Best CRM recruitment software ranked on Trustpilot

In the ever-changing world of recruitment, having the right CRM software is crucial to streamline processes, save time and help place top talent. But with so many options on the market, how do you choose the best CRM recruitment software suiting your needs?

To help you decide, we have compiled a list of the best CRM recruitment software options based on their Trustpilot rankings (as of 12 June 2024).

1. Voyager Infinity by Ikiru People

Trustpilot rating: 4.8 on 799 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

(NB – Voyager Infinity support is provided by Ikiru People – rated 4.8 on 799 reviews).

What we say:

“Voyager Infinity recruitment software supports temporary, permanent and contract agencies, all backed up by the best client service in the industry. Now includes Infinity Copilot, our embedded AI tool to aid your recruiting workflows.

From education to health and social care recruitment, construction to hospitality recruitment, driver to technical & engineering recruitment, and many other sectors, Voyager Infinity recruitment software for perm and temp agencies helps you get your job done more efficiently and grow your revenue faster.

Cloud based SaaS recruitment database and CRM software.
Intuitive, automated recruitment workflow: From CV formatting to automated follow ups, Voyager Infinity does the leg work.
Harness the power of AI: ChatGPT-assisted search queries and candidate profile writing.
Seamless integrations: Outlook, Office 365, Zapier, Job Boards, ISV.Online skills testing and Social Media – Voyager Infinity talks to them all.
Search and import candidates from the web: Search job boards, social media platforms, import selected profiles and CVs.
All-in-one recruitment platform supporting perm, temp and contract recruiters.
Perm recruitment software – perm agencies report that our optional TalentGraph allows them to identify more candidates than other permanent recruitment software.
Temp recruitment software – temp agencies report that our Shift Planner is functionality rarely seen in other temporary recruitment software.
Best rated perm, temp and contract recruitment CRM software on Trustpilot.”

To learn more about Voyager Infinity, request a demo here.

2. eBoss

Trustpilot rating: 4.6 on 20 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“eBoss provides a comprehensive suite of tools tailored to the needs of today’s recruitment market. Its cloud-based recruitment software is designed to streamline and enhance your hiring process with a range of sophisticated features.

Automated CV parsing: Efficiently extract key candidate information from CVs, saving you time and effort.
Customisable Applicant Tracking System: Manage your hiring process with a tailored and user-friendly ATS that adapts to your unique requirements.
Customer Relationship Management: Strengthen and manage your client relationships with our integrated CRM solution.
Semantic Search Engine: Quickly and accurately find the best candidates using our powerful search engine that understands the context and meaning behind search queries.”

3. Access Recruitment CRM

Trustpilot rating: 4.5 on 2,485 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“Access Recruitment CRM is a specialist recruitment CRM for large, complex temp agencies working in highly compliant industries.

Purpose built CRM for large UK-based recruitment agencies with 100+ users.
Book temps faster with the drag and drop scheduler.
Shortlist candidates easily with Intelligent searching and automatic tools.
Bulk import timesheets easily, ready for quick processing.”

4. Vincere

Trustpilot rating: 4.4 on 137 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

(NB – Vincere support is provided by the Access Group, rated 4.5 on 2,005 reviews).

What the vendor says:

“Vincere is a modern recruitment operating system purpose-built for recruitment & staffing agencies worldwide. It offers a single tech platform to streamline the Front, Middle & Back office operations of Executive Search/Permanent/Contract/Temporary businesses.

ATS for candidate resume, applicant tracking and database management.
CRM for client business development and candidate submission.
Market-leading advanced search, activity tracking, email sync and more.
More than just a CRM: Vincere comes pre-integrated with extensible modules to support website applications, video interviews through to placements, invoicing and payroll.”

5. Firefish

Trustpilot rating: 4.4 on 13 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“Firefish revolutionises the way that recruiters approach candidate sourcing by transforming your recruitment CRM into an active candidate network, making it quicker and easier for recruiters to identify qualified candidates.

Empower your recruiters to start inside your CRM when sourcing new roles, reducing time and cost-per-placement.

Search & match: Powerful search and matching tools that make finding candidates quicker and easier, reducing time to fill and job board spend.
Database automation: Time-saving features to help recruiters manage their database with ease and spend more time making placements.
Communications: Engagement tools that enhance candidate and contact communications and create an information rich database.
Make more placements from your existing database: within six months of using Firefish, you’ll see candidate engagement levels increase by 200% and your recruiters converting 25% more placements.”

