TalentVine Recruiter Guide
Take five minutes to familiarise yourself with this guide to build a winning TalentVine profile
First of all, Welcome to TalentVine!
At TalentVine, we think of all recruitment consultants as our partners as you are providing the service we ‘sell’ to employers. You are an extension of our brand. TalentVine is only as good as the consultants that get selected to work with any of our clients. We often only get one chance to impress employers, and therefore, we are protective of the consultants and the agencies onboard.
We are proud to be one of the few in the HR Tech spaces that are not trying to eliminate recruiters. We just make it easier for employers to identify and work with the best consultants in the market. If our recruiting partners don’t reflect this, then we are failing.
With all of this, communication is a very important part of our partnership and we will be as transparent as possible with you so we ask that you do the same.
Table of Contents
TalentVine in a Nutshell
TalentVine is an online recruitment marketplace that connects employers to the most suitable, specialist recruiters so that they can make the best possible hires. Recruiters receive email notifications about roles in their area of expertise and then place bids for the opportunity to work directly with the client.
Using the Platform
1. Getting Started with TalentVine and Your Profile
Have you registered successfully on TalentVine? Congratulations. You will gain access to your online profile and have the opportunity to take a tour of your portal. We highly recommend you to take the tour of the portal when you first login. This will show you where everything is and how the platform works.
2. Recruiter Dashboard
There are two panels on your TalentVine portal. As an individual, you will have an individual consultant profile where you manage your own work. However, there is also an Administration panel with extra functionality for the admin users of each agency.
3. The Admin Panel
There are two reasons we created the admin panel.
Firstly, the admin panel will collate data from all the consultants assigned to that agency on the dashboard. This means that as the admin user you can monitor your whole agency performance on TalentVine. This includes details from total revenue to individual consultant ratings.
Secondly, we want the person who has placed a bit to be the most relevant recruiter for employers. Previously, we have found the case where one user bid on behalf of their agency because they have existing ratings/metrics, but when selected by the employer, the employer was not working with the same person that placed the bid. This goes against what we are trying to achieve at TalentVine. We want the person bidding on a role to be the person that will end up working on.
To help achieve this, we have added several admin functionalities, these include:
Invite a recruiter to bid on a role
If a consultant is not registered on the platform but they are the preferred bidder, the admin user can send them an invitation to bid, which will allow them to bid on the role.
This can be done by sending the invitation to join the agency through email, within the ‘My Team’ section of the admin panel.
Place a bid on behalf of another recruiter
If the preferred bidder is registered on TalentVine but will not be able to place a bid in the timeframe, the admin user can place a bid on behalf of that consultant, which will show as coming from the preferred bidder with their performance metrics.
“Who should be the agency admin user?”
Who becomes an admin user is completely up to the agency. The only recommendation we would make is that the user is someone that will be active on TalentVine so as not to miss out on roles. Some national agencies nominate one admin user per industry and others will often have one admin user per state, this is up to you.
4. I’ve Submitted My Bid. What Now?
Once you’ve submitted your bid and after the 24hrs is up, the shortlist of bids is sent back to the employer. After this, it is up to the employer to make their selection. Please be aware that the time taken for employers to make selections can vary, so please be patient as we do what we can to follow up with employers to get the selections made in a timely fashion. It’s in our best interest that they make these decisions quickly so if the role is still awaiting their selection then just bear with us. If the employer no longer needs recruiters, we will remove this from your profile.
5. You’ve Been Selected for a Role. What's Next?
Once you’ve finished popping bottles and shouting, ‘role on’ across the office floor, it’s time to get to work.
You would have received an email notification so the next steps are to go onto your profile and confirm selection so we know that you’ve seen it. This is to make sure that the email hasn’t slipped through the cracks and the client doesn’t sit there wondering why you haven’t been in touch with them.
When an employer makes their selection to work with a recruiter, they will nominate a time that they would like to be contacted by you to take a brief.
On your profile you will now have access to the full PD for the role, the clients name and contact details and the time that they have requested for the initial brief. If you’re unavailable for this briefing time then please rearrange this with the client ASAP as this is one of the ratings that the employer will give you.
This is your chance to have a direct brief with the employer and treat them as you would on any role so you’re welcome to visit them or do whatever is needed to get this right.
