Mindset Archives - Superfast Recruitment

In this episode of The Recruitment Marketing and Sales Podcast, Sharon Newey explores why imposter syndrome disproportionately affects the most capable recruitment business owners, what it actually costs commercially, and three practical actions you can take this week to start showing up with the authority you have already earned.

You are on a call with a client you have worked with for a while. Good relationship. The conversation is going well.

And then, almost as an aside, they say: “We had a really useful piece come through this week from another agency. A benchmarking report on salaries in our sector. Really timely.”

They are not threatening to leave. They are not complaining. It is a throwaway comment.

But something shifts.

Because you know that topic. You have lived it. You have had the exact same conversation about salary expectations with four clients this month. You know what is happening in that market, why it is happening, and what businesses should be doing about it. You could have written that report. You should have written that report.

But you did not. And someone else did. And now your client is talking about them on a call with you.

That feeling is not a content problem. It is not a time problem.

It is imposter syndrome. And it is costing your business more than you realise.

Research suggests that up to 85% of high-achieving professionals experience imposter syndrome at some point in their careers. Eighty-five per cent.

That is not a niche phenomenon. That is not something that happens to people who lack confidence or ability. That is a pattern that affects the majority of people who are genuinely very good at what they do.

Imposter syndrome is not evidence that you are not ready. It is frequently a signal that you are more capable than you give yourself credit for. The doubt is not a warning sign. It is a side effect of expertise.

In a recruitment business, imposter syndrome rarely announces itself as imposter syndrome. It disguises itself as something far more practical.

It looks like waiting until the website is ready. You know the marketing needs to happen. But the website is not quite right, so you will start once that is sorted. The website gets sorted. Then it is something else.

It looks like not posting because it is not good enough. You draft something, read it back, and think: this is obvious. Everyone in my sector already knows this. So you delete it, and nothing goes out.

It looks like avoiding video, permanently. You know video works. You have seen the data. But something about pressing record feels impossible, so the video conversation gets shelved for another quarter.

It looks like undercharging and struggling to defend your fees. When you do not fully believe in your own authority, you drop your rate before the client has even pushed back. You discount as a reflex, not as a strategy.

And it looks like watching competitors win work you know you could do better. They are not better than you. They are simply louder. They are showing up. They are saying the things you are thinking.

Recognise any of that? Most recruitment directors and founders will recognise at least three of those patterns immediately. And they will have filed them under time, or priorities, or just not my thing.

But that is not really what they are.

The people most susceptible to imposter syndrome are not the least competent. It is the opposite. The more expert you become, the more likely you are to experience it. And there is a name for this: the paradox of competence.

When you are a junior recruiter, you know what you do not know. The gaps are visible and that feels appropriate. But as you become genuinely expert, your awareness of the field’s complexity increases at the same rate as your knowledge. You can see further. Which means you can also see further ahead of where you currently are.

You know more, and so you are more aware of the things you do not yet know. And that awareness can feel, incorrectly, like inadequacy.

There is a specific version of this that we see consistently. Many of our clients built their career inside a corporate agency. They were brilliant at what they did, and the brand gave them a platform. Candidates and clients trusted them, but some of that trust was borrowed from the institution.

And then they went out on their own. Courageous, commercially smart. But it came with a hidden tax. Because now the brand is them. The credibility is theirs to build, not to borrow. And a voice surfaces that says: was it ever really me?

The answer is yes. Thirty years of sector expertise does not evaporate when you hand back a corporate email address. But the voice does not always believe that, and the voice is loud.

Imposter syndrome is not just an internal discomfort. It has a real, measurable commercial cost. And most recruitment business owners have not fully calculated it.

The first cost is visibility. When you are not showing up consistently, not posting, not putting your expertise into the public domain, you are invisible to people who are actively looking for someone exactly like you. Your ideal client is on LinkedIn right now, forming opinions about who they trust. If you are not there, you are not in the conversation.

Visible competitors win the work you should be winning. Not because they are better. Because they are present, and you are not.

The second cost is fee pressure. Authority and pricing power are directly linked. When a client already knows who you are, has read your posts, has seen that you understand their market in a way that other recruiters do not, the fee conversation starts from a completely different position. They have already bought your expertise before you pick up the phone.

When you are invisible, you are just another recruiter. And just another recruiter competes on price.

We saw this play out clearly with a client who had close to thirty years in her sector. Before she started showing up consistently, she was competing on contingency terms like everyone else. Within months of building a visible presence, she was having completely different conversations. Fee negotiations became almost secondary, because clients had already bought into her expertise before terms were discussed. She went on to secure her first ever retained projects after decades of contingency work.

The third cost is referrals. Referrals are generated not just by the quality of your work but by how front of mind you are. If your network has not heard from you in six months, they will refer someone else. Not because your work was not good. Because the other person was more visible at the moment the referral conversation happened.

These are low-risk, practical actions that genuinely move the needle.

Post one piece of content about what you know, not who you are. The best content from a recruitment leader is about the market. What are you seeing in your sector right now? What are clients getting wrong? What do candidates need to understand about the current hiring picture? That is expertise sharing, not self-promotion. Start there. One post. This week.

Share a client or candidate outcome. Not a polished case study. Just a moment. “We helped a client hire a head of finance last month, and here is what made the difference in the search.” Two paragraphs. It demonstrates your expertise and is built entirely from something that already happened. You are not inventing content. You are making your existing work visible.

Say the thing you think is too obvious to say. Your market hears these things all the time and still makes the same mistakes. Obvious to you is not obvious to them. The insight that feels like basic knowledge inside your industry is exactly what your ideal client is waiting to read. Say it.

None of these require a content strategy, a copywriter, or a professional photoshoot. They require you to decide that your knowledge is worth sharing. That is the only prerequisite.

Before you move on, one question worth sitting with honestly.

What is the one thing you know you should be saying publicly that you have been holding back?

And what is the real reason? Not the practical reason. Not the time, or the website, or the platform. The real reason.

In thirty years of coaching, I have rarely met a business owner who lacked something worth saying. What I have met, time and again, are people who had everything they needed and were waiting for permission that was never going to come from anywhere external.

You already have the expertise. You have earned it. The only question is whether you are going to let it stay invisible.

Thanks,

Sharon

Working on your marketing consistently is one of the most important things you can do for the long-term health of your recruitment business. Visibility builds authority. Authority builds better fee conversations. And better fee conversations build the kind of business you actually want to run.

We have just updated our Superfast Circle programme with new resources and support designed specifically for recruitment business owners who are ready to show up consistently and with confidence. If you would like the full details, email us at [email protected] and we will send everything across.

The post Imposter Syndrome Is Keeping Your Recruitment Business Small appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

I want to start by being honest about something. Five hundred episodes sounds like an achievement. And I suppose it is. But it was never a target I was aiming for.

The goal in 2013 was simple. There were very few voices in the recruitment marketing space talking practically to small recruitment businesses. Not the big agencies. Not the enterprise firms.

The one-to-twenty-person operations run by people like you, who are brilliant at recruitment but haven’t had the time, the resources, or the roadmap to build a real marketing system.

That gap felt worth filling. So, we started filling it.

What I didn’t know then was that the act of consistently showing up, of publishing week after week, year after year, would itself become one of the most powerful demonstrations of what we teach.

