanted her because she was a
community leader in the citythat we were recruiting for, and
we knew the chances of gettingher were pretty low.
(12:05):
But the way she was connectedwere high. And when I googled
her, no everyone was justlooking at her LinkedIn. When I
googled her, I realized she hadjust come back from a trip to
Panama where I'm from, and shehad this whole blog post about
the angry honking. Driving inPanama is very interesting, and
honking is a way ofcommunication when driving. And
(12:26):
I remember I just I just the thesubject I think the subject line
was like, we're not all angryhonkers.
I promise. And she replied to myemail within minutes. She's
like, I rarely reply torecruiters. And I knew because
my entire team had tried toreach out. And she said, the
fact that you took the time toread one of my nontechnical
(12:50):
blogs is what made me interestedin replying to your message.
Just normal human interaction101.
Vanessa Raath (12:57):
Exactly, Rhonda. A 100%. What a brilliant
example, and and well done toyou. I mean, that was very
clever, you know, to to throw inthe the Panama as well. I mean,
that's brilliant.
And and, look, you've got aresponse. And and that's what
I'm talking about is that you'realways going to find something
where there's a connection.People get out and about these
days. So you can always refer tosomething because, again, I
(13:18):
mean, all of the otherrecruiters that you're competing
against are literally startingwith came across your profile on
LinkedIn.
Rhona Pierce (13:24):
Exactly. What types of content have you found
are the most effective, inengaging candidates through
email?
Vanessa Raath (13:32):
So I think authentic authentic content. So
I don't think that you need tobe lying. I mean, I I mean, I
had an example with a team thatI was training, and they were
trying to get this guy'sattention that they also wanted
on their team. They were talkingabout how this person was
running. There's a big race herein South Africa called Comrades,
and it's an ultra marathon, andthey started talking running to
them.
Now the person didn't do anyrunning, the recruiter. So what
(13:55):
happened was is to kind of longstory short, the guy got the
role at the company. The companyhad quite a big I mean, it was a
big company. They had a runningclub or whatever. And then he
managed to he he kept on sayingto the recruiter, come.
You you you spoke about howyou'd go running, and I want you
to join the running club withme. And it was very awkward
because this person, there was aguy. He wasn't a runner at all,
(14:17):
yet he had kind of played onthat, you know, on that side of
the human being and had lied andsaid, you know, I'm a runner.
And every time he saw me, he hadto, like, develop this chronic
limp to say, oh, no. I still gotan injury or, you know, I can't
join the running club.
And it's just like, that justdoesn't work. So for me, it's
got to be honest. It's got to beauthentic. And I think you've
got to understand the personyou're reaching out to is
(14:39):
position. I mean, think aboutit.
I mean, a DevOps architect mustget, you know, 10 emails a day
from recruiters. You know? Soplay on that. You know? I'm sure
you're sick and tired of hearingfrom recruiters.
And, yes, I am just anotherrecruiter, but what I'm offering
you is what I'm sure no no otherrecruiters are offering you. You
know, something along thoselines.
Rhona Pierce (14:57):
Yeah. And that's so it's such a great tip. Lying
really isn't gonna get youanywhere because at the end of
the day, your goal is to hirethis person. They will
potentially work at the samecompany as you do if you're
internal. And then how that's soawkward and so weird, that you
would lie.
(15:18):
And I'm sure the candidate isleft thinking, what else did
they lie about?
Vanessa Raath (15:23):
100%. She's not a Absolutely. Yeah. And I know
having been internal, I mean,you see these people at around
the office, you see them at allof the office functions and, you
know, you can't yeah, you've gotto be honest because especially
as an internal, I mean, we allknow you are that ambassador for
the organization. So, you know,you can't, you know, fake it
every day and say, oh, I'mhaving such a wonderful day and
(15:44):
come and work for us.
This is the best place to work.But, no, you've gotta be
positive about where you work.Right?
Rhona Pierce (15:49):
Yeah. But you have to share the truth. And I always
tell people, like, look, there'sgonna be someone out there that
likes the things about thiscompany, whether they're not so
great or not. You work there,100 or maybe thousands of other
people work there. So just findthe people that are okay with
the reality of what your companyis, And you can showcase that
(16:11):
since the beginning, since thefirst interaction, that
recruiter I mean, yeah, I haterunning personally.
I would have said to someone,hey. I see that you're a runner.
We have a running club. Mepersonally, I'm not the biggest
fan of running, but I admireanyone who runs or just
something like that. Stilltalking about what they like,
(16:32):
piquing their interest, but youdon't have to lie and say you're
a runner.
Vanessa Raath (16:36):
Yeah. No. Exactly. A 100%. So so for me,
yeah, that that's the trick.
It's about building that rapportfrom the very first kind of
interaction. I read such aninteresting thing today. I was
reading an article about gettinga candid reach out, and it was
about every sentence that youwrite, you want to encourage
them to be going on to read thenext sentence. And I think that
(16:58):
that is, you know, you've got toevery sentence has to count, and
that's really important.
Rhona Pierce (17:02):
That's a good segue into my next question,
which is, what are some creativeways to personalize your email
outreach so that you can standout in a crowded inbox? Because
we know everyone's inbox iscrowded.
Vanessa Raath (17:14):
So first of all, you know, the big one, and also
I was reading in this articletoday, it's your subject lines.
You've got to make sure that yougot your number of characters
right. It was it went into a lotof detail about people generally
are opening their emails ontheir mobile devices these days.
People are more attached totheir mobile phones than they
are to their laptop. So that's abig one.
So the first one is you got toget that subject line right.
(17:35):
What works for me is putting theperson's name in there, but not
in, like, a salesy kind of way,asking a question so there's a
question mark so people almostfeel compelled to go and open
the email and read it is anotherone. But I think what we do tend
to forget is that, you know, wehave a whole lot of color that
we can use in our email, andeveryone sends their emails in
(17:55):
black and white. So, you know,if I go and do my research on
someone and I see, you know,like, for me, for an example,
I'm a vegetarian. I love beingoutdoors.
I love nature. I'm a greenperson. Okay? So why don't you
put the text of your email ingreen? Why don't you put a
paragraph in green?
A couple of words, you know,that you really want to draw
out. Now use bullet points. Useemojis. Use use different fonts
(18:18):
if you have to. You know, it'sall about being different
because most emails we get thesedays, if they're not advertising
in an HTML format, they'repretty boring.
You know? So I think that's abig one is just livening up the
look and feel. A lot of peopleput too much in those emails.
The shorter, the better. Theshorter the emails actually,
within reason, get a goodresponse.
