From the illustrious Shaker Green Room at RecFest USA—where coffee flows freely and buzzwords hang heavier than the Wi-Fi signal—Joe Shaker, President of Shaker Recruitment Marketing, dished out insights on his company’s magic touch in industry partnerships and advisory.
Joe didn’t hold back: the secret sauce to retaining talent? He also acknowledged the current economic uncertainty (a polite euphemism for "wild rollercoaster") but reminded us that the talent war rages on—because apparently, companies just can’t quit hiring.
Ever the optimist, Joe peered into his crystal ball and predicted that 2025 will be all about amped-up employment branding and retention strategies and of course, Joe couldn’t resist sprinkling in some tech prophecy, hinting at impending MarTech disruptions. These innovations, he claimed, will simultaneously woo candidates and streamline recruiter workloads—though probably not before we all survive another round of software updates and system crashes. Classic Joe, leaving us inspired and maybe just a little skeptical.
PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION
Podcast Intro: Hide your kids, lock the doors. You're listening to HR's most dangerous podcast. Chad Sowash and Joel Cheesman are here to punch the recruiting industry right where it hurts. Complete with breaking news, brash opinion and loads of snark. Buckle up, boys and girls. It's time for the Chad and Cheese Podcast.
[music]
Joel: Thanks for hanging out. Who are you and why are you here today?
Joe Shaker: Thanks for coming. Joe Shaker, President of Shaker Recruitment Marketing.
Joel: And why are you here?
Joe Shaker: I'm told to be here.
Joel: Okay.
Joe Shaker: I'm running a calendar.
Joel: This is like a good...
Joe Shaker: I'm still trying to figure out...
Chad: When Gina says something, Joe shows up.
Joe Shaker: When I show up. I'm trying to figure out how you guys got here.
Joel: So, let's get to...
Chad: No clue.
Joe Shaker: No clue?
Joel: When I say you here, let's expand it. I've known you for a long time, you've known us for a long time. At events, you guys have been, let's say, not aggressive. You've been classy, haven't gone overboard. You've been... You pull back, I guess, in what you could have done. This is the first event in a long time that you guys have really... I don't wanna say go all out, but you have taken it to another level. I assume that was by design, but why was that?
Chad: I've heard the word chic.
Joe Shaker: Chic?
Joel: That's 'cause we're here.
Chad: Yes.
Joel: But yeah, chic.
Joe Shaker: So, I have to give my hats off to the team, my team that put this on. Joking aside, I appreciate all that you guys are doing past as well as present and helping us today. To answer your question, Joel, we're trying to show the industry how we can be a true partner and advisor to our clients. Why this event? Also, I have to congratulate Jamie for, I believe, putting on an event that creates not just a conference but a community of bringing in some of the world's best talent leaders. I was able to spend yesterday at RL100 and Chad was there as well, but also bringing in some amazing partners. So, outside of the organizations that are here, walking around even I've learned some great pieces of information from many of the vendors in an environment that allows really a community and a culture to be built. And that's something that Shaker's always had for seven years. So, it just seemed like a logical fit for us if we were gonna do exactly as you said, come bigger, come bolder, this was the event to do it.
Chad: One piece of advice in today's landscape, what would that piece of advice be to any listener or viewer in our space?
Joe Shaker: Find good partners, whether it be me, whether it be some of my competition or whether it be some of the various different companies that are out there. I think our industry has gotten very complicated. There's a lot of different pieces that move on a constant basis.
Chad: Now, is that complexity really necessary?
Joe Shaker: Yeah, because it's not just, where do I run my ads? It's... We talked about it yesterday, how do I authentically build a message? What should that message be? Is also gonna differ depending upon the platform or the tools that you're utilizing to deploy that message to then even looking at conversion. So, doing this by yourself is a very difficult task. I am biased as I'm one of those advisors, but I'm truly saying my piece of advice is find that true partner that can help you navigate through that creative landscape, through the media landscape and through the conversion.
Joel: You talk about the right partner but you obviously have a lot of the right employees, and one of the things that's always impressed me over the years is your ability to retain talent, to get some of the best talent. What's the secret sauce?
Joe Shaker: My father gave me a great line, "Hire people smarter than yourself and get out of their way." My joy of my job, one of the things that I am really most appreciative of, is I get to work with some of the best in the space, past as well as present. I get to partner with some of the best and biggest organizations out there. And truly, I partner with some of the best organizations. And so, when I look at my job, I get to work with some of my best employees, I get to talk to some of the best clients and I get to talk to some of the best partners. And that's why too... One of the things you're seeing today is when we look at even just like our logo, like the three heads and changing our navigation, without my employees, without my clients, and without my partners, there is no Shaker Recruitment Marketing.
Chad: So, looking back at 2024, we still got a little time to go but still looking back at 2024, there's been a lot that's happened. What surprised you the most?
Joe Shaker: Surprised me the most is that in a state of the economy as well as politically, there's a lot of uncertainty and organizations are still hiring. They may not be hiring at the levels that any of us would wish for and companies still are trying to open up more recs, but we are still in an uncertainty. And in an election year, they're still hiring and I believe they are still hiring not just because of current need, but everyone knows what we got a little taste of in 2020, 2021, 2022 is the war for talent is here and it's only gonna get harder and they know how hard it's gonna be this year, next year and the years to come.
Joel: So, let's talk about next year...
Joe Shaker: Bears are gonna win the Super Bowl.
Joel: [0:05:06.2] ____.
Joe Shaker: Are we gonna go there? One and 0 baby, one and 0.