6. Zoho Recruit

Trustpilot rating: 4.3 on 4,780 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“Zoho Recruit offers a powerful ATS and CRM in a single recruitment platform. With scalability, customization, and remote hiring tools, Zoho Recruit has everything your staffing agency or internal HR team needs to match the right candidate to the right role.

Build your database: Reduce time-to-fill by organizing information from direct applicants, partner referrals, and passive candidates into one database.
Engage passive candidates: Nurture prospective candidates with a custom-made portal where they can input their employment information, review offer details, and ask you follow-up questions.
Match with AI: Instantly compare candidate skillsets against client openings with advanced search, semantic matching, and source boosters.
Optimize your placements: View comprehensive sourcing summaries for each hiring channel, analyze key recruitment KPIs, and make better placement decisions.”

7. Manatal

Trustpilot rating: 3.9 on 53 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“Manatal leverages the latest technologies at every stage of the recruitment cycle to allow recruiters to source more candidates, speed up screening, simplify team collaboration, and hire top talents.

Candidate sourcing: Source candidates from 2500+ job boards integrations, a branded career page, a LinkedIn extension, referral program, and more.
Applicant tracking: Fast-track recruitment operations with a features-rich and highly customizable applicant tracking system.
Recruitment CRM: For dedicated agencies and headhunters to keep track of commercial activity, clients, placements, and revenue.
Candidate enrichment: Go beyond resume parsing and build comprehensive candidate profiles with data from their LinkedIn and 20+ social platforms.”

8. BrightMove

Trustpilot rating: 3.8 on 2 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“BrightMove is the perfect software for staffing agencies of all types and sizes. Whether you are an executive and retained search firm, permanent placement agency, or responsible for contingent staffing, BrightMove will meet your needs and exceed your expectations.

It is cost-effective employment agency software that is streamlined for your business. It can be customized to fit your recruitment process, so you can find the right candidate the first time. No workarounds required.

Candidate screening: BrightMove gives you the ability to quickly and easily screen candidates. Let our recruitment software free you up to do what you’re best at – engage with the candidates.
Completely customisable: Your company’s recruiting process is what differentiates you from the pack. BrightMove can implement your proprietary workflow. No workarounds required.
Reporting and analytics: A comprehensive report library and ad-hoc reporting capabilities gives you deep and real-time insight into the finances of your business.
Automated workflows: Automate and streamline your recruiting process using triggers and templates and eliminate these tasks from the daily routine of your recruiters.”

9. Recruiterflow

Trustpilot rating: 3.7 on 1 review (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“Recruiterflow is purpose built for recruitment agencies. Get a complete suite of recruitment tools so your team knows when they need to dig a little deeper or automate tasks quickly.

Applicant Tracking System: Track candidates, manage jobs. Never miss a single beat.
Customer Relationship Management: Manage clients, track deals. CRM built for recruiting and staffing businesses.
Recruiting automation: Explore what cutting edge recruiting automation can do for you.
Analytics: Measure KPIs, coach your team and make accurate forecasts.”

10. PCRecruiter

Trustpilot rating: 3.7 on 1 review (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“PCRecruiter streamlines your day-to-day management of people, jobs, and organizations, so you can make the right hire. Every time.

Automated tracking: Automate everyday organization and notification tasks, so you can spend more time making connections with candidates and clients.
Flexible configuration: PCRecruiter is built around the organizational record, not the roles or the candidates, so it’s easily adapted to suit your particular recruitment chain.
Secure data management: Powerful configurable security options allow individualized access while giving you the ability to manage and delegate access to your data, with storage on a secure and private hosting system.
PCRecruiter serves thousands of customers worldwide doing permanent placement, third-party recruitment, corporate direct hiring, and staffing/contracting.”

11. Bullhorn

Trustpilot rating: 3.4 on 35 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“Bullhorn’s Applicant Tracking and CRM system enables recruitment agencies to increase sales, streamline operations, and differentiate themselves from the competition.

