Recruiting sales people should be an ongoing and never ending process. You may not be hiring but you should always been recruiting for sales people. Because sales is such a critical role to every company, you should always be on the lookout for top sales talent.
The biggest challenge for most companies in recruiting sales people are:
Where do I find good sales people?
How do I pay them?
How do I keep good sales people once I have found them?
Finding Good Sales people
As we said before you may not be hiring but you should always be recruiting sales people. You should have a recruitment strategy in place to provide you with a steady stream of qualified sales people to interview. They can come from a number of sources:
Employee Referrals
Sales Recruiters
Job Postings On Your Website
HR Department
Industry Conferences & Events
It is best to use a few if not all of these sources to find sales people so when an opening comes up, you will be able to fill the job quickly.
How Do I Pay Sales People?
From our experience, the biggest reason sales people don't work out or don't stay with a company is the design of the sales compensation plan. Pay a sales person too little and they're not happy...too much and the company isn't happy. Here are a few things to keep in mind when reviewing your sales compensation plan:
What is the desired level of income for a sales person in your industry and what sales volume is necessary to achieve this income?
Is the plan tied to gross sales or gross profit?
In most cases, it is not advisable to pay commission of more than 20% of gross profit (this may vary by industry and product). Any more than this and you are paying too much.
How does your sales compensation plan compare to other firms in your industry?
Will sales commissioned be uncapped or limited?
These are just a few of the issues that can come up and if you don't know the answers to any of the questions above, it may be time to review your compensation structure for your sales team.
Retaining Sales People
You've recruited and hired a great sales person. You've spent a lot of time, money and resources to find this person...now what? How can you ensure that they will be successful and stay with your company for years to come?
A common mistake is to hire a sales person and hope they have contacts that can bring in big sales. The reality is that even experience, well connected sales people need help to be successful. Here is what your company needs in place in order to ensure a successful sales person:
A good sales manager - A big reason sales people leave or do not live up to expectations is they have no one to rely on to coach them, mentor them and help achieve their goals
On boarding process - What happens when this person starts? Who is responsible for teaching them about the company, products and services? What kind of support is available? What type of training will be done? These are all important steps to ensuring success.
Sales Training & Coaching - Tiger Woods uses a coach not because he doesn't know how to swing a golf club. He uses a coach to fine tune his swing and improve his performance. Sales is no different. Even experienced sales people need reminders and refreshers on how to approach new business and how to move potential clients along in the sales process. Investing in ongoing training and development will go a long way to securing more business.
Good companies should always be on the lookout for top sales people. Once you have found them be then prepared to hire, train and retain!
Matthew Cook
SalesForce Search
SalesForce Search is a recruitment company specializing in the placement of sales professionals across North America. http://www.SalesForceSearch.ca
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