Think about the effort and thought you put into your sales and marketing process. From refining your sales pitch, creating sales material, content marketing, social media, etc. As important as it is to be able to effectively market and sell your product/service to potential clients, it’s equally as important to be able to sell your company to potential new team members.

It’s very tough for a new company to attract and retain quality talent. Unless you’re a big name like Facebook, Google or Amazon, who have no problem getting quality applicants, most companies have to go above and beyond, and do an extraordinary job of selling themselves to compete for that same pool of talent as the big players.

Being able to communicate your company’s story (every startup has a story) and vision to a potential candidate in an enticing way is critical. Most of the time, the candidate has never heard of you or your company. If they decide to work with you, they’re basically taking a leap of faith and trust in you as the leader.

As with any craft, hiring is a skillset that truly gets better with more practice and time. Just like in sales, where you’re constantly refining your pitch and presentation to make it perfect, you also have to refine your pitch, or “story” when recruiting. Your story must be compelling enough, where that candidate is genuinely excited and enthused to join your team.

Once you’ve sold the story and vision to the candidate and they’ve accepted your offer, the real task begins, which is onboarding the new hire. The first couple of weeks are when new employees are likely to have a change of heart, or fall off and quit. The last thing you want is to start the hiring process from scratch again. That will only stall your growth and halt any momentum. This is why you can’t half-ass onboarding. Starting from the very first day the new hire starts working, their experience has to be positive and structured. If there is any disorganization or unpreparedness during the onboarding process, it will raise serious red flags in the eyes of the new hire, and make them question whether they’ve made the right decision.

Hiring and onboarding are two things that startups often overlook or don’t take seriously. Do not make that mistake.