(18:40):
In my email campaign, just toshare with you, my 3rd email is
generally always a meme. Sosomething along the lines of,
you know, no response, are youfrozen? You know, one of those
that that go out, especially ifthat's, you know, mom of
daughters or I mean, they getit. But, yeah, funny ones for
developers, software engineers,you know, those kind of things.
You can make your own memesthese days if you want to throw
(19:01):
in their names.
Yeah. I just think that it'sit's thinking differently. And
then also things like I'm notone of those people that have on
my email signature the link tomy Calendly because, you know,
it does get pulled up and I wantto make sure that I'm speaking
to the right people. But I thinkthat that signature is
incredibly powerful. I mean, youcould have links there to your
job page.
(19:22):
One of the things I say in myemail signature is that this
email will send us at aconvenient time for me. Please
feel free to respond to it at aconvenient time for you Because,
I mean, my client base is allover the world, so people are
gonna get emails from me at,like, 1, 2 in the morning
because that's just the natureof what it's what it is like.
And then at least people know.So I think there's lots of links
(19:42):
and there's lots of things youcould be doing with your email
signature too that will help youto stand up.
Rhona Pierce (19:48):
Yeah. And anytime I speak to recruiters about
personalizing emails, the numberone thing I hear, and maybe
you've heard it too, is, well,that takes a lot of time. So how
do you balance, like,personalizing and being
efficient? Because we aresending lots of emails or
reaching out to lots ofcandidates.
Vanessa Raath (20:08):
Absolutely, Rona. And I completely agree. And I
hear it all the time in mytraining too. But Van, this is
going to take forever. And Ithink that you've got to think
about, you know, what are yourecruiting for?
I mean, if you're searching fora Java architect versus a call
center agent, I mean, which oneare you going to personalize?
Which one are you going to spendmore time on? And I think that
that's what we've got torealize. And you've also got to
(20:30):
take into account how busy youare. I mean, don't get me wrong,
the old spray and pray method ofposting an advert.
Also, if it's for a junior roleand, you know, you're looking
for you're doing bulkrecruitment, that's great. But
I'm talking about, you know,those more specialized roles,
the hard to fill roles, the onethat you were talking about
earlier, they just need a littlebit more care and attention. And
(20:53):
I think you need to decide thatbased on where you recruit, what
you're recruiting for, and yourvolumes, you know, how busy you
are. But I think if you get intothe habit of it's Rona, to be
honest with you, it actuallybecomes quite quick. And that's
why I say, like, have that 50%templates already, you know, and
then you can just add in thepersonalization.
Rhona Pierce (21:10):
Yeah. Templates aren't bad. I think what's bad
is sending the exact sametemplate to everyone, whether it
applies to them or not. Butusing a template is just a smart
way of being efficient with yourtime.
Vanessa Raath (21:24):
100%. Absolutely. And I think that that's that's a
great answer.
Rhona Pierce (21:29):
What are some common mistakes that you see
recruiters and TA folks do whenit comes to email outreach?
Vanessa Raath (21:36):
So one thing that I see is that it's just outreach
in general is that this wholething of desperation. So within
5 minutes, the person's LinkedInemail from them. They have an
email. They've got a missed callon their phone, and they have a
WhatsApp or a Telegram or asignal or a Facebook Messenger.
It's like too much.
Okay? Calm down. This isn'tgonna work. So that's what I
(21:59):
what I see happening is thatit's it's, you know, we're so
keen, we're so desperate to geta hold of them. We need to learn
how to spread those things out.
Other things that I see, I mean,which is terrible, I received
one last week. Actually, myname's spelled wrong. Sometimes
I have the incorrect name. Andat the moment, what is raising
its ugly head is a lot of AIgenerated content, you know,
(22:20):
especially when I know theperson and I know how they
speak, I know which country theycome from, and I'm like, I'm
sure this was written by thatperson. I know how they express
themselves, you know, thingslike that.
So for me, those are like theobvious ones. Everyone has got
the ability to take, you know,text, run it through 0 GPT, and,
you know, get it to do theanalysis for it and see, you
(22:42):
know, who generated this. And,yeah, for me, it's just a it's a
frustrating thing that'shappening far too often.
Rhona Pierce (22:49):
How do you leverage data and metrics to
refine and improve emailcampaign performance?
Vanessa Raath (22:57):
So it's really, really interesting question. So
I obviously use an email reachouts tool. So when I'm doing
this, I'll be honest, I use atool called Sourcewell. I think
that they are really good, andthey do all the measuring of the
metrics for me because beforethat, I was doing what most
recruiters do and I wasn'tmeasuring. Because how do you
keep track of every single emailthat leaves your inbox as a
(23:19):
recruiter?
You know, and and I think thatyou raise a very valid point.
You know, the data's there. Weneed the metrics. For me, if you
look at LinkedIn, they put outtheir annual report, and they
said their average response rateof in mails was 20%. And I'm
like, well, that's just not goodenough, you know.
And it got me thinking about,you know, email campaigns. A
tool that's very common in theUS is GEM. You know, they also
(23:42):
do outreach campaigns. A lot ofthe tools like, you know, your
hire Eazys, they also haveinbuilt campaigns now to their
software. So there's actually noexcuse for not measuring, and I
think it's good to have a littlebit of a healthy competition
within your team.
You know? What is the average,open rates? What's the average
response rates? And it justactually makes it a whole lot
(24:03):
more interesting becauseotherwise, you're actually just
shooting in the dark, aren'tyou? You're like sending out
emails, you're trying your best,but you don't actually really
know what works.
And that's why I like this wholething about AB testing. You
know, you've got a subject line,AB test, which one's gonna get a
higher open rate. I mean, that'salso important. And now we have
the ability to do it, which isamazing.
Rhona Pierce (24:22):
Yeah. I love AB testing, subject lines, and just
all of the the things that usinga email tool can give you.
Beyond open rates, are there anyother metrics that you look at
when it comes to emails?
Vanessa Raath (24:37):
Definitely open rates versus response rates
because then you know that yourmessage is landing. Other
metrics would be which email isgetting the response. So, you
know, actually, maybe I need topull that email into earlier on
in my campaign. And also othermetrics like, you know, what
time is the most popular thatthe emails are open? You know,
that's also a big one.
Which day is most popular? Ialways say that if you're
(24:58):
sending an email campaign andyou've got someone on their
Gmail, make sure one of thoseemails lands on a Saturday or
Sunday because that's when a lotof people do check their Gmail
addresses over the weekend. So Ithink that there's lots of
learnings that we could takefrom a a single email campaign.
