Mercury in review: The last 12 months

2020 - the year we all want to forget. But there are also lessons to be learnt. So, we spoke to our CEO Chris Kendrick and CTO Richard Liddington to get their take on the last 12 months and what it means for the recruitment sector. 2020 was a momentous year for Mercury xRM. Intense, but momentous!We got through it. In fact, by the end of the year, we had grown in terms of revenue, staff numbers, and client base.In this piece, we want to unpack that a little bit, as some of the lessons we learnt can help you over the next few months and enable your own business to weather the storm of Covid-19 and grow.Of course, this pandemic has brought agonies for many people, both personally and professionally. So, this piece is not about highlighting our achievements. It’s about offering some advice during tough times - not just in relation to what we did right, but what we could have done better.

A dry pipeline

Let us start back in March last year when the full scale of Covid-19 became known.As the UK locked down, so did our sales pipeline, which ground to an immediate halt – just as it did for everyone in recruitment, as hiring went on hold.It was frightening and we had to quickly adjust, particularly in helping our customers to come out the other sideBut fortunately, this is where our business model paid off – there is no other way of putting it - as all recruitment consultants suddenly needed to work from home and required cloud-based technology to enable remote collaboration. And that is exactly what our platform does.So, after an initial lull, we were able to regroup, develop leads, and successfully onboard customers during a challenging time. Our teams were phenomenal, as they quickly pivoted and adjusted. It worked, and the numbers we were getting on our marketing webinars were way above what was expected. Also, we brought on board major new clients – such as PSD Group, Finite, The SR Group, and Techstream Group – during this time.However, many potential clients were understandably nervous about making a big investment in a new CRM at such an uncertain time. Could they just stick with the systems they had in place? Or go for a more economical option?

How do you turn interest into sales?

This is a key learning point, as the situation was – and is – replicated across the recruitment sector. For example, recruitment agency clients are putting off hires as they are worried about long-term prospects. These clients may also think about dealing with recruitment in-house or finding candidates using a business with lower rates, to save money.

So, what can you do if you are in this situation?

It is no longer enough to simply boast about how good you are. The temptation may be to shout from the rooftops about all your successes, but that will not do a full selling job, especially during tough economic times.You must also concentrate on the benefits of what you do. How is your service going to make life easier and more profitable for your potential client?Our experience during the pandemic is a good example of this. Although the switch to remote working brought a lot of interest, we still had to convert that interest into sales.For us, a discussion with a potential client starts with the advantages of Mercury xRM and how it works within the Microsoft Office suite, linking seamlessly with Teams, Outlook, etc.Also, we point to our LinkedIn integration, which enables recruiters to see LinkedIn data in Mercury and vice versa and joins everything up within your CRM. This creates a digital trail of all LinkedIn candidate interaction, so everyone in your business can see what has gone before – ensuring there is no replication of communications.And when we pitch, we do it in partnership with Microsoft and LinkedIn, which really helps us stand out from the crowd. Potential clients can see clear strategic value and realise how they can build better relationships with customers and candidates by integrating updates and communications directly within Microsoft applications and LinkedIn, thus reducing time spent toggling between multiple tools.In short, we demonstrate that switching to Mercury xRM saves you time and money, and results in greater efficiency across your workforce.So, by showing the tangible benefits of working with us, we were able to bring customers on board as we were proving why it would be a profitable decision.

The journey to automation

We must also touch on something that was growing in importance even before the pandemic, but that Covid-19 has shown us is now vital. And it is something that everyone in the recruitment sector should understand.There is now a real need to introduce artificial intelligence and automation into the recruitment sector. Thanks to reduced revenue streams and a more competitive landscape, most recruiters have reined in spending and cut their cloth accordingly – so are trying to do more with less. This is a challenging task, but possible.Our answer at Mercury has been to introduce AI-driven automation that does your work for you. For example, AI can track changes in your database, or make internal communication easier. Equally, automation can deal with low-skilled admin for you, freeing up time for your staff to deal with more important jobs, like fostering relationships with clients and contacts.What else can automation do for you? It can also improve your data quality, by automatically monitoring LinkedIn profiles and sending out an alert when a contact changes job. This will allow you to quickly follow current and previous clients and work with them in their new company, unearth new opportunities and maintain great relationships.In our opinion, the stark truth is that if you are not bringing in automation then you will get left behind by your competition, so it is a vital investment.

Learn from our experiences

There is plenty we could and should have done differently in 2020. It has been a whirlwind and while some things have landed for us, we have dropped the ball elsewhere.Looking back, we should have done better in capitalising on the competitive edge we had. We failed to make enough people aware of the value of our technology – at a time when so many needed it, which was a missed opportunity.So, although we have grown, we could have grown more given a greater focus on marketing and publicity.The takeaway from that – for all – is that you need to shout about it when you are doing well.

Things can only get better

2020 is over, but the pandemic is not.But, with a vaccine rolling out it seems that relative normality beckons during 2021.Undoubtedly, there are tough times ahead, but if this experience has taught us anything it is that you must keep going. We continued to release products and integrations throughout 2020. It has been a tough journey, but we did not just batten down the hatches and wait for it to end – we kept investing in our product and our people.If you do that – and keep yourself constantly evolving – then we believe that you can grow and prosper in even the most difficult of circumstances. Our final question to Chris and Richard:What does 2021 hold? / where do you see the business? What are you looking forward to the most? “2021 is going to be exciting for many reasons, notwithstanding an upturn in the economy and our social interactions, we have lots of big announcements planned this year. A series of product enhancements and additional products within the wider suite will give our clients further competitive advantages. We have many new clients to deploy, new hires planned, and partnerships to announce.Further technology advancements this year will see additional automation and analytics capabilities, with wider engagement opportunities with portals and sales engagement.Automation doesn’t start and stop in your CRM though, in fact, if you only automate within your CRM, you are missing a major part. Recruiters should be automating between applications, leveraging your tech stack but without the need for your people to keep the process moving all the time.2021 is going to be a game-changer, the recruitment industry will evolve much quicker with technology this year than ever before.” Chris Kendrick – CEO“The last 12 months have seen many businesses worldwide have to evolve their technology at breakneck speeds to survive challenging operating conditions. As a 100% cloud-based business running on the Microsoft stack, Mercury xRM were already well placed to ensure that not only could we place the welfare of our staff at the forefront of our thinking, but crucially continue to support our existing and new customers in the challenges that they faced as well. Further, we were able to grow the business with a +25% growth in people and successfully onboarding new starters remotely. I am incredibly proud to be part of the excellent team at Mercury xRM and particularly excited to see what new innovations we will release in the product during 2021.” Richard Liddington – CTO