We tell our clients that consistency beats perfection. That systems matter more than tactics. That visibility compounds over time. Every episode of this podcast has been proof of that.

Five hundred is not the number I was chasing. It’s what happened because I kept going.

I hear a lot of conversation in our world about content strategies, posting schedules, and content calendars. And those things matter. But they are not what keep you going.

What keeps you going is deciding, somewhere early on, that you’re the kind of person who shows up.

Even when it’s inconvenient. Even when no one seems to be listening. Even when you recorded the last three episodes under difficult circumstances, and you’re not sure any of them were your best work.

The episodes I nearly didn’t make were often the most honest. Something about recording when you’re tired or stretched or uncertain strips away the performance and leaves something real. And real tends to connect.

I’ve watched recruitment businesses start podcasts, newsletters, and LinkedIn routines, and then abandon them after six weeks because they weren’t seeing results.

And I understand it. It feels pointless when the audience is small, and the feedback is quiet.

But consistency is not a switch you turn on when it’s working. It’s what you do before it works. It’s what creates the compounding effect that eventually makes the work feel worthwhile.

If you take one thing from this episode, let it be this.

You don’t build consistency by finding the right strategy. You build it by deciding who you are.

Thirteen years is a long time. And I won’t pretend it was straightforward.

There were family bereavements that stopped me in my tracks. A cancer scare for me and my sister’s breast cancer diagnosis that made me rethink everything, the business, our priorities, what we were doing and why.

Three house moves, including our eventual home on the West Cumbrian coast, which we love, but which involved the kind of upheaval that makes everything feel harder.

We changed our business model completely at one point. What SFR looks like today is different from what it looked like when we started this podcast. That kind of change is disorienting even when you know it’s the right thing.

And we lost Flo, our Superfast Staffy. Those of you who knew her will understand why I mention her here. She was a fixture. She sat quietly in the corner of more recording sessions than I can count.

Losing her was a loss that anyone who’s ever had a dog they truly loved will understand completely.

Life kept testing whether I really meant it.

And I think that’s the lesson. Not that you have to be superhuman. Not that you push through without feeling any of it. But come back. You keep coming back, even if the episode is shorter than usual, even if your voice sounds tired.

Marketing while you work is not a nice idea. It’s a business survival strategy. This podcast has been proof of that for thirteen years.

Episode one of this podcast sounds nothing like episode five hundred. And it shouldn’t.

The format has changed. The topics have evolved. The tools we use have completely transformed. When we started, the conversation was about LinkedIn, email, and basic content. Now we’re talking about AI and marketing systems, demand generation, and positioning strategy.

We’ve changed, too.

Sharon and I have both invested continuously in our own development. In understanding marketing models and frameworks that help our clients get better results. In learning from people outside our industry and bringing those lessons back in.

One of the things I feel most strongly about, and I say this to every client we work with, is that the moment you think you know enough is a dangerous moment.

The recruitment market is changing. The marketing landscape is changing. The way buyers make decisions is changing.

Heads up: we have redesigned Superfast Circle and created a brand-new training system that goes with it.

The businesses that thrive are the ones where the owner is still genuinely curious. Still reading. Still listening. Still willing to try something they haven’t tried before.

This podcast has kept me honest about that. When you commit to producing useful content regularly, you have to keep learning. You cannot teach what you’ve stopped practising.

So, if you’re a recruitment business owner listening to this, I want to ask you: when did you last invest in your own learning? Not your team’s training. Yours.

What are you reading? What are you listening to? What are you doing that stretches your thinking?

Your business will grow to the level of your own growth.

That’s been one of the truest things I’ve observed over eighteen years.

In the early days, the downloads were small. The audience was quiet. There was very little external evidence that what we were doing was worth doing.

Most people would have called that a sign to stop.

What I’ve learned is that the seasons of silence are not a sign of failure.

They’re the foundation. They’re where the work gets honest, where you figure out what you actually believe, where the habit forms that will serve you for years.

I say this to recruitment business owners all the time. The content you produce today, the email you send this week, the LinkedIn post you write tomorrow morning, the person who most needs to read it hasn’t found you yet.

You’re not talking to the people who are already watching you. You’re building the thing that will be there when the right person looks.

Visibility compounds. Trust compounds. Expertise compounds. But only if you keep going long enough for the compounding to kick in.

The businesses I’ve seen transform their results through marketing are not the ones that had a sudden breakthrough. They’re the ones who were consistent for long enough that momentum built. And then one day, a prospect said, ‘I’ve been following your content for months. I’m ready to talk.’

That doesn’t happen after six weeks. It happens after six months. Or eighteen. Or sometimes three years.

Build before anyone is watching. The audience comes to the thing that was already there.

There is an idea in professional circles that you should keep your business and personal lives separate. That you should maintain a certain kind of distance, and that showing the human behind the brand is somehow unprofessional.

I’ve never believed that. And thirteen years of this podcast have reinforced why.

The episodes that have resonated most are not the ones with the most polished production or the most comprehensive frameworks. They’re the ones where we talked honestly about what we were going through, where we shared something real.

For recruitment business owners, this matters enormously. You are your brand. The way you show up, the values you demonstrate, the honesty with which you talk about your market, your clients, your experience, that is what builds trust. And trust is what wins work.

Clients don’t hire firms. They hire people. They hire the person they’ve come to know through their content, their emails, and their conversations. They hire the person who feels real.

So be real. Share the difficult moments as well as the wins. Let people see what you actually believe, not just what you think they want to hear; heartfelt candour.

We built SFR on telling clients what they need to hear, not what they want to hear. That’s not always comfortable. But it is always honest. And in eighteen years, it has never let us down.

When Sharon and I started our careers, we worked across multiple industries. Marketing was marketing. We were good at it.

The decision to focus exclusively on recruitment and staffing businesses changed everything. Not just our results. Our satisfaction, our expertise, our ability to genuinely help, and our ability to build a business we’re proud of.

This podcast exists for recruitment business owners. Not all business owners. Not marketers in general. Recruitment business owners with one to twenty people who are trying to build something real.

Every episode we make, every piece of content we produce, and every resource in Superfast Circle is built for that person specifically. Because we know that person, we know their pressures, their market, their billing cycle, their feast and famine patterns, their objections, and their wins.

Generic marketing advice doesn’t work for recruitment. Strategies borrowed from e-commerce, SaaS, or professional services do not translate cleanly into a world where you’re placing people and building long-term relationships in a sector with its own very particular dynamics.

The more specific we have been, the more useful we have been. And the more useful we have been, the more we have grown.

If you are a recruitment business owner listening to this and you’re trying to market to everyone, I want you to sit with this question: who is the one person you serve better than anyone else?

What does the one niche look like where you have the deepest knowledge, the strongest track record, and the most genuine interest?

Go there. Be the definitive voice for that group. And watch what happens.

Five hundred episodes. Thirteen years. One idea I acted on.

Looking back, I’m proud of it. Not because of the number. Because of what it represents. The commitment. The learning. The seasons of showing up when life was hard.

The conversations we’ve had with brilliant recruitment business owners across the UK, the US, and Australia, who needed someone who understood their world and wanted to help.

If that’s been you at some point in the last thirteen years, thank you. Genuinely. You’re the reason this podcast exists.

