There’s hardly ever been a better, or busier, time to be a recruiter in America. With a 16-year low unemployment rate and a record-high number of job openings, the demand for recruiting and staffing services is strong as this candidate driven market rolls on.

SIA just announced US staffing market predicted to grow 3% in 2018 to $126.8 billion. Total US staffing market — which includes temporary staffing as well as place and search — will rise by 3% both this year and in 2018, bringing total revenue in the industry to $145.1 billion next year, according to a new industry forecast by Staffing Industry Analysts. However, with a stronger recovery projected for place and search, the overall staffing market is likely to achieve 4% growth to reach $146.6 billion. Other positive economic factors include cutting the corporate business tax from 35% to 20%. “Despite the somewhat slower growth, the staffing market is on track to hit record size in terms of revenue in the next two years,” said Barry Asin, President of SIA. Online staffing will reach $5 billion in annual spend in 2018 from $1 billion in 2012.

Independent recruiting and staffing firms need to be prepared for the temp/contract staffing boom. If you’re not running contract/temp in your business then you need to add it to your services so you can become a full service recruiting firm for your client base and substantially increase revenue. If you’re already running both contracting and direct hire, make sure your you’ve partnered with a full service single solution back office provider who guarantees the highest profit per hour, features your brand on all forms and client and candidate communications as well as provides extensive value added services to help your business grow.

“Contracting,” “contract to hire” or “contract to permanent” placement scenarios are terms that are being spoken about more and more in today’s marketplace and it’s time to get familiar with it because it’s not going away. Often times, contract to hire is pushed by many recruiting agencies because it can be more profitable than simply placing someone directly with the company and charging a percentage of their salary.

Contract staffing opportunities exist in all verticals from entry level positions, management to executive level jobs. If you think temp/contracting is only for admin or warehouse jobs then you need to take another look at the marketplace. Just like your clients see the value in outsourcing recruiting services, today’s companies are also seeing the value in outsourcing the back office services on W2’s. This is a prime time opportunity for independent recruiting and staffing firms to be ready to market contract staffing services to their new and existing clients.

The bottom line is that contract staffing is only growing, it’s extremely profitable and it’s easy to add to your current recruiting firm’s services. 

Are You Ready for the Temp/Contract Staffing Boom?