Writes the role before the post.
Turns "we need help" into a real job description: what the person owns, what good looks like at 90 days, and what the role pays. A vague post attracts vague candidates.
Nacho ordinary hiring help
A recruiter on your team without the placement fee
Nacho matches growing businesses with vetted, 100% US-based Fractional Recruiters who source, screen, and schedule your hires by the hour, starting at $65/hr.
Free 30-minute call. Every match backed by the Nacho re-match guarantee.
The short answer
What is a Fractional Recruiter?
A Fractional Recruiter is an experienced recruiter who runs your hiring part-time. They write the job descriptions, source and screen candidates, schedule interviews, and keep your pipeline moving, exactly like an in-house recruiter. Through Nacho, a Fractional Recruiter starts at $65 an hour, with no placement fee.
The word "fractional" describes the schedule, not the skill. You get a working recruiter for the hours your open roles actually need, instead of a full-time salary for a job that comes in waves, or a per-hire fee that grows with every salary you offer.
Most small businesses handle recruiting in one of two ways. The founder or a manager does it at night, slowly, between everything else. Or they sign with a contingency agency and pay a percentage of each new hire's salary. A Fractional Recruiter sits in between: a dedicated person running your process, billed like any other hourly work.
You may also see the role called a contract recruiter. The terms overlap. Both bill for time rather than placements. "Fractional" usually means an ongoing part-time arrangement across several roles, while "contract" often means a fixed project. Either way, the recruiter works inside your process and you make every hiring decision.
- Nacho tier
- Specialist
- Schedule
- Part-time, sized to your open roles
- Reports to
- You or your hiring manager
- Owns
- Sourcing, screening, scheduling, and the pipeline
- Cost through Nacho
- From $65/hr from one monthly Talent Budget
- Based in
- The United States, 100% of the time
The job itself
What does a Fractional Recruiter actually do?
A Fractional Recruiter writes your job descriptions, sources candidates who are not actively applying, screens applicants against agreed criteria, schedules interviews, keeps your applicant tracking system current, and coordinates references and offers. The work is running the process, so you only spend time on the finalists.
Sources candidates who are not applying.
Searches LinkedIn and the job boards, reaches out to people who fit, and follows up. The best candidates for most roles are already employed and not reading your listing.
Screens so you only meet the shortlist.
Reviews applications, runs the first phone screens against the criteria you agreed on, and sends you a short list with notes instead of a stack of resumes.
Runs the interview logistics.
Schedules every round, preps your interviewers, collects feedback while it is fresh, and keeps candidates informed so nobody goes quiet on you mid-process.
Keeps your pipeline clean.
Maintains your applicant tracking system, or sets up a simple one, so every candidate has a status and a next step. When the search ends, the pipeline is still yours.
Closes and hands off.
Checks references, coordinates the offer you decide on, and passes the new hire cleanly to whoever runs onboarding. You make the hiring decision. They make it easier to make.
What a Fractional Recruiter does not do is make the hire for you. You set the bar, meet the finalists, and decide. They also are not your HR department: policies, compliance, and payroll sit with Fractional HR or your existing provider.
Timing
When should you hire a Fractional Recruiter?
Hire a Fractional Recruiter when hiring has become a recurring job that nobody owns. The usual trigger is several open roles at once, a founder or manager screening resumes after hours, or good candidates slipping away because the process is slow.
Signs you are ready
- You have two or more roles open at once and no one whose job it is to fill them.
- You or a manager are spending hours a week reading resumes instead of running the business.
- Good candidates drop out because nobody replied for a week.
- You are about to sign a contingency agreement and the fee on one hire makes you wince.
- You keep hiring the same role and starting the search from zero each time.
- You want the candidate pipeline and the process to stay with your company, not an agency.
When it is the wrong hire
- You have one hire this year. A single placement through an agency can be simpler than any ongoing arrangement.
- You have not decided what the role is or what it pays. A recruiter cannot source against a moving target.