And if you’re in one of those quiet, difficult seasons right now, building something before anyone is watching, keeping going when the results are slow, I want to say this directly to you.

The audience you’re building for today doesn’t know you exist yet. Keep going anyway.

The people who will benefit most from what you’re creating haven’t found you yet. Keep going anyway.

The version of your business that you’re working toward is not built in the easy moments. It’s built in the ones where you kept going when you could have stopped. Keep going anyway.

If you’ve been listening for a while and you’ve been thinking about getting more serious about your marketing, I’d love to talk.

You can book a complimentary call with us at superfastrecruitment.co.uk/call, and we’ll have an honest conversation about where your marketing is right now and what would move the needle most.

And if this episode has meant something to you, the best thing you can do is share it with another recruitment business owner who needs to hear it. Every share matters more than you know.

Thanks

Denise

The post Consistency Isn’t a Content Strategy. It’s a Character Trait. appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

Let me describe a morning that might sound familiar.

You wake up. Before your feet hit the floor, you have already grabbed your phone. You are scrolling LinkedIn. Checking emails. A client has chased. A candidate has pulled out. There is a message from a team member about a problem. And suddenly, before you have even had a coffee, you are in reactive mode. Putting out fires. Responding. Reacting.

Sound familiar?

Here is the thing. That pattern of starting the day in someone else’s agenda is costing you more than just peace of mind. It is costing you momentum, marketing consistency, and, ultimately, the growth you know your business can achieve.

In this episode, I will share seven daily mindset habits to help you lead with intention rather than firefighting. These are not fluffy “think positive” suggestions. These are grounded, practical habits designed for recruitment business owners juggling delivery and growth in a noisy, competitive market.

Before I get into the habits, let me provide some context on what we are doing here.

This episode is the first in a series of podcasts we are releasing over the coming weeks, all focused on one question: how do you stand out in your sector in 2026?

If you have read our 2026 Marketing Trends Report, you will know that the recruitment landscape is shifting. The companies winning right now are not the biggest or the best funded. They are the ones who have chosen a clear niche, built authority in that space, and consistently deliver content and conversations that matter.

In this series, we will cover practical strategies to help you do exactly that. We will talk about content, visibility, LinkedIn, business development, and building your personal brand as a recruitment leader.

But we are starting here, with mindset. Because here is what I have learned after eighteen years working with recruitment business owners: you can have the best marketing strategy in the world, but if your head is not in the right place, you will not execute it. You will start strong and then drift. You will get busy with delivery and let the marketing slide. You will tell yourself you will do it next week, and next week never comes.

Before we get into tactics, we need to align your mindset. Think of this episode as laying the foundation that everything else will build on.

Let me explain why this matters more now than ever.

2026 is shaping up to be one of the most challenging and opportunity-rich years for recruitment business owners. The market is noisier than ever. AI is moving fast, and everyone seems to be talking about it. Clients are more cautious with their hiring budgets. Candidate expectations are shifting. And the companies that are winning? They are not the biggest. They are the ones who have built authority in a niche, who show up consistently, and who market their expertise rather than fill roles.

Most recruitment agencies are still running on old habits. Reactive. Transactional. Short-term. That worked when there were more vacancies than recruiters. It does not work now.

Here is what I have noticed working with recruitment business owners over the past eighteen years: the ones who grow sustainably are not necessarily the ones with the best tech stack or the biggest team. They are the ones who protect their mindset. They lead their business rather than letting it lead them.

Let me share seven daily habits that will give you an edge.

The first habit is this: start your day with intent, not your inbox.

When you grab your phone and dive straight into email or LinkedIn first thing in the morning, you have handed control of your day to everyone else. Your brain immediately goes into response mode. You become a firefighter. And firefighters do not build businesses. They stop things from burning down.

Here is the two-minute ritual I want you to try. Before you open your inbox, before you scroll LinkedIn, ask yourself one question:

“What one outcome would make today a win for the business?”

Not ten things. Not a to-do list. One outcome.

Maybe it is: “Have two quality BD conversations with target hiring managers.” Or: “Create and post one useful LinkedIn update for my niche.” Or: “Finish the proposal for that retained brief.”

Please write it down. Protect time for it. Then, and only then, open your inbox.

Let me paint you a picture. Imagine a recruitment owner called Sarah. She runs a small tech recruitment firm. Every morning, she would wake up, check her email immediately, and within ten minutes she would be responding to a client query, resolving a candidate issue, and following up with her consultant about a CV. By nine o’clock, she felt exhausted, and she had not done a single thing to grow her business.

Sarah takes two minutes before touching her phone. She writes down her one outcome. This week, it was: “Send three personalised messages to CTOs in my target companies.” She does that first, before email. And here is what happened. She is now having more conversations with decision-makers than she has in months.

At the same time. Same effort. Completely different results. Because she started with intent, not in the inbox.

The second habit is about managing your thoughts. And this one might feel a bit different, but stay with me.

Here is the truth: your thoughts about your business are not facts. They are stories. And some of those stories are holding you back.

You know the thoughts I am talking about. “Clients are not spending.” “No one is replying on LinkedIn.” “I am terrible at content.” “The market is dead.”

When you have a thought like that, and you will because you are human, I want you to pause and ask two questions:

“Is that really true?”

“What else could be true here?”

Let me give you some examples.

“Clients are not spending.” Is that true? Some clients are spending. They are just spending with recruiters who have clearly positioned their value. Maybe the question is not whether clients are paying. Maybe it is whether you are visible to the right ones.

“I am terrible at content.” Is that true? Or have you not yet practised? Are you comparing yourself to someone who has been posting daily for five years? That is not a fair comparison.

“No one is replying on LinkedIn.” Is that true? Or did you send three messages last week and expect a flood of responses? What if you sent thirty intentional messages over the next month?

This habit is not about toxic positivity. It is about reducing drama and opening space for constructive, problem-solving thinking.

When you catch yourself in a stressful thought, challenge it. Ask: Is that true? What else could be true? You will be amazed at how much clearer you think when you are not trapped in your own stories.

Habit three is about data. Specifically, it is about making decisions based on what is happening, not what it feels like is happening.

Here is what I mean. Many recruitment business owners run their businesses on mood. One good placement comes in, and it feels like things are going brilliantly. A candidate pulls out, and suddenly everything is terrible.

That is drama-first thinking. And it leads to inconsistent decisions.

What I want you to do is create a tiny daily dashboard. Nothing fancy. Just four or five numbers you look at every working day. Here is what I would suggest:

How many new roles came in this week? How many shortlisted candidates are active? How many BD actions did you take, such as calls, messages, and conversations? How many visibility actions did you take, such as LinkedIn posts, content, or comments on client posts?

Every day, take two minutes to look at those numbers. And ask yourself one question:

“What is this data telling me to stop, start, or double down on today?”

Maybe the data shows you had a great week for candidate shortlists, but you made no BD calls. That tells you where to focus today.

Maybe the data shows you have posted three times on LinkedIn and got decent engagement, but you have not converted that into any conversations. That indicates you should include a call to action next time.

Data-first thinking keeps your marketing and business development intentional, rather than reactive. It removes the drama from your decisions.

Habit four is one I come back to again with the recruitment owners I work with. It is about consistency over heroics.