Make faster placements and increase margins: Maximise recruiter performance with clear workflows and easily accessible information. With an intuitive system in place, recruiters can stay organised and increase the number of open jobs they place.
Increase retention and redeployment with top-tier experiences: Bullhorn brings all candidate information in one place, enabling recruiters to connect with a candidate at a moment’s notice, or repeatedly over time, to increase engagement and retention.
Make better business decisions: Manage your business with key metric reporting. Leaders can coach their staff with activity tracking and execs can use custom reports to decide when and where to scale and expand.
Customer Relationship Management: Close the loop between sales and recruitment and gain visibility into your clients’ changing business needs with a mobile CRM purpose-built for recruitment.”

12. Crelate

Trustpilot rating: 3.2 on 2 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“Crelate helps you make more placements with an all-in-one modern staffing & recruiting agency platform.

Purpose-built for the modern recruiting and staffing agency, Crelate’s recruitment and staffing software makes managing your entire workflow fast and easy.

Flexible by default: You already know what type of workflow works best for your business. Crelate is fully customizable to your preferences, methods, tools, and systems.
Deep reporting & analytics: Crelate is packed with integrated and flexible reporting tools to cover every part of your sales, recruitment, and delivery process.
Powerful and fast: From call-notes to CV, accelerate your recruiting and staffing processes with robust search tools across every candidate and client interaction you’ve ever had.
The right fit for you: Designed to scale with your business every step of the way, Crelate is built for organizations of any size and every model.”

13. JobDiva

Trustpilot rating: 3.2 on 2 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“JobDiva’s natively developed core technologies allow recruiting teams to laser-focus and streamline their productivity in a single platform, collaborating at every stage and making more hires at scale.

Applicant Tracking System: Automation enhances sourcing and hiring while minimizing costly administrative loads.
Customer Relationship Management: Featuring an extensive range of automated and visually-enhanced tools, it seamlessly integrates with JobDiva’s ATS, empowering recruiters, account managers, and other critical stakeholders with an all-encompassing, unified platform.
Onboarding: JobDiva’s dynamic middle-office software accelerates the hiring cycle, automating document selection and simplifying the candidate experience.
Reports & analytics: JobDiva is loaded with staffing-centric reports and dashboards. Surface insights and performance patterns while also enabling deep dives into the behavior of teams, clients, service groups and more.”

14. Recruit CRM

Trustpilot score: 3.0 on 2 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“Recruit CRM helps recruiters do everything from sourcing candidates on LinkedIn, sending emails, setting up interviews, reminders, collecting updated CVs & even feedback from clients.

Applicant Tracking System: Change the game by never having to do data entry again while adding or updating candidates.
Customer Relationship Management: Manage clients, candidates, opportunities, and follow-ups like never before.
Automation: Automate repetitive tasks and reduce your workload significantly.
Analytics: Measure every aspect of your business to make informed decisions using high-level analytical reports.”

15. JobAdder

Trustpilot score: 3.4 on 14 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“JobAdder is simplifying recruitment for recruitment agencies, staffing firms and HR and talent acquisition teams who want everything in one place without the complexity.

Applicant Tracking System: Track jobs applications and get a complete view of your candidate pipeline.
Customer Relationship Management: Grow your database through business development and account management.
Placement management: Place candidates with the right skills in the right job for the right cost.
Recruitment operations: Discover what’s working and what could be improved in your hiring process.”

16. iSmartRecruit

Trustpilot score: 2.4 on 25 reviews (as of 12 June 2024).

What the vendor says:

“iSmartRecruit is a highly rated and trusted ATS that is designed to simplify and automate the manual recruitment. This way, it reduces the burden for recruiters and hiring managers.
It is an advanced recruitment software that facilitates a streamlined hiring process and enhances the positive recruitment experience for both recruiters and candidates.

It improves the efficiency of your end-to-end recruitment process and elevates the quality of hires.

Applicant Tracking System: Monitor and track all candidates’ progress during your hiring process in the talent pipeline.
Recruiting CRM: Communicate effectively, engage, and build strong relationships with all the potential candidates.
Executive Search Software: Simplify and manage your end-to-end executive recruitment workflow and hire the best C-level talent, directors, and VPS.
Resume Management System: Automatically import and parse thousands of resumes faster. Detect key information and generate candidate profiles in the database. Manage your resume management workflow smoothly with iSmartRecruit!”