- You need an executive search for a C-level seat. That is a retained search, a different engagement.
- What you really need is HR policy, compliance, or payroll. That is an HR role, not a recruiting one.
- Nobody on your side has time to interview. A recruiter fills the funnel, but you still have to meet the finalists.
We would rather tell you on the discovery call that one agency search is the better deal than sell you hours you do not need. If the real gap is scheduling and inbox load around hiring, an Executive Assistant solves it for less.
Real numbers
What does a Fractional Recruiter cost?
A Fractional Recruiter through Nacho starts at $65 an hour. There is no placement fee and no separate retainer. Hours draw from one monthly Talent Budget with a $1,000 monthly minimum, so about $1,000 a month buys roughly 15 hours and about $2,000 a month buys roughly 30.
The comparison that matters is the per-hire fee. A contingency agency charges nothing up front, then a percentage of each new hire's first-year salary, commonly in the 15% to 25% range. On one hire that can be reasonable. On every hire, the bill grows with every salary you offer, whether the search took a week or a quarter.
Hourly flips that. You pay for the work done on your searches, the cost does not change with the salary, and when the search ends the job descriptions, candidate notes, and pipeline stay with your company for the next opening.
| What you are comparing | Fractional Recruiter through Nacho | Contingency agency |
|---|---|---|
| How you pay | From $65/hr, published up front | A fee per hire, commonly 15% to 25% of first-year salary |
| What you pay for | Hours spent on your search | A successful placement |
| Placement fee | None | The whole model |
| Scope | Job descriptions, sourcing, screening, scheduling, and your pipeline | Usually sourcing and presenting candidates |
| Whose pipeline it is | Yours. Candidates and notes stay with your company. | The agency keeps its candidate database |
| Payroll taxes and benefits | None. They are not your employee. | None for the agency, full cost for the hire |
| Time to first day | About a week from the discovery call | Depends on the agency and the search |
| Commitment | 3-month initial term, then month to month | Per-search fee agreement |
| If the fit is wrong | Free re-match under the Nacho Guarantee | Depends on the agency replacement terms |
| Illustrative cost | About $2,000 a month for roughly 30 hours | About $16,000 for one $80,000 hire at a 20% fee |
Agency fee ranges above are a general US market range and vary widely by agency, role, and industry. The $80,000 example is illustrative arithmetic, not a quote. The Nacho column is our published starting rate.
What the $65 starting rate actually buys
- $1,000 a month is about 15 hours: one role kept moving, with screening and scheduling handled.
- $2,000 a month is about 30 hours: active sourcing and screening across a couple of open roles.
- $4,000 a month is about 60 hours, roughly 15 hours a week: a hiring push with several roles open at once.
Up to $200 of unused budget rolls over each month. Everything bills as one flat monthly Talent Budget, and if you also need an Executive Assistant from $40/hr or a Fractional Executive from $125/hr, they draw from the same budget. The only other fee is the $300 Delegation Strategy Plan, which comes before your first match. See how pricing works.
The process
How hiring a Fractional Recruiter through Nacho works
You book a free 30-minute discovery call, we build a $300 Delegation Strategy Plan, and we introduce you to 1 to 3 hand-picked Fractional Recruiters from our vetted, 100% US-based network. Most clients meet their first match within about a week.
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Book a free discovery call.
Thirty minutes, no obligation. Tell us which roles are open and where hiring keeps stalling. We will tell you honestly whether a Fractional Recruiter is the right fix, or whether a single agency search makes more sense.
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We build your Delegation Strategy Plan.
For $300 we scope the engagement in writing: which roles the Fractional Recruiter owns, how many hours a month that takes, which tools they work in, and how you will know it worked.
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You meet your shortlist.
We hand-pick 1 to 3 recruiters from our vetted, 100% US-based network and send you their backgrounds. You interview them. Nobody starts until you say yes to a specific person.