Rhona Pierce (25:14):
Yeah. There there's definitely a lot you can
learn. How many, like, do yourecommend sending the emails,
like, every day? Let's say Ihave a 5 email campaign. Do you
recommend sending 1 every day,once a week, over 5 weeks?
Like, what's the frequency thatyou've seen works?
Vanessa Raath (25:32):
So I actually have one set up that actually
works to be over 2 and a halfweeks. So I don't send every
day. I think that that's that'snot great. As I say, one of them
must land on a weekend, butdefinitely 2 to 3, sometimes 4
days in between. So my first oneto 4, normally do about 2 or 3
days, mix it up a bit.
(25:54):
And then my last one, I normallyleave about 4 or 5 days and then
they get the gear, John, kind ofbreak up email. And it doesn't
have to be week workdays. It'sit's just a couple of days in
between. Yeah. And also, I mean,I do kind of think about public
holidays and things like that.
I try not to send emails,especially on religious
holidays. You know, sometimesit's not your religion, so you
(26:14):
forget. So, yeah, it's it's acouple of things to to think
about.
Rhona Pierce (26:18):
Yeah. A lot to think about. How can TA folks
use email to build genuinerelationships with potential
candidates, even if they're notthe right fit today, but just to
build those future pipelinerelationships?
Vanessa Raath (26:32):
So I think it's always good to be honest. You
know, if the person isn't rightfor the job today, they could be
right for the job tomorrow ornext week or next month or next
year, whatever it is. You wannastay in touch. And I really
encourage more recruiters not toa lot of people, like, do their
sales pitch and they say, well,we've got over a 1,000
candidates or 10,000 candidatesor a 100,000 candidates on our
(26:53):
CRM or our ATS, whatever it is.And for me, the first thing that
goes through my mind is, well,that's a candidate graveyard.
Because if you're not keeping intouch with people, you're not
keeping that informationupdated, it's no use. I mean,
I'd rather have a network. Soone of the things I do is if
I'm, you know, chatting with theindividual and they're not
suitable now is I always justget them into my LinkedIn
(27:15):
network because that's where I'mmost active. I try and post on
there 3 times a week, but alsoto try and, you know, automate
from, again, my ATS to my CRMsystem to send them, you know,
do you want to sign up for themonthly hot jobs or, you know,
make sure there's an email goingout saying, do you want to
update your details, make surethat you're following all of the
(27:36):
data privacy. I mean, GDPR,we've got CopyX, you know,
whatever it is all over theworld that you compliant with
those.
It's a good excuse to actuallykeep in touch with people. But,
yeah, I just think that it'sit's a bit of a waste that now
that person goes and sits in anATS never to be heard of again.
So it's generating interestingcampaigns. But the best thing,
(27:56):
and what I've been focusing on alot this year, is think about
setting up a community. Youknow, don't put those people
into an ATS or a CRM, put theminto like a circle community or
heartbeat or whatever it is, andkeep interacting with them.
Get some conversations going.That is far more effective.
Rhona Pierce (28:13):
Yeah. So many people think of a talent
pipeline as this collection ofcontact information that you
never reach out to until youneed them. And that's literally
not how networking works.
Vanessa Raath (28:27):
100%. You're so right. You hit the nail on the
head. You know, you gotta keepthese people warm instead of and
that's why I laugh because, youknow, that's how a lot of people
treat LinkedIn is that, youknow, you don't know the person
from a bar. So if you've nevermet them, but we all immediately
think LinkedIn is like a monsteror a job board or something, you
know, and we just assumeeveryone's on the market.
So, yeah, that's a you raised avery good point.
Rhona Pierce (28:49):
What advice would you give to recruiters and
talent sources who are lookingto take and just start using
email campaigns?
Vanessa Raath (28:57):
For me, the best advice is always do your
campaign upfront. So meet withyour clients, take your brief,
know exactly what's going on,ask the questions about the
company. Because say, forexample, you know email 4 is
about CSI, CSR, or you know, youwanted to find out more about
that. Where can you find thephotos? Are they on the website?
Where can you link to? Is it ona YouTube channel, Etcetera,
(29:19):
etcetera. So, you know, you'vegot to have all of that
information. So before I evenstart sourcing, I actually put
that 50% template together sothat it's there, it's ready
because it's you get into theflow of things, you're finding
people, and now you're trying towrite an email campaign at the
same time. So that'sfrustrating.
That doesn't work. So my adviceis to get those email campaigns
(29:39):
up and running. Again, you canuse the same kind of campaign,
the same template for the samecompany. You've just got to
maybe mix it up, add in yourpersonalization. It's all about
staying streamlined.
You know, you don't want to youdon't want to be reinventing the
wheel every single time. So Iactually use OneNote for this,
and I have a whole lot ofOneNote pages, one for each
client, and I have all of theemail campaigns that are set up
(30:03):
over there.
Rhona Pierce (30:03):
OneNote is one of my favorite tools, and it's been
with me since college. I've seenthe evolution of OneNote, but
I've been using I'm such a fanof it, and it's so
underutilized, I think.
Vanessa Raath (30:16):
Absolutely. And and yeah. I I totally agree. I
mean, I I talk to recruitersabout this in my training. Like,
what's OneNote?
I'm like, just download it. Useit. Yeah.
Rhona Pierce (30:25):
So if if listeners wanna learn more about you and
about your training, which isawesome, how can they connect
with you?
Vanessa Raath (30:33):
Sure, Rona. All you say that I'm not difficult
to find. Right? I am on allpretty much social platforms. I
have my own YouTube channel.
It's Van_ Roth. I'm on X. I'm onTikTok. I'm on Facebook. I'm on
LinkedIn.
So wherever they arecomfortable, they can track me
down. My website isvanessaroff.com. And if you send
me a message on LinkedIn, I'mquite happy to send you a link
(30:55):
back. I have got 3 sets of freetraining now on my online
academy. I am more than happy toto give you the links to all of
those courses and, yeah, don'tget stuck in.
I mean, one of my sayings inlife is ABL, always be learning,
and it's something that I reallystick to. So get involved.
Rhona Pierce (31:11):
Perfect. And I'll also add those links to your
courses and how to connect withyou to the show notes. This has
been such a great conversationand such a timely one because I
do think, especially in thesummertime now for the US and
and Europe, it's email is areally good way to get a hold of
(31:32):
candidates.
Vanessa Raath (31:34):
Absolutely. A 100%. So thank you for having
me, Rona. I appreciate being aguest amongst all of the other
esteemed guests that you've hadon your show, and I really wish
you every success. You'reamazing.
Rhona Pierce (31:44):
That wraps up my conversation with Vanessa.