CRM recruitment software products with no presence on Trustpilot include:

Eploy

What the vendor says:

“With Eploy’s advanced applicant tracking system, applicant management, interview scheduling, and communication with your hiring team can all be done through a single, centralised hub. Say goodbye to manual CV screening and hello to a more efficient and effective hiring process.

Job requisitions: Get your recruitment campaigns off to a flying start. With Eploy you can ensure your ‘request to recruit’ process is followed, every time. Raise jobs, gain approval and start recruiting.
Talent pooling: Talent Pools become second nature and easy to nurture with Eploy’s recruitment CRM for passive as well as active candidates. Start recruiting pro-actively. Eploy’s Talent CRM gives you all the tools you need to organise, target and proactively connect with top talent.
Candidate attraction: Deliver a stellar candidate experience that attracts and engages the right talent at the right time, on any device. Eploy leads the way with seamless career site integration and candidate self-service. Think of first-class customer experience…for your candidates.
Candidate engagement: Attracting top talent is not enough- to become successful hires, they need to buy in to your company culture. Convince and convert candidates with Eploy’s recruitment CRM tools for candidate engagement. Your career site becomes the central hub for recruiting with Eploy’s stellar Candidate Portal.”

Itris

What the vendor says:

“This easy-to-use CRM for recruitment agencies offers a holistic view of your recruiting efforts, allowing you to manage your recruiting team and hiring pipeline with ease. Say goodbye to manual data entry and hello to a management tool that eliminates repetitive tasks, giving you more time to focus on finding quality candidates.

Report: Want easy to understand recruitment data? Users can easily interpret complex sets of data, analyse KPIs, and track key metrics within one customizable and easy-to-use dashboard.
Collaborate: Bring your entire team onto one screen, regardless of location, to collaborate, engage and instil a sense of community within your recruitment business.
Automate: Recruiters can easily drag and drop candidates through every stage of the recruiting process, from applications and shortlists to sending CVs, interviews, offers, and placements.
Organise: Designed to help recruiters and staffing professionals stay organised and productive from within the application.”

Eclipse Software

What the vendor says:

“Eclipse recruitment software is designed to deliver a fully configurable integrated client and candidate CRM which provides a completely end-to-end, recruiting software solution. Say goodbye to disparate systems and hello to a centralised recruiting solution that maximises productivity and minimises operational complexities.

Fully featured CRM system that covers the entire recruitment process, including an applicant tracking system, candidate screening, vacancy and temp management right through to pay and bill.
Candidate mobile app and web integration services work seamlessly with the software creating a cohesive and efficient candidate experience.
Integrations with other leading back-office and recruiting software solutions provide total support to your broader IT ecosystem strategy.
Eclipse Software helps and supports every size of business from start-up recruitment agencies to multi-national enterprise staffing agencies to support their business growth.”

Tracker

What the vendor says:

“Tracker helps recruitment and staffing firms build better relationships, workflows, and ROI with its integrated Recruitment CRM and ATS platform.

Recruitment & Applicant Tracking: Tracker’s fully integrated Applicant Tracking System (ATS) enables your recruiters to source candidates, nurture and match applicants, and make more placements.
Sales & CRM: Tracker helps you build better client relationships, generate and qualify better leads, and manage your entire sales pipeline in a visual and intuitive interface.
Automation: Rocket boost activity with Automations directly in Tracker for boosting activity, enhancing productivity, and cutting out busy work.
Marketing: Amplify your marketing efforts for recruitment and sales with branded email and text campaigns built directly into Tracker.”

Buying the best recruitment CRM for agencies (UK)

The answer to the question “what is the best recruitment software for agencies in the UK?” is simple: There isn’t one.

We work with hundreds of staffing agencies in the UK and Australia and know that each agency is different.

The CRM, database and software needs of an agency placing quality candidates on a permanent basis in professional positions will be different to the recruiting needs of a temps agency placing workers on short terms shifts, to a retained executive search firm placing CEOs – and all very different to a talent acquisition team within large enterprises seeking to hire graduates via employee referrals and a career site.

The leading staffing software will help with everything from candidate skills tests through to marketing and placement. It is useful for every type of agency whether they are placing skilled candidates in construction, teaching, healthcare or engineering.

Needs vary by country.

A functional specification for an agency in the UK may include GDPR or IR35, while agencies seeking to buy recruitment agency software in Australia may care far less on these points.