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We handle the paperwork.
Contracts, payments, and onboarding run through Nacho. Your Fractional Recruiter works inside your inbox, calendar, and applicant tracking system, and reports to you, not to us.
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You scale it up or down.
A 3-month initial term gives the searches time to land, then it is month to month. Add hours when several roles open at once, pull back when the team is full, and if the match is not right we re-match you free under the Nacho Guarantee.
Need a different kind of help?
- Fractional HRPolicies, compliance, and people operations
- Fractional Operations ManagerProcess, systems, and day-to-day execution
- Fractional ExecutivesCMO, CFO, COO, and CTO leadership
Every role comes from the same network under the same Talent Budget. See how pricing works.
Frequently asked questions
Fractional Recruiter questions, answered
What is a Fractional Recruiter?
A Fractional Recruiter is an experienced recruiter who runs your hiring part-time. They write the job descriptions, source and screen candidates, schedule interviews, and keep your pipeline moving, the way an in-house recruiter would, but you pay only for the hours you use.
Is a Fractional Recruiter the same as a contract recruiter?
Mostly, yes. Both are recruiters you bring in for a defined stretch instead of hiring full-time, and both usually bill by the hour rather than per placement. "Fractional" tends to describe an ongoing part-time arrangement across several roles. "Contract recruiter" often describes a fixed-length project. Through Nacho it is the same person and the same hourly model.
How much does a Fractional Recruiter cost?
Through Nacho, a Fractional Recruiter is a Specialist role starting at $65/hr, with no placement fee. Hours draw from one monthly Talent Budget with a $1,000 monthly minimum, so $1,000 buys about 15 hours and $2,000 buys about 30. A $300 Delegation Strategy Plan is the only other fee, and it comes before your first match.
Should I pay a recruiter hourly or on contingency?
Contingency agencies charge nothing until a hire, then a fee that commonly runs 15% to 25% of first-year salary. That works well for one hard-to-fill role. Hourly works better when you have several roles open or hire the same role repeatedly, because the cost tracks the work rather than the salaries, and the pipeline stays yours.
What is the difference between a Fractional Recruiter and RPO?
Recruitment process outsourcing, or RPO, hands some or all of your recruiting function to an outside firm, usually under a larger, longer contract built for high hiring volume. A Fractional Recruiter is one person working inside your process, part-time, on the roles you choose. For a small business with a handful of open roles, fractional is the lighter fit.
What is the difference between a Fractional Recruiter and Fractional HR?
A Fractional Recruiter gets people in the door: sourcing, screening, interviews, and offers. Fractional HR looks after people once they are hired: policies, compliance, onboarding, and employee relations. Many growing companies need both, and through Nacho both draw from the same Talent Budget.
How many hours a month does a Fractional Recruiter work?
It depends on how many roles are open and how hard they are to fill. One role with sourcing and screening is a lighter month than three roles running at once. Your Delegation Strategy Plan sets the hours before you start, and you can scale the budget up or down month to month.
When should a small business use a Fractional Recruiter?
The usual trigger is hiring that has become a recurring job nobody owns: several open roles, a founder or manager screening resumes at night, or candidates dropping out because the process is slow. If you will make more than one or two hires this year, the hourly math is worth running.
How long does a Fractional Recruiter engagement last?
Nacho engagements start with a 3-month initial commitment so searches have time to land, then continue month to month. Some clients keep a recruiter on a light rhythm to keep the pipeline warm, and scale hours up whenever a new round of roles opens.
What if the Fractional Recruiter is not the right fit?
We re-match you free under the Nacho Guarantee until the fit is right. It is a re-match guarantee, not a money-back guarantee. Every person in the network lives and works in the United States, so a re-match never means going offshore.
Ready when you are
Fill your open roles without the per-hire fee.
Book a free, no-obligation discovery call. Tell us which roles are open and we'll tell you honestly whether a Fractional Recruiter is the right fix.