Thanks again for being on theshow. Today's conversation is a
reminder that email campaignsare still a powerful tool in
recruiting. Remember, as Vanessasays, always be learning. Keep
refining your strategies, anddon't be afraid to think outside
the box when it comes to talentsourcing.
(32:05):
If you wanna learn from Vanessaherself how to use the entire
Internet to find talent that noone else can find, be sure to
check out academydotvanessaroth.com. You'll find
all of Vanessa's courses and abunch of free resources to help
you level up your sourcing game.The link is in the show notes.
(32:25):
And if you wanna learn how toget the best talent to contact
you and increase your responserates, listen to episode 12,
where Anna Morgan shares how tobuild a personal brand that will
transform your recruitingcareer. Thanks for listening,
and I'll chat with you nextweek.
Don't just go and reach out to a candidate after
looking at their LinkedInprofile because you don't get
all of the information that youwanna actually use in your reach
out campaign from LinkedIn.
Rhona Pierce (00:12):
That's Vanessa Raath, and she's about to
challenge everything you thoughtyou knew about female outreach
to candidates. In this episode,she shares her approach to
crafting email campaigns thatactually resonate with
candidates. From uncoveringhidden candidate information to
thinking like a marketer,Vanessa shares the strategies
(00:32):
that have transformed hersourcing game. You'll learn how
to personalize your emailsbeyond just using a candidate's
name.
Vanessa Raath (00:40):
I mean, I find that I have to give a good
Google search for someone tofind out things like, oh, wait,
hold on. They also run thiscommunity. Or maybe they wrote
this book or they were a gueston this blog or they were a
guest on someone's podcast thatyou could have listened to.
Rhona Pierce (00:55):
What email metrics you should be paying attention
to.
Vanessa Raath (00:58):
Definitely open rates versus response rates
because then you know that yourmessage is landing.
Rhona Pierce (01:03):
How to create engaging email content.
Vanessa Raath (01:06):
So first of all, you know, the big one, and also
I was reading in this articletoday, it's your subject lines.
You've gotta make sure that yougot your number of characters
right.
Rhona Pierce (01:14):
Vanessa even reveals a counterintuitive email
strategy that might surpriseyou.
Vanessa Raath (01:19):
You have to, as a recruiter, tell that candidate
that this is the last email thatyou are sending them.
Rhona Pierce (01:25):
That's right. Vanessa explains why your last
email in a campaign shouldactually be a breakup email,
whether you're struggling withlow response rates or looking to
build a stronger pipeline. Thisepisode is packed with
actionable advice you can startimplementing today. Let's dive
in to my conversation withVanessa. So I always like to
(01:47):
start by asking people, tell mea bit about their background and
how they landed in talentacquisition.
But with you specifically, Iwanna know how you ended up
specializing in talent sourcing.
Vanessa Raath (02:00):
Excellent question. I always ask this one
myself, to be honest, because,like, no one went to university
to study to be a recruiter.Right? There's a everyone kind
of fell into it or as I heardrecently on a podcast, they,
like, face planted intorecruitment. So I basically fell
into recruitment because I liketo eat and I was broke.
I had no money. I'd basicallybeen traveling around the world.
(02:22):
A qualified teacher. I'd spentsome time in London, had left
London, had worked as a scubadiving instructor in Southeast
Asia, and East Africa. Andliterally one morning kind of
woke up and I was like, well, Ithought it was time to go home
now.
And that was about 12 years oftraveling and living outside the
country. And I returned homewith not a cent to my name. So I
(02:42):
literally went for an interviewat a recruitment agency trying
to get into adult educationbecause I thought, you know, I
could still be a teacher, but itdoesn't always pay that well
here in South Africa, and Iquite enjoyed working with
adults. So, yeah, I went for aninterview, and they offered me
the job. And I actually said,no.
Thanks. I'm alright. I'll I'llhang out and wait. And a week
later, I realized that no oneelse was really, like, knocking
(03:04):
down my door for me to doanything for them. And I had to
live with my parents again, andI was in my thirties, and I
really needed some cash.
So, yeah, I kind of went for it.And, the rest is history. 2
years in agency, then the 10years internal, and now I've
been running my own business forjust over 5 years. So, I haven't
worked all over the place,haven't had many different
(03:25):
roles, but I've experienced kindof like the length and breadth
of what recruitment can offeryou, which has been great. Yeah.
And I'm sure sourcing piece. Letme explain the talent sourcing
piece as well before I forget.Rona, to be honest with you,
that was out of pure desperationbecause here I was internal. I
was at the same company for 10years. It was a tech company,
and I realized I wasn't findingthese people on LinkedIn and
(03:48):
local job boards.
So I had to start thinkingdifferently. And And it was
really weird because being stuckin South Africa, talent sourcing
wasn't a thing. And, I mean, I'mgoing back 10 years now. It
really and truly wasn't a thing.And I actually taught myself how
to source talent on the likes ofGitHub and Stack Overflow and
how to write Boolean and how tox-ray all from YouTube.
Because, you know, back then,there wasn't much happening. I
(04:11):
was an avid follower of all theSourceCon conferences. So
whenever there was a conferencehappening, I mean, it was hugely
expensive for me to try and getover there from South Africa to
the US side. I'd sit on thathashtag and I'd learn as much as
possible, even to the point towhere people would say, hey,
Vanessa, you're very trippy. Youknow, are you at the conference?
Can we meet up for, like, adrink for the next break or see
(04:32):
you for a coffee or then I thenhad to explain, actually, no,
I'm sitting on the other side ofthe world. So, yeah, that was a
lot of how I learned waslistening to these conferences,
watching YouTube, and doing allof those, interesting things.
So, yeah, it was a journey, butit was great. I absolutely love
it.
Rhona Pierce (04:49):
Amazing. Amazing. So we're in 2024. Everyone talks
about sourcing on social mediaand just all of these modern
things. Why do you think emailcampaigns are still a relevant
and powerful way to sourcetalent?
Vanessa Raath (05:07):
So it's really interesting because this is
actually one of the courses thatI train people on because
there's so many differentaspects to recruitment. And then
you can even say there's so manydifferent aspects to talent
sourcing. So, when it comes tomy talent sourcing philosophy, I
literally have 3 pillars, andthese are the 3 pillars you have
to get right. It doesn't matterwhat your job title is. If
you're involved in HR,recruitment, or talent sourcing,
(05:29):
or executive search, or whateverit is, is this is what you have
to get right.
So let me share them with you,and then we can talk about why
the the email campaigns areimportant. So first thing is
your brand. You know, how didyou find me? You're sitting in
the states at the moment. I'msitting in South Africa.