If you’ve been selected non-exclusively, this initial consultation is NOT an opportunity for you to push employers to work exclusively if not already selected, nor is it a time to upsell any other non-TalentVine related products. If we are made aware of this, you may be removed from the TalentVine platform.
6. TalentVine ATS
At TalentVine, we have built our own Applicant Tracking System on the backend for employers to use to manage their recruitment if they choose. However, please note that not all employer’s will choose to use TalentVine’s ATS. It is your responsibility to ask the employer if they would prefer to receive candidates via:
- The TalentVine ATS
- The client’s ATS
- Direct via email
If you are concerned that not using TalentVine’s ATS will affect your metrics, please read ‘Ratings & Performance Metrics’
7. Invoicing
Close the role off on the platform as soon as you have placed a candidate. This will confirm the details of the placement for us so that we can invoice the client and it will also record your time to hire. The lower this is, the better your profile’s metrics will look.
Please note that although the TalentVine payment terms are 7 days, if you do not close the role off by the candidate start date, these payment terms may be affected.
Permanent Roles
TalentVine will invoice on the candidate’s start date with seven-day payment terms. You will invoice us for 80% of the fee and get paid 7 days after the start date.
Contractor/Temp Roles
For contractor roles, TalentVine will retain 20% of the net margin after all on-costs have been paid.
8. Employer Rating Guide
After working with an employer, they will provide you with a rating out of 10 for quality of service and quality of candidates. To help them make accurate reviews, we provide them with the following scoring guide.
1 – 2
No service at all, no candidates presented
3 – 4
Service was poor, lack of communication, the job was probably outside the consultant’s specialisation. Candidates presented did not meet the brief.
5 – 6
Service was satisfactory, most candidates somewhat met the brief
6 – 7
Good service, communication was good, took a good job brief, understood culture. Candidates met the brief
8 – 9
Excellent service, good communication throughout process, took a good job brief, understood client culture. Provided good candidates
10
Outstanding all round, service, constant communication throughout the process, listened to clients requirements and understood client culture. Provided great candidates that met the brief and culture fit.
9. What We Don’t Allow
Unfortunately, it must be said that there are some behaviors that we don’t allow on the platform and this results in instant dismissal and an 18 month ban for 100% of the consultants from that agency on a national basis. If that consultant moves to a new agency, this ban will be carried across to their new place of work. This has only happened once and from all accounts, it wasn’t a fun conversation for the consultant to explain why they tarnished and stopped the whole agency’s deal flow because of their unethical behaviour. This includes:
- Trying to disintermediate TalentVine – whether when receiving a bid or when not selected to work on a role, if a consultant reaches out to the employer in the attempt of swaying their decision or working directly with them off-platform. Employers get automated emails from TalentVine from time to time letting them know that if this has happened, let us know and we will reimburse 10% of the recruitment fee to them and donate 10% of the fee to White Ribbon Australia. As per our T&C’s, we will then invoice the agency for this 20%. Even though we make no revenue from this transaction, we would rather eliminate these consultants from the platform.
- When being selected non-exclusively and telling the client to work exclusively with you. Whilst we are aware that exclusive works better, this is unfair to the other consultants working on a role
- Not reporting any follow-on roles that you’ve placed with the client for the initial 12 months of introduction through TalentVine (please view TalentVine Terms below)
- Just being a bad player. We have a one-strike rule against taking advantage of TalentVine or our employer’s trust and this generally
10. Terms and Conditions
Depending on the employer, the terms and conditions of recruiting may be TalentVine’s standard terms and conditions or the employer’s custom terms and conditions.
These terms and conditions of the recruiting will be digitally agreed through the platform.
When placing your bid, you can access the terms and conditions and will be asked to tick the “Agree to the Terms & Conditions” for the role.
Related: TalentVine Standard Terms and Conditions
11. What Happens if You Move Agencies?
If you move agencies, you should reach out to our team at info@talentvine.com.au to indicate your new agency.
It is recommended that you don’t sign up as a new recruiter, as we will assign your TalentVine profile to the new agency to maintain your current TalentVine profile.
Your TalentVine rating, external ratings and performance metrics will be maintained through this process.
