This is honestly ridiculous. Bankers don't want emails from students, so they ignore them. Students need to get on calls with bankers with approaching interview timelines, so they start amping up their email send outs. Bankers proceed to talk shit amongst their group calling it "spam", then "blacklist" the kid as a collective.
Am I tripping or is this all luck ? As a prospect, I need to send out JUST THE RIGHT AMOUNT where its not annoying, but also hope someone responds.
Assuming I have no alum, what's even the ideal amount to be sending out atp...
Don't send them all at once if it's the same group. I used to write them all up at the same time and schedule send them spaced out by a day or two. Sending one to a MD/Director and an analyst on the same day works too.
Ofcourse. I've been aiming for 3-5 per bank, everyday. But I'm only emailing people within their technology group.
Unless you are blasting 10 people in a group on the same day, or sending out ridiculous emails with models attached, bankers are not talking shit about you. They are just very busy.
Unfortunately this is partially timing. October/November have much higher response rates because fewer emails... a LOT of people are emailing by mid-Jan so people limit calls. Just have to keep your numbers up to account for being a hair late with starting to network, honestly. Keep emailing and also email smaller banks like MM / boutiques.
Think the current system at least rewards hustle and gives a very real shot for a non-target to break in if they work for it. The alternative is essentially just going off resume strength which means the target school kids take all the spots. IB has like 10,000+ applications for ~100 spots at each BB - with a 1% acceptance rate no recruiting system is going to be totally foolproof
Definitely, I get what your saying. I've been emailing 3-5 people per bank everyday, but only focused on technology banks in SF so they have leaner deal teams (comparatively to NY). CVP guy just told me to stop emailing ppl on his team lmfao.
Ah well that's because Centerview has a no-networking policy. It's stated on their website and well discussed on here. Don't email CVP people (it's only them, other people won't be nasty to you. don't take it personally)
The MMs aren’t even replying to me, this recruiting season is nuts
I second this, I'd get a few a week (currently at a MM) in Sep-Oct which I'd be happy to take, especially if its from my alma, but now it's up to 3-5 per day...bankers just don't have enough time for that. Even if we're not busy, it's hard to take a call from (i) someone you don't know (ii) from a different city you're currently in so there's no chance you'd ever interact with them and (iii) from a different school, let alone several calls in a day. If we're having a slow week, we want to do something that makes us feel human (dates, workouts, friends, family time, etc.) rather than taking a bunch of calls in a day and pushing your work off for later at night
Additionally, every so often as a banker you agree to a cold call and the prospect is completely unprepared and makes you want to put your head in a wall, so that also makes us less inclined to take calls from randos as well. Just trying to put things in perspective for you
To provide you with advice, talk with current seniors at your school now that have completed their summer IB internship and are signing on / already have banking connections, and get a warmer invite from them to a full time in their group. I'd be much more open to taking a call if I someone I knew "approved" the candidate I was going to speak to, rather than cold calls. We've all been there, it's a numbers game at the end of the day, best of luck with recruiting!
It also helps to add genuine interests in a resume. I'd be much more inclined to talk with someone that comes across as a person that has different passions with maybe some overlap compared to someone who's interested in "stock markets" or "investing" - you wouldn't believe the amount of boiler plate resumes we get
90% of people who have major networking struggles have them because of a major lack of social awareness (i.e. sending cringy emails to every analyst they feel they can get in contact with)
Wym cringey. I'd assume everyone is drafting professional emails requesting a chat because of X similarity or smth.
Chats can be cringey too - sometimes for some reason I don't know why I take a chat with a random prospect and they're very unprepared / awkward and then later a colleague asked if I've talked to them and I said yes but it's not worth your time...just don't be so over eager about things, come across as a person that's just passionate about finance but have other passions as well, not too nervous, not too excited
If you have no alum it's really an uphill battle. People are already being blasted by 20+ kids from their alma maters so it's rare they take calls from random non-targets. My honest advice is to be persistent and widen your selection criteria (can't really be that choosy about location AND vertical if you're a non-target).
I see... unfortunate to hear.
Appreciate the message nonetheless
Don't be disheartened man, I was also a non-target. A good rule of thumb is you need to aim for 4-5 calls per week and send ~20 alum emails or ~50 cold emails to get the hit rate you need to hit the target. Also, it's not a matter of talking to as many people as possible but also the depth of relationship. You just need one person to really go to bat for you for you to get an interview at a bank so try to follow up and send updates to the contacts you've already cracked on top of generating incremental N.