How did you find me to be aguest on your podcast? It's my
brand. Right? So the first thingis having a strong digital
footprint, great online brand.Those kind of things are
(05:52):
important.
2nd is where are you looking? Solet's not go and look where
every other recruiter in theworld is looking, and I refer to
LinkedIn and job boards. Youknow, let's go and think out of
the box a little bit. And thenthe third thing is your
outreach. You know, what are yousaying to people?
I mean, please tell me you'renot using templates of messages,
same message to people, 0personalization, all of those
(06:13):
things. And for me, if you cancrack those three things, you
are going to be you're sorted.You know, that's exactly what
you're looking for. So to answeryour question around, you know,
are email campaigns, you know,successful? Why are they
successful?
It's because I think that wehave to have a multi pronged
approach these days torecruiting. You know, it's it's
about finding the people. Imean, the next step is actually
(06:36):
finding contact details, phonenumbers, or email addresses.
And, I mean, that's a skill initself. And then sending the
message and realizing that we'vegot to think like marketers.
It's a campaign here. It's not aonce off email where a lot of
people make the mistake of thatfirst email is the whole tldr
because it is too long. And thenyour second and third, what have
(06:56):
you actually got to say? But,oh, you know, did you get my
first email? It was quite long.
Did you read it? You haven't gotmuch to say in emails 2 or 3.
But if you think like amarketer, basically what happens
then is that you actually startsending that information from
the very long first emailacross, like, 5 or 6 emails. So,
(07:17):
basically, you are drip feedinginformation to your candidates
and your clients, which worksway better than bombarding them
with a really long emailupfront.
Rhona Pierce (07:26):
Yes. And it's always interesting to me how
much we can learn in talentacquisition from marketers and
how much we, as an industry,neglect to learn from them. They
are marketing to people. We aremarketing to people. So there's
a lot to learn about howmarketers do things and a lot
that we can adapt into what wedo in our day to day jobs.
Vanessa Raath (07:50):
Yeah. Absolutely. And that's why it's becoming
like a little bit of a gray lineblue line, isn't it, between
what does marketing do in acompany? What does talent
acquisition do? Because, I mean,we're all marketing to get more
people on board.
Rhona Pierce (08:01):
Yeah. We just have different audiences. So do you
have any stories? I know you'vebeen doing this for a while and
you've worked with a lot ofcompanies. Do you have any
stories about a time when aemail campaign helped you or
someone that you know connectwith a hard to reach candidate?
Vanessa Raath (08:19):
So I've got lots of stories. I mean, I don't have
one that's really springing outto mind now, but I will tell you
what what does spring to mindwhen I think about email
campaigns. And I alwaysemphasize this in my training,
is that I always say put yourcandidates or your clients into
a 4 or 4 or 5 email campaign. Sothere's 4 or 5 emails. But the
key thing is that last email hasto be your dear John.
(08:43):
Now those of us who were around,you know, in the eighties,
Ronan, I don't know if youremember this. Dear John was
that sitcom, and the person, hiswife or girlfriend broke up with
him by leaving him a Dear Johnnote on top of the fireplace one
day and, you know, off she went.You have to, as a recruiter,
tell that candidate that this isthe last email that you are
sending them. So it's your dearJohn email. You're breaking up
(09:04):
with them.
So saying things like, you know,I really I realize that you are
super busy, and everything'sobviously going alright in your
job. You don't need my services.This is gonna be the last email
that I'm gonna send to you, butyou are welcome to stay in
touch. And if you've written agood email campaign and you've
given them lots of informationand, they've enjoyed it, that is
(09:25):
the email that they they answer.So a lot of the times you've got
to get to, you know, that secondor even 3rd week in your email
campaign before you startgetting answers from people.
And that for me is always areally good tip.
Rhona Pierce (09:38):
Yeah. So how can recruiters craft emails that go
beyond just the job descriptionand actually connect with
candidates on a personal level?
Vanessa Raath (09:50):
So there's a couple of things there, but the
first thing that I actuallyreally recommend is don't just
go and reach out to a candidateafter looking at their LinkedIn
profile because you don't getall of the information that you
want to actually use in yourreach out campaign from
LinkedIn. I mean, I find that Ihave to give a good Google
search for someone to find outthings like, Oh, wait. Hold on.
(10:11):
They also run this community. Ormaybe they wrote this book, or
they were a guest on this vlog,or they were a guest on
someone's podcast that you couldhave listened to.
So it's it's about Googling thatperson before you actually reach
out so that you could mentionsomething that they've done.
Maybe you were at the sameevent. Maybe you've got friends
in common. For me, that'sreally, really important because
(10:33):
you want to, you know, really upyour personalization. So I'm not
meaning go on to Facebook andsay things like, Hey, I saw your
daughter turn 1 this weekend.
That's amazing. I hope the partywas good. Like, that's freaky
stuff. Like, you don't wantthat. But, I mean, if you've got
kids, you could always saysomething like, I'm just out to
do the school run or, you know,just be personable.
They've got kids. Theyunderstand. So for me, that's
(10:54):
really, really important is thatyou've got to do a little bit of
research. Yes, it does takelonger, but it does help. And
that for me is what isimportant, is that you've got to
make that connection withsomeone.
So I always advocate to have a50% template because, you know,
like, what are you telling themabout the job and the company
that potentially won't change?You need to tweak it a little
bit to why it's a good move forthem, but the information about
(11:17):
the company, their mission andvalues, their CSI or CSR,
whatever it is, is pretty bogstandard. But the rest of the
email, the other 55%, it'sreally important that you then
make sure that the person knowsthat you've done your homework
about them. I mean, isn't itbetter to reach out to someone
and say, I listened to yourpodcast or, you know, there was
a fantastic presentation thatyou gave straight away before, I
(11:41):
came across your CV on LinkedIn.
Rhona Pierce (11:44):
Yeah. As you're saying this, I'm remembering I
always remember this LinkedIn.It was a LinkedIn message that I
sent. But to someone that waseveryone on the team had tried
to reach out to her. We reallywanted her because she was a
community leader in the citythat we were recruiting for, and
we knew the chances of gettingher were pretty low.
(12:05):
But the way she was connectedwere high. And when I googled
her, no everyone was justlooking at her LinkedIn. When I
googled her, I realized she hadjust come back from a trip to
Panama where I'm from, and shehad this whole blog post about
the angry honking. Driving inPanama is very interesting, and
honking is a way ofcommunication when driving. And
(12:26):
I remember I just I just the thesubject I think the subject line
was like, we're not all angryhonkers.
I promise. And she replied to myemail within minutes. She's
like, I rarely reply torecruiters. And I knew because
my entire team had tried toreach out. And she said, the
fact that you took the time toread one of my nontechnical
(12:50):
blogs is what made me interestedin replying to your message.