Here is the pattern I see. An owner gets busy with delivery. BD and marketing slide. The pipeline empties. Panic sets in. They do a “big push, a flurry of calls, a burst of LinkedIn activity. A few leads come in. They get busy with deliveries again. The cycle repeats.

This feast-or-famine approach is exhausting. And it does not work.

What moves a recruitment business forward is consistency. Small, repeatable actions, every single working day.

I call these your “minimum viable consistent actions.” They are the things you commit to doing even when you are busy, even when you do not feel like it.

Here is what that might look like. Thirty to sixty minutes of focused BD or relationship-building, every working day. No exceptions. One small visibility action every day, whether that is a LinkedIn post, a thoughtful comment on a client’s content, or a useful insight shared in a DM.

Notice I said “small.” I am not asking you to write a 2,000-word blog post every day. I am asking you to show up, consistently, in small ways.

Here is the mindset shift. Instead of saying “I will do a big push when it is quieter, because let us be honest, it never really gets quieter, say this: “I touch my growth levers every single working day, even when it is busy.”

And here is the identity piece. Start telling yourself: “I am the kind of owner who shows up, even when I do not feel like it.”

That statement changes everything. Because once you believe it, you act on it. And once you act on it consistently, your business grows.

Habit five is about relationships. And this is where recruitment business owners have a massive advantage, if they use it.

In a market where AI can automate sourcing, where job boards are commoditised, and where every recruiter has access to the same databases, what is your edge? Relationships. Real, human, trust-based relationships.

But here is the thing. Relationships do not happen by accident. They happen when you intentionally nurture them.

So here is the daily habit: one intentional relationship touchpoint per day.

That is it. One.

It could be a client, candidate, referrer, or team member. And the touchpoint does not have to be complicated.

Maybe you send a useful market insight to a hiring manager you have not spoken to in a while. Perhaps you check in on a candidate after a tough interview. Maybe you send a quick voice note to a team member to say well done on something. Maybe you comment thoughtfully on a client’s LinkedIn post.

The key is intentionality. You are not reaching out because you need something. You are reaching out because you are building a long-term relationship.

Here is the mindset shift: every interaction is a brand moment. Every email, every call, every message either builds trust or erodes it.

After each interaction, ask yourself: “Did I leave this person clearer, calmer, or better informed?”

If the answer is yes, you have just deposited into your relationship bank. And over time, those deposits compound.

Habit six is about stepping back and thinking like a strategist. And I know that when you are in the weeds of delivery, strategy can feel like a luxury. But it is not. It is essential.

Here is a question I want you to ask yourself at least once every day:

“Is what I am doing right now owner work or consultant work?”

Let me explain what I mean.

Consultant work is delivered. It is sourcing candidates, filling roles, managing processes, and responding to client requests. It is important work. It pays the bills. But it does not grow the business.

The owner’s work is different. It is a strategy. Positioning. Marketing. Systems. Key relationships. It is the work that creates leverage and long-term value.

Most recruitment business owners I meet spend 90% of their time on consulting and 10% on owner work. And then they wonder why the business is not growing.

The daily habit is simple. Check in with yourself: “What mode am I in right now?” If you have spent the whole day on deliveries, carve out 30 minutes for owner work. Even fifteen minutes.

Look for one small system you can improve. A template that would save time. An email sequence you could automate. A briefing process that needs tightening.

Small improvements, compounded daily, move you from heroics to scalability.

The final habit is about ending your day well. Because how you close today shapes how you start tomorrow.

Here is a short end-of-day routine I would encourage you to try. It takes five minutes or less.

First, note three wins from today. They do not have to be big. Maybe you had a good conversation with a client. Perhaps you posted on LinkedIn and got some engagement. Maybe you finally finished that proposal. Write them down.

Second, note one lesson or improvement idea. Something you learned, something you would do differently, something you spotted that could be better.

Third, decide on the one outcome that would make tomorrow a win. Sound familiar? Yes, this is where you set your intent for the next day, so you don’t have to figure it out when you are half-asleep tomorrow morning.

Here is why this works. It builds momentum. Instead of every day feeling like a blur, one crisis rolling into the next, you start to see progress. You see wins stacking up. You see lessons accumulating. You see yourself improving.

It creates a clear boundary between work and home. When you have closed the day properly, you can switch off. That is not a luxury. It is how you sustain this for the long term.

Alright. I have just given you seven habits. That might feel like a lot. So let me be realistic with you.

You will not do all this perfectly. Not tomorrow. Probably not next month. And that is okay.

Here is what I would suggest. Pick one or two habits to start with. Just one or two.

If I had to recommend a starting point, I would say: begin with “Start with Intent” and “Is That Really True?” Those two habits alone will shift how you show up every day.

Commit to practising them every working day for thirty days. Not perfectly, just consistently.

You will slip. There will be mornings when you grab your phone before you have even thought about intent. There will be days when you spiral into a stressful thought and forget to challenge it.

That is not failure. That is part of building a new normal.

The goal is not perfection. The goal is progress. Small, consistent improvements. Showing up, even when you do not feel like it. Catching yourself in old patterns and gently redirecting.

Over time, these habits become automatic. They become part of who you are as a business owner. And when that happens, your business changes, not because you worked harder, but because you led smarter.

Remember: the companies winning in 2026 are not necessarily the largest or best funded. They are the ones led by owners who protect their mindset, show up consistently, and play the long game. You can be one of them.

Here is what I would like you to do.

Right now, or as soon as this episode ends, choose one habit from today’s episode. Just one. Please write it down. And commit to practising it every working day for the next thirty days.

Then, if you are up for it, share which habit you chose on LinkedIn. Tag us. We would love to hear which one resonated with you and cheer you on.

This is just the first episode in our “Standing Out in 2026” series. In the upcoming episodes, we are going to build on this foundation with practical marketing and visibility strategies, the tactical stuff that turns mindset into momentum. Make sure you are subscribed so you do not miss any of them.

Thank you for listening. I know your time is precious, and I hope this has been genuinely useful.

Now go and decide: what one outcome would make today a win?

Thanks

Denise

Knowing what to do is one thing. Doing it consistently is another.

If you are ready to build these habits but want support staying on track, that is exactly what we help with inside Superfast Circle.

Our members get done-for-you content, monthly coaching calls, and a clear system that makes showing up and getting noticed straightforward rather than overwhelming.

No more feast-or-famine marketing. No more “I will do it when it is quieter.”

If you have been thinking about getting proper support with your marketing this year, book a call and let us show you how it works:

www.superfastrecruitment.co.uk/call

The post Standing Out in 2026 Episode One: Mindset Habits Every Recruitment Business Owner Should Practice Daily in 2026 appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

This week’s post and podcast are about how your beliefs and thoughts are directly impacting the results you’re getting in your recruitment business. I’m talking about those stories you tell yourself that might limit your growth without realising it.

I frequently encounter this with clients and prospects during discovery calls. I’ve noticed one pattern recently and have a specific individual in mind.

Let’s call him Michael.

Michael had noticed his business performance had plateaued over the last six months. When I asked what he thought was behind this stagnation, he responded immediately: “The market is just so competitive and tough right now. The big firms have all the advantages in times like this.”

I paused and asked him, “Is that a fact or a thought you keep having?” He stopped in his tracks. After a moment, he said, “I guess that’s how I’ve been viewing things.”

