How to sell to Founders at Recruiting companies
Founders in recruiting companies are primarily measured on the speed of talent acquisition. They respond to outreach when it demonstrates a clear understanding of their current hiring bottlenecks, such as long time-to-fill metrics or high candidate drop-off rates during the interview process. Addressing these issues directly can prompt them to engage with a stranger.
Written and maintained by the SoloRiff team, who build outbound software and run outbound with it. The figures below are our own: we measured 562 recruiting company domains over public DNS on 2026-09-03. Last updated 2026-09-03.
What actually hurts
- long time-to-fill metrics
- high candidate drop-off rates
- difficulty sourcing diverse candidates
- inefficient interview processes
The playbook
- 01
Identify recent funding rounds
Filter for recruiting companies that have recently secured funding, as they are likely to be expanding their teams. Use databases like Crunchbase or PitchBook to find these companies and note their funding amounts and investors. This indicates they may have immediate hiring needs.
- 02
Highlight specific hiring challenges
Craft your outreach to emphasize common challenges in recruiting, such as difficulty in sourcing diverse candidates or managing candidate experience. Reference industry trends that align with their challenges to show you understand their specific situation and can provide value.
- 03
Mention recent industry changes
In your outreach, reference recent regulatory changes or market shifts affecting the recruiting industry. For example, if there are new labor laws impacting hiring practices, mention how your insights can help them navigate these changes effectively.
- 04
Follow up on engagement metrics
After your initial outreach, track if they opened your email or engaged with your content on LinkedIn. If they did, send a follow-up email referencing their engagement and ask if they would be open to a brief call to discuss their current hiring strategies.
- 05
Propose a specific meeting time
In your follow-up, suggest a specific time for a call, such as 'Would you be available Tuesday at 2 PM?' This reduces the back-and-forth and increases the chances of securing a meeting. Be sure to mention how the conversation could directly address their pressing hiring needs.
Can recruiting companies even receive your mail?
We measured the DNS of 562 recruiting companies, sampled evenly across company sizes, to see how many authenticate their own email. It matters in both directions: a domain that does not authenticate is a domain whose team is used to mail going missing — and if your own domain is in the gap, yours is the mail going missing.
Publishes a DMARC policy of quarantine or reject — the domain actually asks receivers to act on failures.
The gap is the finding: 20.2% of 1–10-person companies against 75% of the largest — 55 points apart. Small companies are where the unauthenticated domains are, and small companies are who most cold outreach is aimed at.
Where does your domain sit?
Same three lookups, run live against your domain. Nothing is stored and nothing is emailed to you.
How this was measured
Company domains were sampled within employee-count bands, then queried over public DNS for SPF (TXT at the apex), DMARC (TXT at _dmarc.) and MX. One domain per company, deduplicated. Anyone can reproduce any single row of this with dig.
DKIM is deliberately absent. A DKIM key lives under a selector that cannot be enumerated from outside the domain, so a company with flawless DKIM under a name we did not guess would be counted as having none. That would measure our guess list, not the industry.
Domains with no MX record are excluded rather than counted as failures — parked and redirect-only domains would otherwise drag every figure down and make the result an artefact of the sample.
Sampled within bands, so this describes the population of companies, not of employees: a 10-person company counts once, as does a 10,000-person one. Each band is at least 60 domains; bands below that are not published. Figures are percentages of the sample, not of the whole industry, and we publish no company names — only counts.
Measured 2026-09-03. Re-measured monthly.
The full census across every industry — sortable, with sample sizes, free to reuse under CC BY 4.0.
Subject lines that fit
- Improving your hiring speed
- Navigating recent recruiting changes
- Tackling candidate drop-off
Questions
- Why do founders at recruiting firms ignore cold outreach?
- Founders often receive numerous outreach messages daily, making it difficult to prioritize them. If the outreach does not immediately address their pressing hiring challenges or provide a unique insight, it may be overlooked. Tailoring messages to highlight specific pain points is crucial for capturing their attention.
- What hiring metrics are founders most concerned about?
- Founders typically focus on metrics such as time-to-fill, candidate quality, and retention rates. They want to ensure that their hiring processes are efficient and that they are bringing in talent that aligns with their company's culture and goals. Addressing these metrics in your outreach can engage their interest.
- How can I build trust with a founder in recruiting?
- Building trust with a founder involves demonstrating a deep understanding of their industry and challenges. Sharing relevant case studies or insights about hiring trends can position you as a knowledgeable partner. Additionally, being transparent about your intentions and respecting their time can foster trust.
- What common objections do founders have regarding hiring solutions?
- Founders may object to hiring solutions due to concerns about cost, effectiveness, or the time required for implementation. They often worry about whether a solution will truly address their specific challenges. Providing clear, tailored examples of how your approach has worked for similar companies can help alleviate these objections.
Or have it run itself
SoloRiff does every step above on its own — finds the companies, finds the people, writes each of them individually, and handles the replies. Drop your URL and watch it work before you sign up for anything.
Try it on your site