Just normal human interaction101.
Vanessa Raath (12:57):
Exactly, Rhonda. A 100%. What a brilliant
example, and and well done toyou. I mean, that was very
clever, you know, to to throw inthe the Panama as well. I mean,
that's brilliant.
And and, look, you've got aresponse. And and that's what
I'm talking about is that you'realways going to find something
where there's a connection.People get out and about these
days. So you can always refer tosomething because, again, I
(13:18):
mean, all of the otherrecruiters that you're competing
against are literally startingwith came across your profile on
LinkedIn.
Rhona Pierce (13:24):
Exactly. What types of content have you found
are the most effective, inengaging candidates through
email?
Vanessa Raath (13:32):
So I think authentic authentic content. So
I don't think that you need tobe lying. I mean, I I mean, I
had an example with a team thatI was training, and they were
trying to get this guy'sattention that they also wanted
on their team. They were talkingabout how this person was
running. There's a big race herein South Africa called Comrades,
and it's an ultra marathon, andthey started talking running to
them.
Now the person didn't do anyrunning, the recruiter. So what
(13:55):
happened was is to kind of longstory short, the guy got the
role at the company. The companyhad quite a big I mean, it was a
big company. They had a runningclub or whatever. And then he
managed to he he kept on sayingto the recruiter, come.
You you you spoke about howyou'd go running, and I want you
to join the running club withme. And it was very awkward
because this person, there was aguy. He wasn't a runner at all,
(14:17):
yet he had kind of played onthat, you know, on that side of
the human being and had lied andsaid, you know, I'm a runner.
And every time he saw me, he hadto, like, develop this chronic
limp to say, oh, no. I still gotan injury or, you know, I can't
join the running club.
And it's just like, that justdoesn't work. So for me, it's
got to be honest. It's got to beauthentic. And I think you've
got to understand the personyou're reaching out to is
(14:39):
position. I mean, think aboutit.
I mean, a DevOps architect mustget, you know, 10 emails a day
from recruiters. You know? Soplay on that. You know? I'm sure
you're sick and tired of hearingfrom recruiters.
And, yes, I am just anotherrecruiter, but what I'm offering
you is what I'm sure no no otherrecruiters are offering you. You
know, something along thoselines.
Rhona Pierce (14:57):
Yeah. And that's so it's such a great tip. Lying
really isn't gonna get youanywhere because at the end of
the day, your goal is to hirethis person. They will
potentially work at the samecompany as you do if you're
internal. And then how that's soawkward and so weird, that you
would lie.
(15:18):
And I'm sure the candidate isleft thinking, what else did
they lie about?
Vanessa Raath (15:23):
100%. She's not a Absolutely. Yeah. And I know
having been internal, I mean,you see these people at around
the office, you see them at allof the office functions and, you
know, you can't yeah, you've gotto be honest because especially
as an internal, I mean, we allknow you are that ambassador for
the organization. So, you know,you can't, you know, fake it
every day and say, oh, I'mhaving such a wonderful day and
(15:44):
come and work for us.
This is the best place to work.But, no, you've gotta be
positive about where you work.Right?
Rhona Pierce (15:49):
Yeah. But you have to share the truth. And I always
tell people, like, look, there'sgonna be someone out there that
likes the things about thiscompany, whether they're not so
great or not. You work there,100 or maybe thousands of other
people work there. So just findthe people that are okay with
the reality of what your companyis, And you can showcase that
(16:11):
since the beginning, since thefirst interaction, that
recruiter I mean, yeah, I haterunning personally.
I would have said to someone,hey. I see that you're a runner.
We have a running club. Mepersonally, I'm not the biggest
fan of running, but I admireanyone who runs or just
something like that. Stilltalking about what they like,
(16:32):
piquing their interest, but youdon't have to lie and say you're
a runner.
Vanessa Raath (16:36):
Yeah. No. Exactly. A 100%. So so for me,
yeah, that that's the trick.
It's about building that rapportfrom the very first kind of
interaction. I read such aninteresting thing today. I was
reading an article about gettinga candid reach out, and it was
about every sentence that youwrite, you want to encourage
them to be going on to read thenext sentence. And I think that
(16:58):
that is, you know, you've got toevery sentence has to count, and
that's really important.
Rhona Pierce (17:02):
That's a good segue into my next question,
which is, what are some creativeways to personalize your email
outreach so that you can standout in a crowded inbox? Because
we know everyone's inbox iscrowded.
Vanessa Raath (17:14):
So first of all, you know, the big one, and also
I was reading in this articletoday, it's your subject lines.
You've got to make sure that yougot your number of characters
right. It was it went into a lotof detail about people generally
are opening their emails ontheir mobile devices these days.
People are more attached totheir mobile phones than they
are to their laptop. So that's abig one.
So the first one is you got toget that subject line right.
(17:35):
What works for me is putting theperson's name in there, but not
in, like, a salesy kind of way,asking a question so there's a
question mark so people almostfeel compelled to go and open
the email and read it is anotherone. But I think what we do tend
to forget is that, you know, wehave a whole lot of color that
we can use in our email, andeveryone sends their emails in
(17:55):
black and white. So, you know,if I go and do my research on
someone and I see, you know,like, for me, for an example,
I'm a vegetarian. I love beingoutdoors.
I love nature. I'm a greenperson. Okay? So why don't you
put the text of your email ingreen? Why don't you put a
paragraph in green?
A couple of words, you know,that you really want to draw
out. Now use bullet points. Useemojis. Use use different fonts
(18:18):
if you have to. You know, it'sall about being different
because most emails we get thesedays, if they're not advertising
in an HTML format, they'repretty boring.
You know? So I think that's abig one is just livening up the
look and feel. A lot of peopleput too much in those emails.
The shorter, the better. Theshorter the emails actually,
within reason, get a goodresponse.
(18:40):
In my email campaign, just toshare with you, my 3rd email is
generally always a meme. Sosomething along the lines of,
you know, no response, are youfrozen? You know, one of those
that that go out, especially ifthat's, you know, mom of
daughters or I mean, they getit. But, yeah, funny ones for
developers, software engineers,you know, those kind of things.
You can make your own memesthese days if you want to throw
(19:01):
in their names.
Yeah. I just think that it'sit's thinking differently. And
then also things like I'm notone of those people that have on
my email signature the link tomy Calendly because, you know,
it does get pulled up and I wantto make sure that I'm speaking
to the right people. But I thinkthat that signature is
incredibly powerful. I mean, youcould have links there to your
job page.