Here’s the thing: if you keep thinking the big players have all the advantages and that you can’t compete as a micro or SME business, that belief will show up in your outreach and conversations. You can’t not communicate those feelings when you’re speaking with prospects.

In recruitment, where rejection is part of everyday life and market conditions constantly shift, your thoughts and beliefs become the lens through which you interpret everything. They’re like an invisible force steering your ship. We need to make those invisible forces visible so you can make different choices.

Returning to my call with Michael, everything changed once he recognised this pattern. He started thinking differently: “What a fantastic opportunity for a smaller business to get ahead because we’re more nimble and agile and can adapt quickly.”

He created a new service offering based on this new perspective and took it to market. Within a quarter, his business started growing again, and he built from there.

It’s easy to think our thoughts are just thoughts, but they’re so much more. Your beliefs aren’t just random ideas floating around in your head – they’re the foundations of every decision you make for your business. They affect your confidence with clients, your confidence as a leader with your team, and ultimately, your results.

I want as much control over our results as possible. That means being conscious of my thoughts and ensuring they’re constructive thoughts that move us forward rather than hold us back.

Let me share some of the most familiar beliefs I hear during coaching sessions and business development calls. See which sounds familiar to you:

“My team just don’t have the same drive that I do.”

“I’m not really a natural salesperson. I came from the industry and haven’t been trained through other recruitment companies, so I’m never going to be great at winning new business.”

“Every time I feel like we’re making progress, something gets in the way and knocks us back.”

“The economy, the market, the pandemic – this isn’t a good time to grow a business.”

And here’s one I’ll explore in detail: “Clients in my sector will never pay higher fees.” This is a variation: “I don’t believe in charging high fees. I think some recruitment companies overcharge.”

Let me tell you about Sam, a client I worked with in engineering. He had always charged 15-18% when competitors were charging more. When I challenged Sam about what held him back from asking for more, he believed that clients would say no if he asked for higher fees and he would lose them.

There was a real fear of losing business here. But when we talked about holding a different thought – “My expertise is valuable, and the right clients will pay for quality” – everything changed.

Within a month, Sam called to tell me he’d secured a new client at 22%, a rate he’d never charged before. He now consistently charges 25% and has seen a 30-40% increase in revenue.

I use a simple yet powerful framework with clients to show how beliefs create results. This framework can be applied to any situation.

Let’s examine what’s happening in the market right now—global economic situations, political changes, and government shifts. There’s a lot going on that affects how recruitment businesses operate.

Here’s how the framework works:

Thought: When you consider all these market dynamics, your initial thought might be: “2025 is going to be a tough year in recruitment.”

Feeling: Based on that thought, you experience a physiological response – perhaps fear, panic, or anxiety.

Actions: When you’re feeling anxious, you might procrastinate, withdraw from outreach activities, or become less confident in leading your team. This affects focus and direction.

Results: The consequence is that your pipeline suffers, which ultimately affects your business results. You stay stagnant.

Now contrast this with someone who looks at the same market dynamics and thinks: “Whenever there are challenging times, there are equal opportunities for new businesses. It’s about grabbing those opportunities.”

This different thought creates feelings of inspiration, hope, and excitement. The actions that follow are completely different – they’re focused, they have a plan, they’re actively on social media, doing outreach, and leveraging their networks.

The results? They’re growing and hiring.

We can all interpret a situation differently. Consider going to the cinema to see a blockbuster film. You might go with family or friends, and everyone will have different opinions about the same movie.

This happens in business, too.

We can attend the same meeting and come away with completely different meanings from the conversation.

The key is stepping back from the story and looking at the data—the facts and figures. Current market data from the UK, US, and Australia presents a more nuanced picture than many of the stories we tell ourselves.

For example, while the UK has fewer jobs available quarter-on-quarter, forecasted growth in Australian and American markets is present. The UK economy grew in the first quarter, which was higher than anticipated.

We don’t know exactly what the trading market will be like in the next six months. The only certainty is uncertainty. But in an uncertain market, you have a choice about what you make that data mean.

You can interpret it as “another tough six months” or as “there’s always opportunity in any market, and I’m going to find those opportunities.”

When we explore beliefs, remember they aren’t facts. They’re just thoughts you’ve practised repeatedly until you believe them. That’s the definition of a belief – a thought you keep thinking.

The good news? You can change beliefs. You change your beliefs about political parties, brands you like, even from season to season. Here’s a process I use with clients:

Identify the belief: When you’re feeling stuck or frustrated, ask yourself, “What am I believing about this situation?” Write it down exactly as it appears, sticking to facts.

Question it: Ask yourself: “Is this absolutely true? Can I know this is true? What evidence do I have that this belief is true?” Be brutally honest with your answers.

Explore the impact: “How do I react when I believe this thought? Who would I become if I didn’t hold this thought?”

Find alternatives: “How would I advise a friend who believed this? What would be a more empowering thought about this situation?”

A simple way to start is by asking, “What if the opposite of what I’ve been thinking was true?” Test this out and notice how you feel differently from the original thought.

Your business will grow when you decide to grow, and that growth often starts with challenging your thinking and beliefs. It starts with yourself.

I remember a mentor saying, “A person’s degree of success is related to the degree of discomfort they’re willing to put themselves in.” As soon as something feels easy and comfortable, that’s your cue to start looking at yourself again, starting with your thoughts and beliefs.

The recruitment owners who have made the most remarkable transformations aren’t necessarily the most experienced or well-connected. However, they are willing to question the limiting stories they tell themselves and experiment with different thoughts and ways of doing things.

This week, I encourage you to notice one belief holding you back. Ask yourself: “What if this isn’t true? What would be possible if I didn’t hold this belief?”

Thanks

Sharon

If you recognise limiting beliefs in your thinking and want support in identifying and transforming them, we do exactly this kind of work with Superfast Circle members.

Through our coaching calls and one-to-one sessions, we help recruitment business owners overcome the mental barriers holding their businesses back.

Your beliefs are the foundations of your business. Build them wisely, and you’ll build your success.

The post Your Beliefs Are Holding Your Recruitment Business Back appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

In the fast-paced world of recruitment, marketing isn’t just another task on your to-do list – it’s a mindset that can make or break your success. In this video recording and podcast from one of our client training sessions, Sharon shares how our internal dialogue shapes our actions and, ultimately, our results.

Whether you’re a seasoned recruitment business owner or just starting your marketing journey, understanding and mastering your inner marketer could be the key to unlocking your next level of success.

When we talk about empowering our inner marketer, it’s not just about having the right skills or official job title. It’s about developing the right mindset to tackle marketing challenges head-on.

Some of you might employ marketing professionals, while others handle it themselves. The ability to stay consistent with your marketing efforts often comes down to managing your internal dialogue and doing things others aren’t willing to do.

The way we talk to ourselves significantly influences our marketing activities. When we’re feeling positive and motivated, we tackle tasks with enthusiasm. However, when self-doubt creeps in, we might say things like, “I haven’t got time today” or “I need to focus on my core job.” This internal dialogue can either propel us forward or hold us back.

When you’re implementing your plan, other responsibilities compete for your attention, and it’s easy to let those marketing activities slip.