How to Win More Roles
12. Getting Selected to Work on Roles
When you registered, you selected the states and industries that you specialize in. These are the areas that you will receive email notifications to bid on. This can be updated at any time but as a part of your terms of use, you may only select the areas that you specialize in.
If you’ve been invited to bid on a role, awesome! This means that you have been identified as one of the most relevant recruiters and have been asked to bid for the opportunity to present your top candidates. Some important notes about bidding on a role:
- Bidding on a role is only open for 24hrs. If you miss the deadline, we cannot reopen the role for bidding as the shortlist will have already been sent to employers.
- Once a bid is submitted, it can only be edited once. This restriction is to prevent a race to the bottom but you can choose to bid at a higher rate than you originally proposed.
- You will receive a two-hour reminder before the role closes.
On occasion, you might be sent a role that is not relevant to you as some positions may have crossover into more than one industry. You are not obliged to put a bid on any roles that you’re invited to. So, if you are not confident you can fill the role, please don’t throw your hat in the ring, this could affect your performance metrics in the future.
Our model only works when we have the right consultants working on the right roles for the clients. If someone is bidding and getting selected for roles that are not a part of their domain expertise then everyone from the candidates, clients, recruiting experts and TalentVine loses. So, please don’t be that person.
Top Tip for Getting Selected
Bidding on roles is obviously competitive. However, we are not trying to create a race to the bottom and for the lowest bid to always win. Feedback from employers is that they prefer to work with a highly-rated consultant who has proven that they are a domain expert for that role. (please refer to ‘Ratings & Performance Metrics for more information about ratings).
The average winning fee on TalentVine has been 3% higher than the lowest bid.
There is no denying the fact that lower fees can be attractive but here is what you can do to help win more roles without having to compete on price alone.
13. Customise Your Blurbs
When bidding on a role, it’s easy to copy and paste the last blurb you wrote, but this becomes quite clear to the employer, especially when they are repeat customers. We’ve seen that those consultants that take the time to read the job description, and customise the blurb accordingly, make a good impression and improve their chances of selection.
TIP: Check spelling, grammar & avoid referring to yourself in the third person. Remember this is your opportunity to put forward your value proposition and explain why you’re the most suitable consultant to work on their roles. Outlining your current candidate pool/network within the industry and location of the role will also be enticing to employers.
14. Placement History of Similar Roles
This is a big factor for employers because they want to know if you’ve been working on similar roles recently, and therefore will be able to access the candidates that they need. We understand that due to confidentiality, you can’t always divulge the name of the client and even though we recommend providing these names, you can just state something along the lines of Full-Stack Developer, Sydney eCommerce retailer instead of ‘The Iconic’.
Please note, that if you are caught falsifying similar roles placed, you may be removed from the platform as clients may ask for references if you don’t provide the company name.
All in all, those that win bids are the consultants that put the time and effort into their bids. The time taken to customise for a client that is ready to engage with recruiters, will always take less time than the time taken to research and make a single cold call so this effort pays for itself.
15. Bring on External Ratings
Being a marketplace, we understand that it can be hard to get roles without previous ratings and it’s hard to get ratings without winning roles. So, to help new recruiters get going on TalentVine, you can request ratings from previous employers that you have worked with before joining the platform.
You can head to the ‘External Ratings’ section on the dashboard to send out requests and also view all your ratings from external employers on the same page.
TalentVine Ratings
Employers will rate the recruiters they work with on the following (star rating /10):
1. Customer Service
2. The Quality of candidates provided
Performance Metrics
TalentVine captures and displays to employers the following performance metrics:
1. Percentage of candidates that made it to interview
2. Percentage of candidates that were hired
3. Candidate Retention rate
4. Time to hire
To capture your performance metrics, there are two options. If the TalentVine ATS is used for the hiring process, this will automatically capture the metrics. However, if the client uses their own ATS or they would like to receive candidates via email, then upon placement, you will input your performance which will then be sent to be verified by the employer. This way we can make sure your profile is kept up to date.
Great work! You are ready to win now
Well done on setting up the great profile and familiarising TalentVine mechanism. If you still have questions, you can book a time with our Customer Service team here to get further assistance.