(19:22):
One of the things I say in myemail signature is that this
email will send us at aconvenient time for me. Please
feel free to respond to it at aconvenient time for you Because,
I mean, my client base is allover the world, so people are
gonna get emails from me at,like, 1, 2 in the morning
because that's just the natureof what it's what it is like.
And then at least people know.So I think there's lots of links
(19:42):
and there's lots of things youcould be doing with your email
signature too that will help youto stand up.
Rhona Pierce (19:48):
Yeah. And anytime I speak to recruiters about
personalizing emails, the numberone thing I hear, and maybe
you've heard it too, is, well,that takes a lot of time. So how
do you balance, like,personalizing and being
efficient? Because we aresending lots of emails or
reaching out to lots ofcandidates.
Vanessa Raath (20:08):
Absolutely, Rona. And I completely agree. And I
hear it all the time in mytraining too. But Van, this is
going to take forever. And Ithink that you've got to think
about, you know, what are yourecruiting for?
I mean, if you're searching fora Java architect versus a call
center agent, I mean, which oneare you going to personalize?
Which one are you going to spendmore time on? And I think that
that's what we've got torealize. And you've also got to
(20:30):
take into account how busy youare. I mean, don't get me wrong,
the old spray and pray method ofposting an advert.
Also, if it's for a junior roleand, you know, you're looking
for you're doing bulkrecruitment, that's great. But
I'm talking about, you know,those more specialized roles,
the hard to fill roles, the onethat you were talking about
earlier, they just need a littlebit more care and attention. And
(20:53):
I think you need to decide thatbased on where you recruit, what
you're recruiting for, and yourvolumes, you know, how busy you
are. But I think if you get intothe habit of it's Rona, to be
honest with you, it actuallybecomes quite quick. And that's
why I say, like, have that 50%templates already, you know, and
then you can just add in thepersonalization.
Rhona Pierce (21:10):
Yeah. Templates aren't bad. I think what's bad
is sending the exact sametemplate to everyone, whether it
applies to them or not. Butusing a template is just a smart
way of being efficient with yourtime.
Vanessa Raath (21:24):
100%. Absolutely. And I think that that's that's a
great answer.
Rhona Pierce (21:29):
What are some common mistakes that you see
recruiters and TA folks do whenit comes to email outreach?
Vanessa Raath (21:36):
So one thing that I see is that it's just outreach
in general is that this wholething of desperation. So within
5 minutes, the person's LinkedInemail from them. They have an
email. They've got a missed callon their phone, and they have a
WhatsApp or a Telegram or asignal or a Facebook Messenger.
It's like too much.
Okay? Calm down. This isn'tgonna work. So that's what I
(21:59):
what I see happening is thatit's it's, you know, we're so
keen, we're so desperate to geta hold of them. We need to learn
how to spread those things out.
Other things that I see, I mean,which is terrible, I received
one last week. Actually, myname's spelled wrong. Sometimes
I have the incorrect name. Andat the moment, what is raising
its ugly head is a lot of AIgenerated content, you know,
(22:20):
especially when I know theperson and I know how they
speak, I know which country theycome from, and I'm like, I'm
sure this was written by thatperson. I know how they express
themselves, you know, thingslike that.
So for me, those are like theobvious ones. Everyone has got
the ability to take, you know,text, run it through 0 GPT, and,
you know, get it to do theanalysis for it and see, you
(22:42):
know, who generated this. And,yeah, for me, it's just a it's a
frustrating thing that'shappening far too often.
Rhona Pierce (22:49):
How do you leverage data and metrics to
refine and improve emailcampaign performance?
Vanessa Raath (22:57):
So it's really, really interesting question. So
I obviously use an email reachouts tool. So when I'm doing
this, I'll be honest, I use atool called Sourcewell. I think
that they are really good, andthey do all the measuring of the
metrics for me because beforethat, I was doing what most
recruiters do and I wasn'tmeasuring. Because how do you
keep track of every single emailthat leaves your inbox as a
(23:19):
recruiter?
You know, and and I think thatyou raise a very valid point.
You know, the data's there. Weneed the metrics. For me, if you
look at LinkedIn, they put outtheir annual report, and they
said their average response rateof in mails was 20%. And I'm
like, well, that's just not goodenough, you know.
And it got me thinking about,you know, email campaigns. A
tool that's very common in theUS is GEM. You know, they also
(23:42):
do outreach campaigns. A lot ofthe tools like, you know, your
hire Eazys, they also haveinbuilt campaigns now to their
software. So there's actually noexcuse for not measuring, and I
think it's good to have a littlebit of a healthy competition
within your team.
You know? What is the average,open rates? What's the average
response rates? And it justactually makes it a whole lot
(24:03):
more interesting becauseotherwise, you're actually just
shooting in the dark, aren'tyou? You're like sending out
emails, you're trying your best,but you don't actually really
know what works.
And that's why I like this wholething about AB testing. You
know, you've got a subject line,AB test, which one's gonna get a
higher open rate. I mean, that'salso important. And now we have
the ability to do it, which isamazing.
Rhona Pierce (24:22):
Yeah. I love AB testing, subject lines, and just
all of the the things that usinga email tool can give you.
Beyond open rates, are there anyother metrics that you look at
when it comes to emails?
Vanessa Raath (24:37):
Definitely open rates versus response rates
because then you know that yourmessage is landing. Other
metrics would be which email isgetting the response. So, you
know, actually, maybe I need topull that email into earlier on
in my campaign. And also othermetrics like, you know, what
time is the most popular thatthe emails are open? You know,
that's also a big one.
Which day is most popular? Ialways say that if you're
(24:58):
sending an email campaign andyou've got someone on their
Gmail, make sure one of thoseemails lands on a Saturday or
Sunday because that's when a lotof people do check their Gmail
addresses over the weekend. So Ithink that there's lots of
learnings that we could takefrom a a single email campaign.
Rhona Pierce (25:14):
Yeah. There there's definitely a lot you can
learn. How many, like, do yourecommend sending the emails,
like, every day? Let's say Ihave a 5 email campaign. Do you
recommend sending 1 every day,once a week, over 5 weeks?
Like, what's the frequency thatyou've seen works?
Vanessa Raath (25:32):
So I actually have one set up that actually
works to be over 2 and a halfweeks. So I don't send every
day. I think that that's that'snot great. As I say, one of them
must land on a weekend, butdefinitely 2 to 3, sometimes 4
days in between. So my first oneto 4, normally do about 2 or 3
days, mix it up a bit.
(25:54):
And then my last one, I normallyleave about 4 or 5 days and then
they get the gear, John, kind ofbreak up email. And it doesn't
have to be week workdays. It'sit's just a couple of days in
between. Yeah. And also, I mean,I do kind of think about public
holidays and things like that.