Joel: God. Pretty sure I won our last bet on the over/under of Bears victories. So, I won't...
Chad: We're looking forward now, Joel. We're looking forward.
Joel: Yeah, I won't bring the Bears into this. 2025, more of the same, more hiring, greater... I mean, the geopolitical challenges that we have now are not gonna go away...
Joe Shaker: They're not.
Joel: But you see a much sunnier road ahead.
Joe Shaker: I am optimistic and I also think you have to prepare. So, the organizations, as you look for the years ahead, continuing to invest in your employment brand to find ways to differentiate yourself, to increase retention, continue to market to either current clients... Well, we spent a lot of time, again, yesterday on future employees that are gonna work for the firm and then literally look at the data and don't lock yourself, don't be married to anyone and move to where the data dictates the money should move to.
Chad: So, Shaker was a firm of column inches for a very long time, newspaper.
Joe Shaker: Not that many people know what that is.
Chad: Column inches. Yeah. If you don't know, look it up. What is tomorrow look like? The velocity of technology is dizzying in some cases. So, for you, in an organization like yours to stay up with it, number one, not easy, let alone all the heads of TA trying to do it themselves. What does it look like moving into 2025?
Joe Shaker: One thing what have been said before, so much has changed yet so much has stayed the same. So, from the days of running, to your point, column inch ads, we still ran them in multiple newspapers across the US and then you read trains journals and you ran, obviously, even into radio and cable. It was a diversified media strategy then it went... It got real simple. You use one, two, maybe three sources. We're back now to running a diversified strat and pulling levers. The difference now though is you can be flexible. So, you don't just set it and forget it. And so, as long as you build out a diversified plan, put it out to as many places as you possibly can and then let the data dictate where it should go and also create that good experience. And that's where I believe you can use technology coupled with people in terms of making out what's gonna be best to deliver and convert those data points.
Joel: You sit in front of a metaphoric dashboard every day about those data points, what's performing well, what's trending, what's declining. Give us a broad picture of what is working, what you see on the horizon and what do you see fading.
Joe Shaker: Well, answer that in three different scenarios. You're gonna answer it from a creator perspective, you should see retention. So, if we did the brand and we did it right or your partner did it right, you should see an uptick in retention. And that's not something you're gonna see in three months, six months or 12 months. It's gonna take some time, but that data should dictate, did my message that I developed in my employment brand that I went to market with increase retention? Short term, to where I think you are going, CPC, CPAs, throw them out the window. We want quality applicants. My opinion of quality applicants is interview scheduled and our job should be filling out as many of those interviews as you possibly can and then time to fill them. But at the end of the day, it still is go back to when we were running column inch ads, cost per hires. But to judge your cost per hire and to drive it down, it's looking at the messaging, it's looking at the media and it's making sure we convert.
Chad: From what you can remember, what was the most expensive full-page newspaper ad?
Joe Shaker: New York Times.
Chad: New York Times? What was it?
Joe Shaker: $40,000. Easy, easy.
Chad: $40,000 for a Sunday.
Joe Shaker: And that's one category.
Chad: One category.
Joe Shaker: Remember, and you couldn't run an ad for multiple categories. So, if you were hiring engineers as well as running sales managers, it's two ads, $40,000, $40,000. And then if you wanted to run a paper... Right?
Chad: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Joe Shaker: Outside of the classified section, then you're paying on a CPM basis.
Joel: All right, I'm gonna bring us back to the present day because you seem to be stuck in the olden times.
Chad: Gotta make people remember.
Joel: So, you talk about...
Joe Shaker: I agree.
Joel: I wanna know more about what you see. Where's the disruption gonna be? What do you see sort of on the upswing in terms of, oh, we need to watch that, whether it's TikTok or some social media or we hear a lot about AI. What are we gonna be looking for in 2025 to be like, I saw that coming?
Joe Shaker: Conversion. I think personally, applicant tracking systems are not gonna go away but I think they're gonna continue to get pushed further and further back. I mean, walk outside this lovely tent, bias, but lovely tent that we have today, and you're gonna see a lot of great technology that is helping us convert leads and helping us make those leads then become applicants that ultimately will become hires. So, I think you're gonna continue to see disruption in the Martech sector in terms of other technology that just helps us create a better experience but then also lets recruiters be more effective. It's a win-win for not just the candidates, but also for the companies themselves.
Chad: Well through that disruption, through that noise, you can always go to Joe Shaker.
Joe Shaker: You can.
Chad: Joe, if somebody wants to connect with you or part of your team, where would you send them?
Joe Shaker: Come to shaker.com, we just launched it on Monday or feel free to hit me up on LinkedIn.
Chad: Beautiful.
Joel: It's a wealth of information. Shaker.com. Joe, thanks for hanging out, man.
Joe Shaker: Hey, thank you, guys.
Joel: Enjoy the rest of the show.
Joe Shaker: Hey, good to see you.
S?: Now, we return you to our regular scheduled program in progress.
Podcast Outro: Wow, look at you. You made it through an entire episode of the Chad and Cheese podcast or maybe you cheated and fast forwarded to the end. Either way, there's no doubt you wish you had that time back, valuable time you could have used to buy a nutritious meal at Taco Bell, enjoy a pour of your favorite whiskey or just watch big booty Latinas and bug fights on TikTok. No, you hung out with these two chuckleheads instead. Now, go take a shower and wash off all the guilt but save some soap because you'll be back. Like an awful train wreck, you can't look away. And like Chad's favorite Western, you can't quit them either. We out.