Going to be honest, maybe this just makes me an asshole to someone in your shoes, but I probably responded to a whopping 2 networking emails (other than students from my non-target state school) during my 2 years of banking. I think one had a decently funny line or niche interest on the resume, and the other one I was a jerk off second year incredibly bored but stuck in the office that day.
The reality of it is that the last thing a junior banker wants to do after a long day of hating their job, is take a call from an over-eager college student and pretend they don’t hate said job. Point being — no one said networking is easy or that there’s some obvious tutorial you can follow. I don’t say this to be disparaging, but just to provide some perspective and level set expectations.
My advice is when it comes to the analyst level, do your best to sound mature but chill, dial down any hyperbole of “omg IB is my dream job,” have a few relatable interests or anecdotes in your resume / body of email, and — unfortunately — just get lucky that you emailed the right person at the right time. Do wish you best of luck.
(And no one is making fun of you or blacklisting you unless you say something incredibly stupid or follow up unsolicitedly for the 8th time with also an incredibly stupid comment about it “getting lost in my inbox.” I’ve seen probably 100+ cold emails and can only think of one that was so bad it got forwarded around.)
Nah nah not an asshole at all. You make a completely fair point tbh.
My only problem is i spend every morning drafting 2-3 emails per bank with no hit rates especially in SF.
And its not some bs email, like I (along with many others) customize each one and draw similarities or wtvr.
My biggest question is , from someone in your shoes, what makes you more likely to respond ? Longer, customized, emails or maybe a short email with a descriptive subject heading ?
From what I heard, everyone at the SF banks are simply ignoring prospect emails unless they come from referrals so i just dont know what to do as no one in my family comes from finance.
Realistically… I probably stereotype a lot based on your interests tbh. I personally always enjoyed seeing poker or certain sports teams that I’d relate to. Someone mentioned “sports betting simulation models,” “Christopher Nolan movies” was a good one, and one girl literally put “chocolate milk” which was so random it gave me a laugh. Personally I appreciated these just so it at least gave me a fallback if the banking part of the conversation sucked.
I also enjoy a more lighthearted email (and please ffs don’t ever say Mr. or Ms.). I remember one kid from a rival college being like “it’d be nice to chat with a fellow SEC alum even though you tore our hearts out in football last week” and I believe I responded to that. As you pointed out, cold emails are all very similar (and boring), so a little personality stands out to me.
I’m sure there are others that don’t appreciate it as much, buttoned/up hardos are certainly a dime a dozen. But I guess if your hit rate right now is 0% anyways then maybe it’s worth a try. FWIW I also received a few IB interviews from cold applications without any networking so I do think it could be a little bit overrated. I’d say don’t let your frustration get the best of you and maintain some positive spirits.
My advice (from someone who broke in from a super-non target to a MM coverage group) is to ditch the emails, use linkedin. Send out at least 20 invites a day to people that you may remotely be interested in working for. Start sending these out no less than one month before you think applications could have a small chance of opening up so that you have at least two phone calls with one person from the group so that they'll vouch for you.
I have a pretty detailed breakdown on my account in a post/comment, so check that out for some detailed networking advice.
Thank for you for this
LinkedIn is fair. I’ve ignored cold emails because you’re taking away time from my work. But I’ve always responded to LinkedIn requests and messages because one, you’ve doxxed me so I don’t want to be a dick and two, I’m less sensitive to someone taking up my procrastination time on LinkedIn. Now, some people never check LinkedIn but then you should have better success with an improved numbers game.
Thank you so much, this is very helpful
I think your recruiting system is stupid. In EMEA, you do tests and if you pass them, you're screened further and invited to interview. Yes, it does mean that there is more bias in favour of target schools, but sorry if you're at Birmingham City University or something, banking just isn't for you.
Hahaha good one
My advice is to keep it short. Nobody wants to read a cover letter disguised as an email. Be straight up. Who are you (experience, uniqueness etc), what do you want, why from me - all of this doesn't take more than a few sentences and can still be worded politely and effectively.
I only take calls from my alma matter at this point. Too many of these random calls end with "can you put me in touch with XYZ office/team and give them my resume". Like no dude. I am not going to use my political capital and vouch for you...I don't know you!
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