Back in the day, just before and during the early days of the Internet, I used to write job copy. I generated about 90% of my fees by selling this to my clients.

I’d produce a great display ad - probably not always as great as what the client would get from a decent creative ad agency, but miles better than anything produced by any other recruitment agency.

But mine were free – paid for out of the retained fee the client would pay me.

Years later, as fame spread about my copywriting prowess (amongst about 5 of my friends), I’d occasionally get asked to write a job ad – often for as little money as to make driving 200 miles for a job interview flipping burgers on minimum wage sound appealing.

Here’s one such phone conversation, as best as I can remember it, with a friend that we’ll call ‘John’:

John: “Mitch, we need an ad. We’re looking for some recruiters to join our team. Can you do us something?”

Me: “Maybe. Have you got some kind of job description?”

John: “No, that’s partly why we want you to write the ad for us.”

Me: “But I don’t know what it’s like to be a recruiter at your company?”

John: “It doesn’t matter, all recruiter jobs are the same anyway.”

Me: “True. But I need to find out more about your business if I’m going to find a way of selling you to the right people.”

John: “Everything you need to know is on our website. Can you get something over this afternoon?”

Me: “Sure, no problem. All I have to do is hit ‘F5’ on my computer to get this done anyway.”

John: “Are you being sarcastic?”

Me: “No, not at all. Producing good job ads from fuck-all information is really easy. I am just a job ad jukebox afterall.”

John: *click*

I used to write job ads.

If you really do want to attract better candidates for a particularly important job, hire a copywriter.

And pay them what they ask for.