QUESTION: I am spending most of my time marketing MPCs and calling old clients and candidates. I need more job orders, but I find myself procrastinating putting a list of new companies to make MPC calls. – Jim
ANSWER: Whenever I hear procrastinating, there are usually a few things going on because this is a way you think about it. The problem is never the problem. The problem is how you think about the problem, personally or professionally. This applies to everything in life. When somebody is procrastinating, what usually comes up is usually fear-based. If you are procrastinating putting a list together, then potentially – again, I do not know, Jim – is when the list is together, I will not have any more excuses to not reach out to them. That could be a reason.
The other reason is you have not connected at a deep enough level how many actual conversations you need to have to get one job order. I am not sure if either of these situations are our or if it is something else. When people procrastinate, they are generally not clear on the benefit of the outcome. We all know if you leave 20 voicemails or you reach out to 20 people, you may have one or two conversations or marketing presentations. There is really no short-term consequence, meaning today or tomorrow, if you do not hit your marketing calls or job orders, because placements take 90 to 120 days from the time you take a job order to the time the money comes in anyway.
We have been measuring metrics since April 2020 to watch the trends as the COVID-19 pandemic progressed. There was a peak in mid-April where we were seeing around 30 marketing presentations, actual conversations to get a job order. Since then these metrics are down now to between 16 and 17 in our latest review. In a really, really good economy, the ratio is 12 or 13 marketing presentations to job order.
If you are procrastinating, Jim, I would just say, okay, instead of thinking about all of these calls you have to make, think f it this way – I need to talk to four or five people today. Because at four a day, five days a week, that is 20 conversations. Based on our metrics ratio of 16 to 17 conversations to one job order, statistically you would get a new opening that you would work on every week.
Metrics are predictive, but work more like a slot machine. You could have 20 marketing presentations this week resulting in zero job orders. You could even go into the 30 to 35 presentation range, meaning you did 10 or 15 more presentations next week and not get a job order, then all of a sudden on Friday you get three openings.
The success is random, but predictable, just like a slot machine. None of us know what that algorithm is but, casino owners do. Slot machines pay out on a predictable ratio. Marketing presentations are predictable outcomes. If your goal is two strong job orders a month, I would inflate the number right now a little bit to 40 marketing presentations a month. That is 10 marketing presentations a week, or two or three conversations each day.
Thank you for the question.
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