A traditional contingency agency is one way to fill a senior role. It is rarely the only way, and for an early-stage startup it is often not the best first move. This guide lays out ten alternatives, what each one asks of your team, and how founders usually combine them.
Correction: An earlier version of this article included placement statistics, adoption percentages, and competitor prices that were not supported by a verified dataset. Those figures have been removed. Fee examples below are illustrations, not observed outcomes or claims about what any provider charges.
How to read this list
Each channel is judged on three things: where the candidates come from, what your team has to do, and how you pay. No channel is free of work. The cheapest options on paper are the ones that consume the most founder time.
| Alternative | Candidate source | Cost basis | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Referral marketplace | Referrals from operators and specialist recruiters | Success fee on hire | Senior engineering and GTM at seed to Series B |
| 2. Investor introductions | Your cap table's network | Free, limited supply | First sourcing pass on any senior role |
| 3. Founder network | People you have worked with | Free, limited supply | Early senior hires |
| 4. Broader recruiter marketplace | Independent recruiters | Success fee on hire | Volume hiring across many role types |
| 5. Contractor and trial-to-hire platforms | Hourly talent pools | Hourly rate plus markup | Project work, capacity, try-before-hire |
| 6. Flat-fee placement services | Provider's own sourcing | Flat fee per hire | Roles where a fixed price is attractive |
| 7. In-house recruiter | Outbound sourcing | Salary and tooling | Sustained hiring volume |
| 8. Sourcing tools | Outbound at scale | Software subscription | Supplementing an in-house team |
| 9. Job boards and inbound | Active job seekers | Free to low cost | Top-of-funnel supplement |
| 10. University recruiting | New graduates and interns | Sponsorships and program time | Building a junior pipeline |
1. Referral marketplaces
A referral marketplace routes your role to people who know candidates personally: founders, operators, investors, and specialist recruiters. Introductions arrive with context from someone who has worked with the person.
What your team does: write a clear brief, respond quickly to introductions, run your own interview process.
How you pay: a success fee on hire. Refery's published pricing is 15% to 25% of first-year base salary, paid only when you hire someone Refery introduced, with the exact scope and fee agreed before the search starts. There is no retainer and no exclusivity.
Illustrative cost: on a $200,000 base at a 15% fee, the fee is $30,000. Your actual percentage belongs in your agreement.
Best for: senior engineering and GTM roles at seed to Series B startups where a warm introduction changes whether a passive candidate replies.
2. Investor introductions
Your investors and angels know operators. A specific ask ("we are hiring a founding backend engineer; do you know anyone who has built payments infrastructure at a Series A?") gets better results than a general request.
What your team does: send a one-paragraph role summary and a handful of named target profiles to each investor. Follow up on a schedule.
How you pay: nothing, beyond investor goodwill.
Limit: supply runs out. Treat this as the opening move, not the whole search.
3. Founder personal network
List every senior engineer or GTM leader you have worked with directly, then the people they would recommend. Reach out personally with the role context.
What your team does: the founder writes the messages. Delegating this to a coordinator loses the reason it works.
How you pay: nothing.
Limit: the network saturates after the first few hires. Second-degree asks ("who is the best engineer you have worked with?") extend it.
4. Broader recruiter marketplaces
Some marketplaces open a role to a large pool of independent recruiters who source through their usual channels. The strength is breadth of top-of-funnel; the tradeoff is that candidate context varies by recruiter.
What your team does: more screening, because more submissions arrive with less context.
How you pay: a success fee. Check the provider's own published terms rather than assuming a number.
Best for: later-stage companies running many searches in parallel across role families.
5. Contractor and trial-to-hire platforms
Talent clouds match you with engineers on hourly or project engagements, sometimes with an option to convert to full time.
What your team does: scope the project, manage the contractor, decide on conversion.
How you pay: hourly rate plus the platform's markup for the length of the engagement. There is usually no one-time placement fee, so the total cost depends on duration.
Best for: short-term capacity, specialist project work, or testing fit before a permanent offer.
6. Flat-fee placement services
Some providers charge a fixed fee per hire regardless of salary. At higher base salaries a flat fee can be cheaper than a percentage; at lower salaries it can be more expensive.
What your team does: confirm what the fee covers and what happens if the hire leaves early.
How you pay: the provider's flat fee. Compare it against a percentage fee on your actual salary range before deciding.
7. In-house recruiter
A full-time recruiter owns sourcing, screening, scheduling, and offers. The loaded cost (salary, benefits, tooling) is fixed whether you hire two people or twenty.
What your team does: manage the recruiter, define priorities, still interview.
How you pay: salary and benefits plus sourcing tools.
Break-even: divide the recruiter's loaded annual cost by the success fee you would otherwise pay per hire. If you expect to make more hires than that in a year, in-house starts to pay back. Use your own numbers; the answer varies widely by salary band and fee.
8. Sourcing tools
Outbound sourcing software surfaces candidates matching your criteria and runs outreach sequences. It does not evaluate or close anyone.
What your team does: write the outreach, review replies, run the process.
How you pay: a subscription per seat.
Best for: supplementing an in-house recruiter or a founder who is already spending time on outbound.
9. Job boards and inbound
Post the role, review applications. Inbound skews toward active job seekers.
What your team does: triage volume. See how to triage inbound job applications.
How you pay: free to modest listing fees.
Best for: a passive supplement. Do not plan a senior search around inbound alone.
10. University recruiting
Career fairs, sponsorships, and faculty relationships build a pipeline of new graduates and interns.
What your team does: invest program time and mentoring capacity. See early-career engineer mentorship capacity before committing.
How you pay: sponsorship fees and internship compensation.
Best for: companies with the management bandwidth to grow junior engineers.
How founders usually combine them
- Free channels first: investor introductions and founder network for the opening sourcing pass.
- Referral marketplace alongside: for reach beyond the personal network without a retainer.
- Specialist layers as needed: contractor platforms for project work, retained search for a handful of executive roles.
- In-house when volume justifies it: once your own break-even math says so.
Use the recruiting partner checklist to compare any provider on scope, evidence, fees, and ownership before you sign.
Share your role with Refery to agree the scope and fee for your search.
For the providers behind these channels, with each one described in its own published words, see the best startup recruiting platforms and networks in 2026 and eight Paraform alternatives.