Consider Diana Nyad, an American swimmer who, at age 64, successfully swam 110 miles from Cuba to Key West. Her story exemplifies the power of mindset over physical limitations. She was passionate about swimming from a young age, competing throughout her school years before transitioning to open-water swimming.

Many people seemed to find her goal of swimming from Cuba to Key West without a shark cage impossible—it was 103 miles as the crow flies, but currents could make it even longer.

She first attempted this feat at 28 but had to exit the water due to exhaustion. Thirty-two years later, at 60, she found herself contemplating society’s views on age limitations. Feeling in her prime despite societal expectations, she decided to attempt the swim again. She remortgaged her house and made four attempts over four years before succeeding.

During her successful attempt, she swam 110 miles due to currents, experienced hallucinations, and faced dangerous box jellyfish. Her determination continued, even when her support team suggested she exit the water. She had to leave the water unassisted to qualify officially until her feet were completely on dry sand.

Similarly, two female soldiers faced the challenge of infantry training alongside 45 male counterparts at a military training facility filmed in a BBC docuseries.

Out of the initial 49 trainees, only about 20 completed the six-month course, including these two women. One was petite, standing around five feet two inches and weighing just 45kg, while the other was of average height and build.

The infantry regiment carries the heaviest packs, ranging from 15 to 25kg. One crucial test required carrying a 25kg pack for eight miles, mostly walking but concluding with a mile-and-a-half run that had to be completed in 13 minutes. Failing to meet this time meant failure of the entire six-month training, regardless of performance in other areas.

When we’re not feeling confident, it’s easy to get caught in negative thought patterns. We might scroll through LinkedIn, looking for evidence to support our doubts. The key is recognizing this pattern and actively managing it. Instead of letting self-doubt control your actions, acknowledge the thoughts and redirect them toward productive activities.

The same principles apply whether you’re swimming across open water, completing military training, or implementing your marketing strategy. It’s about managing that internal dialogue that says “I can’t” or “It won’t work” and replacing it with more constructive thoughts.

One effective technique is the five-second rule: counting backwards from five before taking action. This simple technique can break the pattern of overthinking and push you into action mode. It’s particularly useful when you find yourself stuck in analysis paralysis.

External factors like market conditions don’t solely determine results. Consider two legal recruitment business owners operating in the same market—one struggling while the other thriving. Both worked in the same verticals, had access to the same opportunities, and operated nationally. The difference lay in how they interpreted and responded to their circumstances.

The struggling owner focused on the negatives, repeatedly telling their story of hardship to various consultants and reducing their outreach activities.

The successful owner acknowledged the challenges but maintained higher activity levels, implementing twice-daily BD sessions and increasing cold email campaigns across all verticals.

This difference in mindset led to vastly different behaviours and, consequently, different results. The successful owner focused on what they could control – their activity levels, follow-up processes, and team organization. They recognized that while the market wasn’t as buoyant as in previous years, success was still achievable through increased effort and systematic approaches.

The key to transforming mindset into results lies in systematic implementation. When creating your marketing plan, allocating specific time blocks in your diary is essential. These shouldn’t be flexible windows that can be moved but rather hard blocks dedicated to marketing activities. Many marketing initiatives require significant front-loading of effort before they begin to run smoothly.

Emotional intelligence plays a crucial role in marketing success, with two key components standing out. The first is awareness – recognizing when that negative internal dialogue begins. The second is managing and regulating those thoughts. Just as Diana Nyad didn’t immediately succeed in her swim, and the military trainee needed two attempts to complete her run, marketing success often requires persistence through initial setbacks.

Think about your thoughts as creating a loop that influences your results. When you have an idea like “The market is tough, I haven’t made a placement in two months,” it generates worry. This worry influences your actions – perhaps leading to reduced outreach or excessive time spent seeking advice rather than implementing solutions.

However, you can control this loop. Instead of thinking, “It’s tough,” try thinking “The business isn’t coming to us like it did before, so we need to go get it.” This slight shift in perspective can create a completely different emotional response and, consequently, other actions.

When implementing new marketing initiatives, expect that internal resistance will arise. Rather than being surprised by it, plan for it. Create specific action plans with measurable outcomes that don’t rely solely on results. For instance, success might be defined as completing ten outreach actions rather than securing a specific number of responses.

Consider setting up dedicated marketing sessions twice daily, as the successful legal recruitment firm did. This structured approach helps maintain consistency even when motivation fluctuates. Remember, it’s not about waiting until you feel confident – it’s about taking action that builds confidence.

One common challenge is balancing marketing activities with other business responsibilities. Rather than viewing this as an either/or situation, successful recruiters integrate marketing into their daily routine. They recognize that consistent small actions yield better results than sporadic large efforts.

Having a professional and personal support network can significantly impact your marketing success. Working remotely can make it challenging to maintain motivation, but having colleagues or family members who understand your goals can help maintain momentum. Some successful recruiters even create specific pre-call routines or use positive self-talk techniques to maintain their energy and focus.

When implementing marketing initiatives, define clear success metrics before starting. This might include:

– Number of outreach attempts made

– Consistency of posting schedule

– Time spent on marketing activities

– Response rates and engagement levels

The key is to focus on metrics you can control rather than getting discouraged by immediate results. Remember, marketing efforts often require time to gain traction.

As you develop your marketing strategy for the coming year, consider how you’ll handle the inevitable challenges. Create contingency plans for when motivation dips or results don’t immediately materialize. Remember that success often comes from maintaining consistent action despite temporary setbacks.

Remember, the difference between successful and unsuccessful marketing often isn’t in the strategies themselves but in the mindset and consistency of their implementation. Just as Diana Nyad succeeded on her fourth attempt at age 64, your marketing success might require multiple attempts and adjustments before finding the right approach.

You can develop a sustainable and successful marketing approach that supports your recruitment business goals by maintaining awareness of your internal dialogue, actively managing your responses to challenges, and consistently implementing your planned activities.

Thanks

Denise and Sharon

How Can We Help You

Part of being successful is working with a performance coaching team and surrounding yourself with like-minded people; this is exactly what happens when you join Superfast Circle.

To find out more, book a call with us here.

The post The Psychology Behind Successful Recruitment Marketing appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

In today’s podcast post and video, we had the pleasure of interviewing Louise, one of our amazing clients who walked the Camino whilst running her business over six weeks during June and July.

I encourage you to listen to the podcast and video; they are so full of gems! I have also added a summary of the main points below.

Louise Shepherd from First to Recruit recently embarked on an incredible journey: walking the Camino de Santiago, an ancient pilgrimage route that spans nearly 800 kilometres across northern Spain.

Louise’s decision to undertake this challenge while running her business remotely demonstrates a remarkable blend of personal growth and professional adaptability.

Louise had wanted to walk the Camino for years, and when the opportunity finally presented itself, she seized it. She prepared her business for her absence, setting up systems and processes that would allow her to work remotely while walking up to 20 kilometres a day.

Below is a summary of our conversation. I encourage you to listen to the recording or watch the video. It is so inspiring!

Despite her fierce independence, Louise discovered the immense value of having a support network. She created WhatsApp groups to keep friends and family updated on her progress. This experience taught her the importance of vulnerability and sharing in personal and professional settings.