While there may be a long list of specialist vendors to choose from, none can genuinely claim to offer the “best software for recruitment agencies.“

Recruitment agencies are different. Recruitment software is too.

As a result, rather than give you a simplistic answer designed to get you to purchase our software, I thought I’d lay out some of the key criteria to factor into your decision making, based on what I’ve seen working with our staffing firm clients.

Of course, nothing is better than hearing from an expert, and you’ll find various comments from our recruiter clients below – or many more real recruitment software reviews on our Trustpilot page, or ask for a live demonstration with our team!

From recruitment database to recruitment CRM to…

The phrase “recruitment software UK” covers a wide variety of audiences and functionality. Traditionally, the primary use case for these systems was to be a database.

Software buyers would want to store data on applicants and clients, and so suppliers developed a recruitment database. Today, that still remains the case in some niches. In other spaces – executive search, for example – tools such as LinkedIn mean that the need to store biographical information is reduced.

Moving on from the recruitment database, the next major development was the recruitment CRM. Essentially, this took platforms beyond storage of people data, and into a world of candidate relationship management.

Recruiters wanted more time to concentrate on the actual art of recruiting and relationship building. This opened the opportunity for platforms that focused on delivering streamlined services.

“The detailed candidate page ensures that we contact them about roles which really match their requirements,” says Katie Bevan, Managing Director of People First, “We can access all communication history easily so that even when their dedicated consultant is away, the rest of the team can understand their background and aspirations. We can set up templates on the system, so they receive helpful interview tips, and vital company information easily. Most importantly, it allows us the time to understand them so that we can offer tailored career advice and support.”

Recruitment software for temporary and permanent agencies will include aspects of the recruitment database and recruitment CRM. However, other areas of functionality will be vital in certain niches, and meaningless in others.

For example, in retained executive search, online research and candidate sourcing capability is a key. This would not be valuable to an agency specialising in the placement of temporary staff. On the other hand, the temping agency would look for pay and bill functionality, and timesheet management.

What do recruitment agencies placing permanent staff look for in software?

The key challenges faced by perm agencies revolve around front office. You’ll need to identify candidates, identify clients and bring the two together. A recruitment CRM designed to do this will include these essential recruiting tools:

Integrated job boards
Automatic CV parsing and formatting
Automated emails and messages for candidate development and recruitment marketing
Access to skills tests
Social media connectivity (particularly LinkedIn!)
Cloud-based for ease of management

What about agencies placing temporary staff on shift-based contracts?

Recruiters involved in the placing of temporary talent face a whole host of different challenges. The major challenges comprise candidate management and applicant dishonesty.

Temporary recruitment agencies are constantly dealing with issues arising from lack of applicant visibility which makes it extremely challenging to find and place the right candidates. Speed is of the essence when placing temporary candidates.

If your business engages temporary workforce, you will need to pick a software that has these key functionalities:

Simple booking and sheet planners
Easy candidate communication
Skills tests
Track time and attendance
Integrated online timesheet entry, authorisation and approval
Automated compliance checks
Produce self-bill invoices

Amber Employment Services, one of the many agencies we work with, places many temporary workers for their clients. Skills testing has a huge impact on the temps industry. Rebecca Bannerman, Director of the Surrey-based staffing firm, shares how Voyager Infinity has improved candidate experience:

“The candidate’s experience is significantly improved. In today’s market, candidates are looking for brief, informative and engaging hiring experience. It’s simple, it’s stress-free. Candidates can email their assessments with an easy to follow link, and results are automatically filtered through to our database for review. Candidates can complete the tests in the comfort of their own home at any time. We find that it’s a huge benefit as applicants are far more at ease, and clients get a true picture of their capabilities in a virtual office setting.”

What is the best software for recruitment agencies placing candidates on contracts?

Firms specialising in placing contractors understand the value of speed and efficiency. These are vital when you have to find top talent with some specific requirements within a short time frame. And despite IR35 legislation being pushed to April 2021, the responsibility of engaging IR35 compliant contractors still falls to the agencies supplying the services of these workers to the clients.

