First of all, a disclaimer. I'm a Recruiter, I have been for the majority of my working life, and no doubt will be for the rest of it. I'll be very honest with you. Recruiter emails even annoy me, and I write them. Hopefully though, I'm going to explain why we do what we do, not to defend it, but to give you some insight and maybe try to change your perception. 

What I'm referring to is the infamous recruiter email: 

"I've seen your profile today, it looks excellent for a role I'm recruiting for, and I'm only contacting you about it, you've been referred to me, you look amazing, this role is phenomenal..." Blah blah blah, we've all had them. 

This would be fine but: 

• No company name. 
• No job description.
• Nothing prevalent, other than a key word match that matches you to the job. 

Not very interesting is it? Why can't we just put the company name in? It's not like you're going to approach the company directly? Well, I hope I can explain to you why. 

The market at the moment is highly 'candidate driven'. You get jobs offered to you every day. You hear from countless recruiters, to the point where it's not worth even replying. We get that. We understand. 

BUT: 

The recruitment market is saturated, there's no end of people looking for 'a phone number and a time to speak.' So when we send you a company name, you naturally take a look at the website we're referring to, and within 15 seconds, you already know if you're interested or not. It’s usually ’not’ because you’re busy, and we don’t really know what you’re looking for.

So here's why we do what we do... 

When we contact you we really do have a job in mind for you. BUT. It's one of 100 that we're working at any one time. So the best option that we have as a recruiter is to send you a relatively vague email, in hope that it sparks enough interest for you to send a phone number. Once we get that, we can speak in more detail and find out about YOU. 

And we both know we can't do that just by email; it's not quite the personal approach that would work for you.

We don't get to hear your voice, sense of humour, and how you present yourself. We don’t get to find out the information our Clients pay us to find out. We can’t do our jobs. 

However, when we speak, the entire time we're talking we're eliminating unsuitable jobs from our portfolio that you wouldn't like, or wouldn't be suitable for. By the end of the phone conversation, we can present 3 or 4 options, and can decide together which ones are most appealing, based on YOU. We get a genuine idea what you're interested in, and we move forward, or not. 

A lot better than 15 seconds on a client website to decide you're not interested. 

So we know it's annoying how many emails you get, we know you don't like giving your phone number to an irritating recruiter full of emotive words and hyperbole, but if you've take then time to read this far, please just keep an open mind on the next one. Maybe we do have something to offer. Maybe you should hear us out. Maybe there is a great job at the end that you're instantly turning down. So maybe next time, hopefully, you might just give us the opportunity to speak with you. 

We’re not all that bad.