Louise reflected, “I’m fiercely independent, and I’ve always been very independent. And I find it hard to trust people. So, for me, I need to set up a group… I really only ever did it just as a safety thing. But I learned from it that I put all this support that I didn’t even realise I had, and although I was walking it alone, I wasn’t alone.”

Louise managed to run her business while walking up to 20 kilometres daily in intense heat. She structured her days to accommodate the Camino’s physical demands and her work responsibilities. This experience highlighted the importance of robust systems and processes to enable flexibility.

“I was walking in the mornings, as, you know, as one of my support groups. And I would get to where I was going to by two, 3:00. And then what do I do? You know. Yeah, I’d work because I had the time to do it,” Louise explained.

The Camino presented numerous challenges, from shared accommodations to language barriers. Louise embraced these discomforts, recognising that growth often happens outside our comfort zones. This mindset shift has influenced her approach to business, encouraging her to be more open to new experiences and technologies.

Louise shared, “There were times when I’d get to where I was going to, and I’d take one look at my bunk bed, and I knew there were bedbugs in it; I knew it; you could tell by looking at it. I mean €10 for a bunk for the night. You know, it. And there were creepy crawlies, and, you know, there’s someone that snores, and there’s someone. It’s just all this kind of stuff, you know, it’s going to happen. But I knew it was just one night, and I could get through it.”

The journey reinforced the importance of taking action and trusting the process. Louise learned that overthinking could paralyse personal challenges or business decisions. She advocates for making decisions and course-correcting, a valuable lesson for any business owner.

“My father said something to me a couple of years ago, which, as we were talking about before, resonates later down the line, not necessarily at the time. But he told me he’s got an Army background and was always taught to make a decision. Not making a decision is, but it’s really bad that, in some situations, it can be fatal. So, make a decision and then course correct,” Louise shared.

Louise’s Camino experience has profoundly impacted her approach to both life and business. She encourages others to embrace challenges and step out of their comfort zones, recognising that growth and success often lie beyond our perceived limitations.

Thanks.

Sharon

P.S. If you want to connect with Louise, you will find her at First2Recruit.

The post A Journey Of Self-Discovery And Business Growth: Walking The Camino With Louise Shepherd appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

Today’s topic of conversation is that uncomfortable one we often avoid: procrastination. Be honest with yourself.

“I wish we had more hours in a day!” We don’t. We have 24. So, we need to think about how we use and invest our time; the second one is the comment: I feel overwhelmed.

So let me take time as the first reason because we can’t escape it. There are just 24 hours in a day. And yet, so many of us spend half our time talking about how busy, busy, busy, busy we are. Having spent thousands over the years, if not tens of thousands, on lots of different mentoring programmes, I know I can no longer get away with using time as an excuse!

And if this is important, it’s about making the time.

So, sometimes I hear people say, “Well, I’m not going to start my marketing until I’ve got more time, or I’ve done this, or I’ve done that.” And yet they’re struggling to do those other things because they haven’t got time.

What I would say to you is when you’re sat down, probably at night, and that thing pops up on Facebook that tells you how long every day you are doing some casual surfing, often for many people, certainly in the kind of circle that we’re in, it can be anything from an hour to two hours.

Over a week, even if we take Monday to Friday, that is between 5 and 10 hours. What if you committed to 30 minutes or a maximum of an hour of surfing time?

The second is the big topic of overwhelm, and this applies to people perhaps who’ve never done marketing before. Yet you’ve been doing lots of research about what you could be doing, and you just don’t know, genuinely, where to start, and you are looking for some help to point you in the right direction.

Well, rather than procrastinating, take some action.

Talk to somebody, somebody like us. Have a conversation with us about where should you start.

Thanks

Sharon

We have multiple strategies that work, including making marketing easy for you, which eliminates the time issue and the impact of feeling overwhelmed.

The post Procrastination and Marketing Your Recruitment Company appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

Lessons from 2023

Every year I sit down and write my observations from the year.

I like to call them ‘lessons’ in the valiant hope that I can do something about them or accept that life throws us the odd curve ball we aren’t always prepared for or expecting. What I have learnt then gives me the option to do things differently.

This is what I am taking into 2024; I do a deeper dive into each one on the podcast

1. Put your health first always.

2. We have life AND business seasons; know when you are moving to the next one.

3. Always do more for your clients than they expect; such an easy win.

4. Stop having expectations of people; otherwise, you will always be disappointed.

5. Always have expectations of yourself.

6. It all starts with your vision.

7. Be a badass at the basics. Foot to the floor and be a huge action taker.

8. Some business years are harder than others; be prepared.

9. The answers are in the data.

10. Keep raising your standards.

11. Take more holidays.

12. Document the journey and update the spreadsheet.

13. People see things differently from you, AND that is OK.

14. Good and bad times never last.

15. Most of the thoughts you have aren’t true

16. Remember the rule of 100 inputs.

17. Put down the device.

18. Get 7 hours of sleep every night.

19. You will get things wrong, and in the words of Dawn French, some days you will be an absolute T!*%!! forgive yourself.

20. Work hard; you know how much you enjoy it.

Thanks

Denise

If You want to do ‘marketing differently because you want better results. Then, book a quick chat here.

The post Lessons I’m Taking Into 2024 appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

Let’s discuss reasons and excuses that might stop you from jumping on the marketing ideas we have shared over the past few weeks.

Here is the thing; while we notice that many business owners now see marketing as important, whether that is because they are up-levelling or they have been doing different aspects of marketing, but it’s inconsistent, or whether people are not getting the referral business they used to;…..

They still aren’t jumping into action  

It’s fascinating because only last week, I was chatting with an owner who wants to implement some email campaigns and make their social media much more consistent with value-added content.

That all sounds great, doesn’t it?

Now, what’s interesting, though, is as soon as we talked about what they could do, how they could get started, and what to begin from an implementation point of view, this owner started talking about what they needed to do before they could begin!

I have no doubt that many of you will relate to some of these examples I will share with you because they are incredibly common.

The first thing that needed to happen (from their perspective) before any active marketing could occur was to wait for it; we needed to clean up the database.

Now we all know how important a really good quality database is. We know it’s an ongoing project. Keeping our database clean. Now, the other thing that often comes up as a reason not to start immediately is making website changes.

That could be adding some new pages; it could be changing some of the copy on it; it could be just doing some general updates because some of the technical parts perhaps need updating with plugins and a whole variety of things.

The reality was, as we were chatting with this owner and myself, it became apparent that while marketing was important. They wanted to put these email systems in place, et cetera; it would take several months before the database had been sorted out before the website updates had been done with the backing and forth between themselves and their website designer.

Before that could happen, there were several key assignments that this individual wanted to make sure that they’d brought into the business.

We were probably looking at another three months before any marketing would start, which is quite a time. It’s a full business quarter

Now, let’s think about this, okay? 

Let’s look at what can happen in that time while all these other things are going on. First of all, there’s a huge lost opportunity, if not several lost opportunities, because what it means is that because those new email systems are not going to be put in place for at least three months, there are 90 days of building pipelines and funnels that will create demand for services and opportunities for conversations, meetings for that individual’s teams, and potentially jobs that will be lost.

They’re going to be playing catch up in terms of the time they’ll require to build a funnel to get business.

We’ve probably all heard the data that it takes 60 to 90 days to build a pipeline. Without realising it, that particular business owner was pushing back on building their pipeline and funnel.