Contract recruitment firms need these key features in their software:

Online timesheets
Candidate availability planner
Skills testing
Raise sales invoices for contractors
Comprehensive compliance and right to work checks and management systems

Here’s Clayton Dempster of contracting agency BRS Jobs on the impact of Voyager Infinity on his business: “It took me 5 years with my first agency to get to the point where we’re at now with BRS in only 18 months. We have a great team environment, great partners and we’re ready and primed for the fight for the best perm, contract and temp talent.”

What is the best recruitment CRM for retained executive search firms?

Retained search firms operate very differently to contingent search firms. The recruiting process can take up to 90 days. It is project-based and research-intensive. Functionality for this type of recruiting will include:

A database structure that treats “People as People” and doesn’t artificially differentiate between “Candidates” and “Clients”.
The ability to quickly source candidates from sites such as LinkedIn and GatedTalent.
Extensive reporting capability, including both traditional printable / emailed reports, and online client portals.
The ability to track relevant KPIs including “days to shortlist” and key candidate and sourcing ratios.

Retained executive search is so different to other types of recruiting, that we actually encourage potential clients not to buy from us – we have sister products – FileFinder executive search software and Talentis executive search software – which are dedicated to delivering the best software for retained executive search.

Recruitment software can support skills testing

I’ve talked about some of the key requirements that you might need to consider when selecting the best CRM solution for your agency. I’ve tried to go into detail based on the different business models used by agencies – but even this is over-simplistic.

For a lot of niche recruiters, a major driver is being able to put forward skilled candidates who are proven to be a good fit for the specific role. In this context, lots of recruiters will look for a recruiting CRM that integrates with skills testing software that allows them to validate the ability of the quality candidates that they propose.

With regard to the current pandemic, recruiters are seeing significant increases in speculative candidate applications, and these can be a big drain on resources.

Voyager Infinity is one of very few recruitment CRM platforms that offer integration with candidate assessment software – ISV.Online is a market-leading product used by the majority of the top recruiting firms in the UK.

Agencies don’t need an ATS!

This article is about the software that recruitment agencies use. As in, companies which exist to recruit top talent on behalf of hiring managers at the clients’ end.

These recruitment companies have entirely different needs to that of a Fortune 500 company looking to buy a system for managing job seekers – so-called “active candidates” – and, as a result, an entirely different type of recruiting platform – the Applicant Tracking System (ATS).

While there are some similarities – support for job postings, for example – recruiting tools designed for the employment agency will require some things that the end client will not – business development, is a good example. On the other hand, the reverse is also true. Lots of ATS systems have talent management functionality bolted on.

And it’s not just one product!

However powerful your CRM, it will not be able to do everything your business needs. You’ll need to send emails. You’ll need to report. You might need to post jobs. That’s why another important consideration is third party integrations.

And if you are early in the development of your staffing agency?

If you are starting an agency, you are building it to succeed, not fail. Implementing the right recruitment platform early on can increase the chances of your achieving that.

What about the technology – Cloud or on-premise?

Essentially staffing software is delivered in one of two ways – either through the Cloud or “On-Premise”. Cloud-based solutions essentially see all of your data stored (backed up, etc) by your software supplier (or their partner). On-Premise solutions are those that are hosted by your firm, on a server in the corner of your office (or run on your local machine if you are a sole trader).

The vast majority of modern CRM software is cloud-based and sold on the SaaS model. SaaS which stands for “Software as a Service” is a combination of a technology model (hosting your candidate and client data in the cloud) and a commercial model (rather than buying the software, you rent it. Your upfront cost is typically much lower with SaaS solutions, but you will pay for it in perpetuity).

Some of the more flexible systems (including ours!) offer the option of either Cloud or On-Premise solution. So you should determine what works best for you and then find a solution that delivers on your needs.

And the cost?

The main CRM technology vendors have invested millions in developing staffing solutions. Very few offer it for free – or, rather, few offer it for free for long, and even fewer live to tell the tale! For a mainstream recruitment CRM software product in the UK, you can expect to pay a cost in the region of £50-100 per user, per month for a SaaS-based solution. If you are looking for on-premise your licence price is likely to be between £700 – £1,000 per user. Some vendors offer hybrid pricing models designed to offer the benefit of cloud with a lower ongoing cost – albeit with a larger upfront investment.

So, which is the best recruitment software supplier in the UK?

