Recruitment agency or direct employer: two games, two strategies

A notable share of online ads is posted not by the employer but by an intermediary: recruitment agency, headhunter, temp firm. The same role can even exist twice, at the employer and at its agency. Answering both the same way means playing two different games with one strategy.

Recognising who is posting

The signs are constant: the employer is unnamed, replaced by “our client, a major player in its sector”; the advertiser's name is an agency's; the description is rich in criteria and poor in team context; the ad says “for one of our clients”. The duplicate is another clue: the same ad word for word under two names, which an aggregator's deduplication sees go by, points to the agency-client pair.

The agency's game

An agency recruiter does not hire you: they present you. Their constraint is defending a shortlist of three to five files before their client, and every file sent engages their credibility. Direct consequence: they look for profiles that are easy to defend, close to the brief, without grey areas. The atypical application, career change or mixed path, does poorly there, unless you hand them the arguments to sell you: that is exactly the role of a factual letter translating your record into the brief's terms. Second consequence: the agency works several roles at once. A file set aside on one ad stays in their base for the next; taking care of the exchange even after a refusal is an investment, not a courtesy.

The direct employer's game

At the employer, your file is read by someone who will live with the result. Context outweighs criteria: the letter can speak to the department's problem, the product, the calendar, all things an agency does not pass along. A question to a direct employer is about the real job; a question to an agency is about the process and the client. And a direct employer's ad says its name: its posting history becomes readable. An employer reposting the same role in a loop for months is telling you something no interview will volunteer.

When both versions coexist

If the same role exists at the employer and at the agency, the direct route almost always wins: it avoids the “easy to defend” filter and removes the fee question, which can weigh against the agency-presented candidate at equal merit. The agency version stays useful when the direct route is closed or silent. Aptenda shows the twin postings of a single employer precisely for this choice: for the same role, choosing your entrance is an advantage that costs nothing.

Temp agencies and their cousins

The temp agency plays a third game: it genuinely hires, since the contract is signed with it, and the assignment at the client can start in days, not weeks. To test a sector, bridge a gap or enter a company closed to direct applications, it is a serious channel: a real share of assignments turns into direct hires at the client. The file follows other rules there: immediate availability and certifications weigh more than the letter, and the local agency that knows you offers work before posting it.