Sadly, this is so common.

The other issue is that not only was that individual holding back from starting cold outreach, and of course, when you’re reaching out to a cold audience, it will take longer for that audience to get to know, like, and trust you before they start engaging, they weren’t contacting their current database either #missingthelowhangingfruit

What I mean by that is if we look at our database and LinkedIn connections, we will have people we can put our recruiting offer in front of now.

First, let’s talk about it from a client lead gen point of view.

We have people in that CRM system that we know hand on heart that we haven’t reached out to for quite some time because we’ve been busy working with existing clients if you’ve been busy filling existing roles.

Those warm relationships you’ve had in the past have now cooled off, and yet it’s easier to warm that relationship back up again and create potential opportunity.

Again, a lost opportunity to create some quick wins for this business.

Those quick wins could have been conversations; they could have been meetings. It could have been new jobs on the board.

The final loss for this organisation was around value-add content which was something they wanted to action.

They wanted to make their content more consistent because they realised that while they posted jobs frequently, as many of you do, their value-added social media was quite inconsistent.

So over a business quarter, potentially, that organisation will have another 90 days where all their connections on LinkedIn, both client and prospective candidates, will see more jobs, but they’ll see less value-added content, which people need to see before they say yes.

Another delayed opportunity to nurture connections who are not ready to ‘buy’ yet.

I understand you have to work on assignments; it’s a priority.

Yet, when there are other marketing activities you know you want to get in place, rather than saying, “Well, I can’t start because of….; I need to update my website and clean up my CRM; these are excuses to procrastinate.

What was great about this conversation was, as I was listening to this particular business owner, I think they had been listening to themselves talk because once they’d stopped talking, there was this big, long pause, and then they burst out laughing.

That laugh was, “Of course, Sharon, let’s be honest about it; they could just be reasons, too, couldn’t they?”

I said, “Absolutely,”

Because what often happens is when we want to do something outside our comfort zones or new, we can all relate to this professionally and in our personal lives as our well-that brain goes into overdrive. It is a part of our brain that drives what you and I do; it loves to keep you and me in our comfort zone.

It’s the habit part of our brain; its job is to keep us safe and comfortable.

If things are new to us, such as implementing an email campaign when you haven’t done it before.

Or creating more content, sharing more value-added advice, or perhaps a personal branding post you are stepping out.

These aren’t things that come naturally for many people.

It kicks in when it is outside our comfort zone, that old habit brain.

It will say, “Hang on a minute here. Before you start doing something that’s new and is going to be a bit different, well, just let’s hang on a minute here. Let’s look at what else we could do that’s more comfortable and safe, like cleaning our database.”

This part of our brain will always pull us back to our comfort zone.

Similarly, if you want to grow your business, that growth will not come by being comfortable. Our success will come from the degree that we are willing to be uncomfortable and step outside our comfort zone.

Here’s a suggestion for you.

When you are looking at marketing in the coming months, and you look at what’s a priority for you, what is new, and what timelines have you got in place, is to be mindful as you then map out that slightly more detailed to-do list this month, this quarter, maybe you’re mapping out your 90-day plan; Be very mindful as you start moving into action, if that voice inside your head starts kicking off, as soon as you notice it saying, “Ah, but you need to do this first,” just put it back in its box and take that step.

Whether it’s 20 or 30 minutes, or however long that day you’ve set aside to do that particular marketing activity, do it because what that will mean is that you are taking action to start building and nurturing the pipeline that will deliver the demand, the opportunities, the conversations, the jobs, and ultimately, the cash flow into your business.

The longer you delay taking those actions, the longer you wait to create more opportunities for yourself, your team, and your business.

Remember that even if you’re not taking action to move marketing forward, you can bet your bottom dollar a lot of your competitors are.

It is a competitive market, and certainly, we are seeing more and more businesses realising the importance of marketing and acting on it.

Don’t get left behind; watch out for that habit brain telling you that list of things that need doing before you can start levelling up or starting your marketing.

Put that voice back in the box and act.

Thanks

Sharon

As part of Superfast Circle, we will support you in pushing through the barriers that come up for you as you move forward so you can start getting results like our clients do, which you can read and watch in their case studies here.

Not only do we help direct you on your marketing, we are also qualified business and life coaches that will help you manage your mind too.

The post Reasons and Excuses That Keep Us Stuck appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.

I hope today’s title piques your interest to listen to this short podcast this week around data and drama and diagnosing exactly what is going on when things happen as you market your business.

It is one of those things that can often happen to us, that our minds flick into overdrive, and we start putting two and two together, and unfortunately, producing five rather than four.

Let me explain.

Last week I noticed something in a recruitment group on both Facebook and LinkedIn. A particular recruiter was talking about the lack of candidates.

He was having a poor month and was canvassing other opinions about the market.

One of the things I suggested is that they look at the data, in other words, the facts of the situation.

This particular individual was talking about filling their pipeline. Eventually, the facts came out that he had not done any outreach or marketing, no emails sent, etc.

I am sure you get the picture.

This is not a blog about the consistency of approach, which is always a good idea.

The moral of this story is to look at the facts.

Look at what the data tells you and base your decisions on data; rather than letting your unconscious brain produce crazy ideas about what is going wrong.

Let us say you are promoting a lead magnet/eBook/download/value add content on various social media platforms.

I will use an example of ours, which is relevant for any B2B company using content to build a list of interested clients and candidates.

Last month we ran a live webinar on email marketing. On the surface, I could have gone into drama mode saying, ‘It’s not working!” as my goal number of people I wanted to register was off target.

Instead, I started looking at multiple data points.

People were converting once they got to the landing page. In other words, giving us their name and email address to register for the live training and to receive a recording afterwards.

Our registration rate, also called an opt-in rate, was good at 25% for cold traffic, in other words, for people who were not currently on our email list. Everyone hundred people who visited the registration page 25 gave us their contact details.

The data was telling me that part was okay.

What was happening was we were not getting as many people on the opt-in page as we wanted. We identified we were not using enough channels. We had only sent out one email; I discovered that one email had not gone out

Also, we had not shared enough on social media.

Then I looked at tweaking the plan.

We need more estimates on that page.

Then we decided to run a series of LinkedIn ads that worked incredibly well for us.

I had not turned the tap on, and I needed to turn the tap on in a different area.

I hope this makes you think about where you are going into drama mode about this is not working rather than looking at the facts.

For instance.

Because it can be so easy to look at a perceived result and make it mean something when it does not.

Instead, we need to analyse the facts.

So, rather than going, “It’s not working,”

Let us deconstruct the process and say, “Okay, which part of the process isn’t working?” not something every business owner does.

However, if you are a little bit stressed out, you have got a lot going on. Sometimes that logical brain of, “Okay, let’s stand back here.

Let us stop the drama and look at some data because it might be easier to change than we think.

Remember, if you ever sense yourself uttering that phrase, it is not working! Check yourself and identify what exactly is happening.

Thanks,

Denise.

P.S. We help our clients in Superfast Circle analyse their results and what is and isn’t truly working in their marketing. Consulting is part of your Superfast Circle membership. To book a demo click here.

The post Drama, Data, Diagnosis and Decisions About Your Marketing appeared first on Superfast Recruitment.