However, there is one thing that UK agencies of all sizes should seriously consider when selecting a new CRM software. Support. We recently conducted a survey where 50% of our responders stated that a supplier’s quality of support plays an important role in their decision making.

Your new database is a business-critical application. You are dependent on it. If it’s not available, or your users are not able to operate it, you have a major problem. It doesn’t matter how powerful the functionality if you can’t log in.

The same survey results pointed out that more than 50% believe that the supplier reputation is just as important as the product in making a new vendor. This is why I’d recommend that you look beyond the software and look at the supplier.

“It was important to have a supplier who was recognised in the industry, had a good reputation, provided continual training and support,” says Lorraine Ragosa-Rout, Managing Director of F4P Recruitment, who has been using Infinity for more than a decade now.

Voyager Software is delivered by Ikiru People. We are part of a global public company, supporting staffing agencies in more than 60 countries. We work hard to deliver the best support and – unlike virtually any other mainstream supplier – we ask our clients to validate our efforts through Trustpilot.

At the time of writing, we have an overall “Excellent” score of 4.8 out of 5 stars from 224 independent reviews.

I’d suggest that – while there may be no single “best recruitment agency software” there is a strong argument to say that there is a “best UK recruitment software supplier” and that we are it!

And which is the best recruitment software for your agency?

If you’ve made it this far, I think it’s reasonable for me to assume that you are in the market for a new recruiting agency CRM. So, what is best practice for making a buying decision?

Firstly, choose a shortlist of vendors. Obviously, you’ll want to include us in that list (!). But hopefully, you’ll find others based on some of the advice we’ve provided above.

Ask for a presentation. All of the mainstream suppliers will do a live demonstration, and it’s a great opportunity to ask questions.

Don’t limit your questions to product functionality. The software needs of your agency will change over time, and so will the functionality of your chosen product. However, you need to maintain a close working relationship with your chosen vendor – probably for a decade.

Each company has distinct needs. The quest for the best staffing software is contingent on their business model, company culture and vision.

For People First, the priority was to embrace technology in order to compete effectively in this competitive industry. MD Katie Bevan further says, “We wanted our consultants to achieve their full potential and not be held back by time-consuming data input. Additionally, in an industry where regulatory compliance is increasingly important, technology was one way to ensure that we were adhering to our legal requirements and best practices without increasing our employees’ workload.”

How do you overcome challenges when you onboard a new recruitment agency software?

This is where the importance of support and training come into play. Not everyone will adapt easily to new technology. Some might find their CRM software to be too complex or with long-winded steps which can make the transition challenging.

Choose a supplier who has a consistent record of providing excellent support and training. Even if the onboarding is complete, don’t hesitate to reach out to your service provider if you continue to struggle.

Kristi Vaisto of Vaisto Recruitment has been using Infinity for some months now and says, “Some of the functionality was different from what we were used to. But any queries we had were answered quickly and promptly by support staff.”

Questions to ask your shortlisted recruitment software suppliers

Look beyond the demo – here are some good questions to ask about the ability of a supplier to support you:

I’m in the UK (or Australia, or wherever!). When I call for support, who will answer the phone? Can I get a full support service in my time zone? Keep in mind the choice of best staffing software UK firms might reach is likely to be different from decisions taken by Australian recruitment agencies. It’s imperative to get strong support from your supplier.
Where will my data be hosted? If you are in the UK, that’s where you should expect your data to be. If you are in Australia, expect your data to be in Australia. The further away your data is, the longer it will take to reach you. As an aside, if you are in Europe, be very careful about selecting a supplier who is not. GDPR compliance might not be a priority for that part of the world, but it applies strictly in Europe!
Speaking of which – your software system plays a key part in achieving legal compliance. How much does the vendor know about the law as it pertains to what you do? Ask about GDPR. Ask about IR35 (if relevant to your business). If the salesperson can’t answer your question, it’s very unlikely that the support representative will be able to!
How many staff do you have? Where are they based? Since when have you been trading? Can you convince me that you will be here for the long term?
Ask for references. Remember any references you are offered are likely to be targeted. For more “genuine” or independent recruitment agency software reviews, consider Trustpilot.

To summarise the points in this article, here’s an easy guide to facilitate your recruitment software buying journey.

I hope you’ve found this article constructive. This should help you determine which of the myriad options is the best recruitment software for agencies in general – and your agency in particular.