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Double Your Job Applications By Offering Flexible Or Home-Based Job Opportunities

Double Your Job Applications By Offering Flexible Or Home-Based Job Opportunities

Continuing our series of data-based posts, this month we have examined the difference in the number of candidates who apply for ‘almost’ identical jobs. A single factor is altered in the job advert which is the flexibility to work from home, all or at least some of the time.

We have focussed on our data for Business Development Managers (BDMs), which include telesales roles. This is one area where we have had a consistent number of very similar roles advertised, along with an area that has been particularly strong as the economy begins to recover.

On average, a BDM job advert will receive 36 applications.

Data from 2018 until the end of June 2020 shows that a home-based role will consistently attract more applications than an office-based role, with the percentage difference increasing, starting at 27% more in 2018, rising to 58% in 2019 and is currently at 75% in 2020.

Data Showing The Volume Of Applicants For Office Vs Home-Based Roles

Home/partially home-based 2018 2019 2020
No 24.8 26.8 46.9
Yes 31.5 42.5 81.9
Percentage difference 26.6% 58.1% 74.8%

Breaking 2020 down further, assuming that Q1 was pre-COVID, with Q2 being post-Covid shows the following:

Home/partially home-based Q1 Q2
No 41.5 50.9
Yes 66.0 83.9
Percentage difference 59.0% 64.9%

It is interesting to see the uplift in applications at the beginning of 2020, especially when unemployment was so low across the country. The increase in applications for both “office” and home-based roles during Q2 is not surprising.

A number of our clients instruct us to review CVs/manage the recruitment process. We have noted that the calibre of candidates has increased dramatically during Q2, especially for home-based or flexible roles. We are receiving applications from candidates who have previously run successful businesses or been on the senior management teams of organisations. Despite the BDM roles in question being of a fairly junior nature.

Unique Opportunity

This is a unique opportunity for organisations to recruit successful candidates for a potential fraction of what they may have had to previously paid. This does though of course mean that once life has returned to normal, we may find a lot of job movers. This is then a new challenge for businesses on how to retrain their staff.

When you have longer sales processes, a lower basic salary for the first few months may be tough on staff members, but once commissions start to be paid, they provide a good incentive for staff to stay, especially if comms are uncapped. Good sales staff will always struggle to walk away from a pipeline of future commissions; they have already done the work, so why would they leave?

The data shows that being able to offer staff the opportunity to work from home means you will have a large pool of candidates to choose from. Working from home has suddenly become very mainstream, and is likely to be the norm going forward.

Final Thoughts On Home-Based Jobs

If you have a job that can be partially home-based or at least offers a degree of flexibility, make sure you include this in your job advert. From the data we have, it appears to make a significant difference to the response you will receive.

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