DM firms demand more from new hires
How has the collapse of the dot-com world affected hiring practices? Direct marketing employers–instead of employees–have the upper hand.
For starters, I’m filling dramatically fewer Internet jobs. Last year, finding upper-level executives to take positions at dot-coms was 40% of my business. Now candidates are clamoring to work in the security of traditional direct marketers. I have one-and-a-half times as many resumes coming to me unsolicited as last year. In traditional and online companies, the market has slowed to the extent that one out of every three job searches are put on hold at some point.
The good news is that employers ready to hire can get precisely what they want. Last year, with dot-coms sucking up a lot of the talent, a company would be grateful to get a B player to take a position; this year only an A-plus player will do. In addition, employers are very specific about what they will accept: qualifications, experience, background–everything must be spot on.
For an insurance company client, we’re looking for a senior manager of marketing who can manage people and processes. The job pays about $100,000. During the years of full employment, this company would have considered as a serious candidate anyone with related financial experience, or even a similar job in another sector, because that’s all it could get. In today’s market, the company insists on 10 years of experience–and it must be in-depth experience in the insurance industry. And the firm will get that person.
On the other hand, gainfully employed candidates with solid backgrounds and good credentials are being equally selective in considering their next career change. (Search firms tend to approach executives currently employed in great jobs.) They have to be really wooed because they know the overall environment is tenuous.
Salaries have returned to a realistic range in the wake of the dot-com boom. Hiring managers say to me: “I know 28-to-30 year olds were getting $120,000, plus stock options that were going to make them millionaires, and I will not pay for the decadence of their dot-com experience.” Instead, they are paying based on the value of a candidate’s experience, prior to their dot-com position, with a small increase.
I’ve seen no negative backlash from employers against candidates who had been enamored of the dot-com brass ring. DMers have been there all along–with the desire to hire good people and pay them well. That hasn’t changed.
Some samples? A vice president of marketing for a catalog in the Midwest commands $125,000 to $175,000; a catalog/dot-com CEO in the rural Midwest earns up to $200,000; a director of database marketing in the urban mid-Atlantic makes up to $125,000; and a good salesperson anywhere can get a base of $60,000 to $100,000, with unlimited commission.
DMers value some–but not too much–dot-com experience. Most candidates have spent about six to nine months in an Internet environment. But when a top-level executive has jumped from three to four different online companies, employers say: “I’m not sure his business judgment is that good. How smart will he be in assessing the business processes in my company?” One bad decision at a senior level is okay.
Most DMers see some Internet background as an asset because most of them have an Internet presence. The online jobs considered the best experience are those in the marketing arena (people who know how to draw visitors to a site) and in the business development arena (people who know how to make partnership deals to drive traffic).
Finally, Internet firms want traditional DM experience, too. For a vice president of marketing job for a direct-to-consumer content provider, the person who was hired knew about retention, acquisition and continuity in direct mail–and had 15 continuous months working for another dot-com.
Victoria James ([email protected]) is the founder and president of Victoria James Executive Search Inc., Stamford, CT, which provides national search solutions in the DM and Internet industries.
