Writing a great recruitment brief for niche business projects

Think about the start of every successful user research project you have witnessed or been involved in, and surely one of the things that jumps to your mind is the need for a great recruitment brief. This is true for all kinds of research or testing projects, but especially if we are talking about complex or niche sessions like research with business owners, for example.

Our years of experience recruiting all types of participants show us that there is a direct correlation between a quality, well-thought out B2B brief and the success of a project. We understand that it can be hard to create the perfect research brief, but spending time to craft a detailed document is the first step towards a seamless recruitment process.

In order to achieve this, there are a number of different elements that need to be considered. Keep reading to find out more.

🎯  Define and share the nature/aims of the research

• Understanding the wider scope of the project will help during the screening process, especially if you are working with a recruitment partner. This allows an agency like PFR to probe further to obtain information that would be inaccessible otherwise.
• It allows you or your recruitment partner to ‘sell’ the advantages of taking part in research to a busy business owner, for example. If someone can see the benefit to themselves/their business of giving up 60 minutes of their time, they are more likely to take part and will remain engaged throughout the process.
• During the recruitment stage, yourself or your recruitment partner may come across potential participants whose profile may not completely fit the criteria, but can provide great value to your research by sharing useful feedback about a product or service. In this scenario, it's easier to identify their contribution as valuable because there is an understanding of the overall aim of the research.

🔎 Identifying primary vs secondary criteria

• Doing this at the start of the process makes it easier to understand who is suitable from the get-go and the different rules around relaxing criteria.
• Having rules around layers of criteria helps to inform your research and create recruitment plans A, B and even C, depending on the complexity of the requirements.
• If working with a user recruitment agency, make sure you select a partner that, like PFR, works on a consultative approach basis with their clients. By providing your partner with a clear understanding of your primary and secondary criteria, you allow them to better plan the path ahead towards a successful project.

📏 Setting tangible measurements

• Setting tangible criteria helps your team or your user recruitment partner to verify the participants’ suitability. Using works like 'regularly' or 'not often' can be subjective, meaning there is room for error. Removing the guessing elements will help you find your perfect participants.
• This will help to build robust screener questions to filter out those who are unsuitable.
• It’s useful to define and share all the available information upfront, even details you might think are not relevant. Researchers often have a lot of ingrained knowledge that they think isn’t important, but it can really help out whoever is handling your user recruitment. Sharing all available information allows your team or your supplier to create highly efficient recruitment plans and use tailored recruitment methods to improve engagement.

📆 Lead times and testing dates

• Business professionals are usually time-poor, so we urge our clients to keep this in mind when scheduling their research sessions. Being flexible and allowing participants time to schedule a research session into their diary will reduce the risk of drop-outs.
• Offering a range of testing dates rather than one day will open up the pool of participants able to take part in your research by 19%.
• Allowing yourself or your recruitment partner three to four weeks’ lead time will provide enough time to use free find methods, such as LinkedIn, to yield the most suitable responses.