How to Become a Freelance Recruiter

If you like connecting with others and helping them to reach their goals, then recruitment could be a great career path for you. Whether you’ve already got some in-house experience or are just starting out, you might be wondering how to become a freelance recruiter so that you can take charge of your career and be your own boss.

Whatever the profession, taking the first steps as a freelancer can be daunting. Not only do you need to brush up on your professional skills, but you also need to have the business know-how in order to market yourself and get clients. If you want to become a freelance recruiter, keep reading this guide for some simple tips.

Research the career and skills that you need

Of course, as with any career, it’s important to know what you’re getting into before you get started. For those who want to become a freelance recruiter and who do not yet have any in-house experience, you should begin by learning more about what the role entails.

Recruiters will need great organisational skills and to be sociable. You’ll have to keep track of a number of different clients and act fast during certain parts of the hiring process. In general, recruiters are required to have at least A-Level qualifications, and many also have a university degree.

You’ll find it much easier to find work if you have some experience working for someone else, as clients will have greater trust in you. It will also give you the confidence and experience to handle the job with ease.

Choose your niche

As with any career, having a particular niche market that differentiates you from other recruiters will help you to be successful. Rather than trying to be a jack of all trades, it’s helpful to pick a particular industry or job type.

For example, if you’ve previously worked in advertising, then why not recruit specifically for advertising agencies? What’s more, freelance recruiter rates can be much higher for specialists.

Find clients

Often the most difficult part of starting out your career as a freelance recruiter is finding clients. While the first stages can be tricky, it’s much easier once you get the ball rolling. You should initially aim to get in touch with companies who are hiring, which you can do in several ways.

Make the most of your personal network by asking friends and family. Take a look at job boards such as Indeed, and get in touch with the businesses that are recruiting in order to propose your services. If you’ve worked in-house before, it’s unlikely you will be able to use these connections due to contracts.

You can also use social media to your advantage. Try to build a good presence on your preferred social network, and use this as a way to get in touch with new clients. It can also build a sense of trust, as a good social media presence conveys professionalism and expertise.

Use GoCardless for payments

For those who haven’t worked freelance before, you might be wondering “how do freelance recruiters get paid?” and “what are freelance recruiter rates?”. You can make the whole payment process easier by using GoCardless to collect funds from your clients.

GoCardless puts you back in control, since it is a pull-based system. This means that rather than having to wait for your clients to make payments, payments will be automatically collected on the expected due date. If this fails, then the Success+ payment intelligence system will attempt to collect again, which recovers on average 70% of failed payments. This dramatically reduces the probability of late payments.

GoCardless is quick and easy to set up, and there are no initial set up fees. In addition, the platform offers integration with major invoicing software like Xero and QuickBooks. This ensures that you’ll have payment visibility every step of the way.  

We can help

GoCardless is a global payments solution that helps you automate payment collection, cutting down on the amount of financial admin your team needs to deal with. Find out how GoCardless can help you with one-off or recurring payments.