I try not to send emails,especially on religious
holidays. You know, sometimesit's not your religion, so you
(26:14):
forget. So, yeah, it's it's acouple of things to to think
about.
Rhona Pierce (26:18):
Yeah. A lot to think about. How can TA folks
use email to build genuinerelationships with potential
candidates, even if they're notthe right fit today, but just to
build those future pipelinerelationships?
Vanessa Raath (26:32):
So I think it's always good to be honest. You
know, if the person isn't rightfor the job today, they could be
right for the job tomorrow ornext week or next month or next
year, whatever it is. You wannastay in touch. And I really
encourage more recruiters not toa lot of people, like, do their
sales pitch and they say, well,we've got over a 1,000
candidates or 10,000 candidatesor a 100,000 candidates on our
(26:53):
CRM or our ATS, whatever it is.And for me, the first thing that
goes through my mind is, well,that's a candidate graveyard.
Because if you're not keeping intouch with people, you're not
keeping that informationupdated, it's no use. I mean,
I'd rather have a network. Soone of the things I do is if
I'm, you know, chatting with theindividual and they're not
suitable now is I always justget them into my LinkedIn
(27:15):
network because that's where I'mmost active. I try and post on
there 3 times a week, but alsoto try and, you know, automate
from, again, my ATS to my CRMsystem to send them, you know,
do you want to sign up for themonthly hot jobs or, you know,
make sure there's an email goingout saying, do you want to
update your details, make surethat you're following all of the
(27:36):
data privacy. I mean, GDPR,we've got CopyX, you know,
whatever it is all over theworld that you compliant with
those.
It's a good excuse to actuallykeep in touch with people. But,
yeah, I just think that it'sit's a bit of a waste that now
that person goes and sits in anATS never to be heard of again.
So it's generating interestingcampaigns. But the best thing,
(27:56):
and what I've been focusing on alot this year, is think about
setting up a community. Youknow, don't put those people
into an ATS or a CRM, put theminto like a circle community or
heartbeat or whatever it is, andkeep interacting with them.
Get some conversations going.That is far more effective.
Rhona Pierce (28:13):
Yeah. So many people think of a talent
pipeline as this collection ofcontact information that you
never reach out to until youneed them. And that's literally
not how networking works.
Vanessa Raath (28:27):
100%. You're so right. You hit the nail on the
head. You know, you gotta keepthese people warm instead of and
that's why I laugh because, youknow, that's how a lot of people
treat LinkedIn is that, youknow, you don't know the person
from a bar. So if you've nevermet them, but we all immediately
think LinkedIn is like a monsteror a job board or something, you
know, and we just assumeeveryone's on the market.
So, yeah, that's a you raised avery good point.
Rhona Pierce (28:49):
What advice would you give to recruiters and
talent sources who are lookingto take and just start using
email campaigns?
Vanessa Raath (28:57):
For me, the best advice is always do your
campaign upfront. So meet withyour clients, take your brief,
know exactly what's going on,ask the questions about the
company. Because say, forexample, you know email 4 is
about CSI, CSR, or you know, youwanted to find out more about
that. Where can you find thephotos? Are they on the website?
Where can you link to? Is it ona YouTube channel, Etcetera,
(29:19):
etcetera. So, you know, you'vegot to have all of that
information. So before I evenstart sourcing, I actually put
that 50% template together sothat it's there, it's ready
because it's you get into theflow of things, you're finding
people, and now you're trying towrite an email campaign at the
same time. So that'sfrustrating.
That doesn't work. So my adviceis to get those email campaigns
(29:39):
up and running. Again, you canuse the same kind of campaign,
the same template for the samecompany. You've just got to
maybe mix it up, add in yourpersonalization. It's all about
staying streamlined.
You know, you don't want to youdon't want to be reinventing the
wheel every single time. So Iactually use OneNote for this,
and I have a whole lot ofOneNote pages, one for each
client, and I have all of theemail campaigns that are set up
(30:03):
over there.
Rhona Pierce (30:03):
OneNote is one of my favorite tools, and it's been
with me since college. I've seenthe evolution of OneNote, but
I've been using I'm such a fanof it, and it's so
underutilized, I think.
Vanessa Raath (30:16):
Absolutely. And and yeah. I I totally agree. I
mean, I I talk to recruitersabout this in my training. Like,
what's OneNote?
I'm like, just download it. Useit. Yeah.
Rhona Pierce (30:25):
So if if listeners wanna learn more about you and
about your training, which isawesome, how can they connect
with you?
Vanessa Raath (30:33):
Sure, Rona. All you say that I'm not difficult
to find. Right? I am on allpretty much social platforms. I
have my own YouTube channel.
It's Van_ Roth. I'm on X. I'm onTikTok. I'm on Facebook. I'm on
LinkedIn.
So wherever they arecomfortable, they can track me
down. My website isvanessaroff.com. And if you send
me a message on LinkedIn, I'mquite happy to send you a link
(30:55):
back. I have got 3 sets of freetraining now on my online
academy. I am more than happy toto give you the links to all of
those courses and, yeah, don'tget stuck in.
I mean, one of my sayings inlife is ABL, always be learning,
and it's something that I reallystick to. So get involved.
Rhona Pierce (31:11):
Perfect. And I'll also add those links to your
courses and how to connect withyou to the show notes. This has
been such a great conversationand such a timely one because I
do think, especially in thesummertime now for the US and
and Europe, it's email is areally good way to get a hold of
(31:32):
candidates.
Vanessa Raath (31:34):
Absolutely. A 100%. So thank you for having
me, Rona. I appreciate being aguest amongst all of the other
esteemed guests that you've hadon your show, and I really wish
you every success. You'reamazing.
Rhona Pierce (31:44):
That wraps up my conversation with Vanessa.
Thanks again for being on theshow. Today's conversation is a
reminder that email campaignsare still a powerful tool in
recruiting. Remember, as Vanessasays, always be learning. Keep
refining your strategies, anddon't be afraid to think outside
the box when it comes to talentsourcing.
(32:05):
If you wanna learn from Vanessaherself how to use the entire
Internet to find talent that noone else can find, be sure to
check out academydotvanessaroth.com. You'll find
all of Vanessa's courses and abunch of free resources to help
you level up your sourcing game.The link is in the show notes.
(32:25):
And if you wanna learn how toget the best talent to contact
you and increase your responserates, listen to episode 12,
where Anna Morgan shares how tobuild a personal brand that will
transform your recruitingcareer. Thanks for listening,
and I'll chat with you nextweek.
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