Posted By: John Frey on February 09, 2018
The Big Shift in the Healthcare Recruiter Market Between 2008 and 2018.
So what resources do I need in this market?
In the past 10 years, Healthcare Recruiters have moved from the challenge of finding clients to the major challenge of finding Candidates.
Due to the consequences of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and the historically high volume of Mergers and Acquisitions between 2008 and 2016 it became difficult to find new clients. The Primary Care Physician market went from 95% self-employed or group practice to today's in excess of 95% employed by facilities. By changing the tables that rated what acquisitions were allowed to a much more lenient scale, multiple facilities that previously could not be purchased were now fair game. The end result is bigger systems and fewer small providers. Hundreds of clients disappeared and getting orders became very difficult.
2017 marked a complete shift in this challenge as the extreme shortage of Healthcare Providers shifted the market again. Healthcare Systems began to more readily work with healthcare recruiter agencies to compete with other Healthcare Systems in an attempt to find candidates. Today recruiters are saying that it is easy to secure contracts.
The challenge is finding Healthcare Providers in a market that has a job demand far exceeding the number of applicants. Today over 45,000 physician opportunities will not be filled by a physician. The shortage has grown to an epidemic proportion. The search for candidates has become so challenging hospital systems and healthcare facilities are using all possible means to fill their open positions. The competition between them is fierce.
It is now 2018 getting orders from clients is no longer a problem. The biggest challenge for healthcare recruiters is finding Candidates. For a recruiter to succeed in this market they must have multiple sources of candidates. This can be accomplished using the standard approaches, but the return on these efforts has significantly diminished. Consider these three approaches:
- Job Boards are a must, but performance on job boards is at an all-time low. The candidate shortage continues to drive the market resulting in post prices skyrocketing. It is a no-win situation for Healthcare Recruiter Agencies.
- Mass marketing off massive databases is still in play, but emailing, calling, and texting Healthcare Providers is becoming an overused marketing effort and, as should be expected, the candidate replies are swiftly diminishing as well.
- Networking with other recruiters is most certainly in play. Compared to a few years ago, the activity of Networking to fill opportunities with the help of other recruiters has measurably picked up.
- The one area where there has been limited participation by Healthcare Agencies is working with a Job Aggregator company on a pay-per-click model. For those of you who might not be totally clear on what this means. Here is a description:
- You post your opportunities on the job aggregator site.
- You purchase pay-per-clicks on a monthly or annual contract.
- Your jobs are displayed on the site in what is called sponsored positions.
- The Job aggregator ensures that your opportunities are displayed when a candidate conducts a search matching your job criteria.
- When your opportunity detail button is clicked, you are charged for that click.
Historically the problem with this model is the major job aggregators are not willing to work with small healthcare recruiters. Healthcare Agencies are faced with two major problems:
- The first problem is the monthly minimum investment is too high to be able to enter into financially feasible contracts. It is common to have to sign minimum contracts as high as $20,000 annually. This is the common entry level contract NCHCR signs to cross post member opportunities on these sites.
- The second problem is the quality of the candidates the query displays. The search result is so unfiltered it is common to get Allied Health Candidates applying for Physician or Advanced Care Provider positions. You end up being charged for 5 or 6 clicks with an average of only one of them being a quality candidate. If you pay .25 cents per click, you are actually paying an average of $1.25 to get a valid candidate view of your job description. That is not a guaranteed application.
As a result of these problems, NCHCR has never aggressively promoted a Job Aggregator. Previous minor attempts have failed as a result of the inherent high fees and poor results.
Times have finally changed!
After years of development work, www.speciallist.com is providing a viable solution to the intentionally ignored flaws in the current market.
Their core value is ensuring the quality of your clicks. Speciallist’s search technology is designed so your jobs show up in many searches they belong in that they do not show up on other sites and, conversely, don’t show up in searches they do not belong in as they do on other sites. This means they save you time, money wasted on the wrong clicks and time wasted on the wrong applications. Their occupation, location and job filter technology are individually and synergistically a game-changer in my professional opinion.
Speciallist.com has addressed all of the problems recruiters have encountered. For the first time in this industry, you will be able to buy pay-per-clicks at an excellent price with a monthly contract that fits in your marketing budget.
Speciallist also has implemented what they call “Fair and Transparent Billing”, a policy in the Pay-Per-Click model that has been sorely needed. Transparent means that clicks are tracked, reported and validated by an independent third-party company which has no vested interest in the number of clicks made, and fair means Speciallist is committing to only billing for unique and valid clicks. Paying for malicious clicks, fraudulent clicks, spider/bot clicks and even repeated clicks by a valid candidate just confirming details of a job they already clicked are a thing of the past. For a change, you are actually going to get what you pay for!
Today marks the first time in the history of NCHCR that we wholeheartedly endorse a Job Aggregator- Speciallist.com - and are encouraging all of our members to add this relationship to your marketing efforts.
johnfrey@nchcr.com 304-699-5426
