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Candidate response rate calculator.

See where your outreach leaks.

Your numbers
Volume projection
To bookmeetings, at your current rate.
364
messages to send
18
messages per meeting
Your funnel
vs. industry average
Response rate19.0%
Fair
Positive rate50.0%
Good
Meeting rate57.9%
Fair
Overall conversion
5.5%of your messages
turn into a meeting

Strong end to end. The lever now is volume: more of the right companies, reached at the right moment.

Helen Wright
Boilr gave us the BD structure and follow-up support to sign our first client and secure a job brief in under a month.
Helen Wright
Managing Director, 923 Jobs

About this tool.

What counts as a good candidate response rate?

For cold recruitment outreach, 15 to 25 percent is solid and above 30 percent is excellent. Below 10 percent usually points to a targeting or messaging problem rather than a volume one. The calculator flags each stage against those bands so you can see where you sit.

What is the difference between a response and a positive response?

A response is any reply, including a polite no. A positive response is a candidate who actually shows interest. Splitting the two tells you whether people are ignoring you, replying but uninterested, or interested but not booking, and each problem has a different fix.

How does the volume projection work?

It takes your overall conversion, the share of messages that become meetings, and works backwards from a meeting target. If 5 percent of messages become meetings and you want 20 meetings, you need roughly 400 messages. It is a planning number, not a promise.

My response rate is fine but few book a meeting. What does that mean?

Interested candidates are dropping at the booking step. That is usually friction: too many back and forth messages, no clear link, or vague time slots. Send a scheduling link in the first positive reply and offer specific times rather than asking when works for you.

How often should I recalculate these numbers?

After every 50 to 100 messages, or weekly for an active campaign. Small samples swing wildly, so wait for enough volume before you read into a drop. The point is to spot the leaking stage early and adjust the message, the targeting or the timing.

A calculator finds the leak. An employee plugs it.

This tool is a free taster. boilr is the AI sales employee that researches the right companies, reads the signals and hands you finished outreach to verify and send.