How You Can Recruit Sales Super Stars - Part 1 - Sales Traits

Ted Nicholas, the author of "Magic Words That Sell" once said,"Marketing mistakes are by far the primary reason businesses do not survive. This includes companies which consider themselves direct marketers as well as those who do not".Of course Ted is quite right make mistakes in marketing and you'll end up paying through the nose with absolutely no results. Yet companies continually make mistakes in sales.They waste the opportunities that marketing provides by using salespeople that have one, or more, of these traits:
Poor closers
Too aggressive
Passive order takers
Fear of phoning
Can't write to persuade
Can't present without being boring
Unable to build value in the service or product
Has poor follow-up skills
Can't get to top decision makers
Finds rejection difficult to handle
Poor time manager
Doesn't think strategically
Not self-disciplined
Doesn't try to get market knowledge
Yet sales training may have little or no effect because they're at the limit of their potential already.What About The Owners As Salestaff?Often the owners in small companies are also the sales staff. If they can't sell they ultimately go out of business. If they can sell they usually reach a point where they're working harder than if they were in a job. Think about it...If the owner is the company's sales channel they're probably also their own bookkeeper, administrative clerk, VAT returns clerk, receptionist and general "muck in and get the thing finished or delivered" guy too.


We all know Michael Gerber's mantra about "Working on the business, rather than in it". We all agree that's a very laudable aim. But we're all so busy doing and doing that we can't quite bear to tear ourselves away from working in the business.I've been a consultant and coach for over 30 years and I've rarely met a business owner or director who's felt able to step back and consider the strategic aims of the business as it grows.Strategic Selling AimsIt's all down to the perceived urgent need for sales. Because often management have no visibility of sales beyond the next one or two months.Ultimately your business reaches a point where you and your current staff are working all the hours there are to simply stand still.Growing the organisation is just another item that stays on the "to do" list. If it's not part of a strategic plan it rarely gets any focus until it's been a problem for a long time. A time where the company has been unable to keep up with sales leads.Before you reach that point you need to set-up a strategic business plan - for you, not for investors. As part of that consider when you're going to want to recruit a salesman.I'll use the term salesman rather than salesperson to indicate a man or woman who sells because it's seems less clumsy than salesperson.In the next article in this series I'll explain the three types of sales people you can attract and what their impact could be on your business

How Do You Save a New Salesperson Who Is Failing?

When you hired that new salesperson you had a great feeling in your gut. You felt they had the perfect personality. You made a good connection. You could see how others would easily get to know, like and trust this candidate. You hired her!Several months have past and now you realize you didn't get the full picture through your current hiring process. The person you were convinced would be a star is turning out to be a gigantic disappointment. She just isn't delivering at a level that is even close to your projections; and you are not going to meet your projections and goals. What do you do? Do you need to let her go?It's a tough decision as you have invested so much in terms of time and money to bring the new salesperson up to speed on your company; it's culture and it's products and services. The though of finding a replacement and going through the process of education someone else is overwhelming. You wonder how you can go through this again.Have you ever considered a coaching solution -- for yourself? I'll bet you thought I was going to suggest coaching for your underperforming salesperson? No, I am suggesting coaching for you, the sales manager. Through a coaching solution you can develop a coaching approach for yourself that will transcend years into the future, all the while you improve your staff's success potential.


Many sales leaders are turning to coaching models today to manage and grow their staff competencies. They are also using assessments to help determine who are the appropriate hires and who is right for a promotion. Assessments help managers determine who's the right fit based on incredibly valid data. When we hire based on resume's and face to face contact, we are only seeing about one-third of the candidate... not nearly enough information to make credible, positive hiring judgments for very important positions.Managers can compare thinking and behavioral styles to those criteria of your top performers who are important to you and your business. From this information you can determine not only job fit, but also where there might be behavioral and training needs that need to be addressed. Once you have this information you are positioned to make the best possible hiring decision.Through the coaching and assessing model of managing you continually improve your proficiency and are leading your sales team with maximum impact.

What Does a Sales Manager Do?

Are you considering the leap from client facing sales to the role of sales manager? Have you wondered what it is that the sales manager does? Let's look at the top 10 activities that the sales manager performs on a regular basis.1. Managing Targets/Quota: Every sales manager will have a target that is the total of all sales people that are reporting to him/her. In a situation where there are agents or partners involved, the sales manager will also carry this target. The sales manager must look at all potential means to close this target as management will be looking to him/her to find a way to close any and all 'gaps' between projections and targets.2. Working on Strategy with your Team: Often this element is forgotten in the rush to provide numbers on a continual basis for your management. However it is one of the most important things you will do to develop the skills of your team. Through their interactions with you and exploring the opportunities at hand you have the opportunity to truly provide value to your salespeople.3. Reporting: Unfortunately the role of the sales manager also contains quite a bit of reporting. The sales manager may be asked to report on funnel activity, forecasts (30, 60, 90 days), current month commitments, and specific products sold. They may also be asked to participate in marketing initiatives designed to improve the sales function.4. Managing the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software: Hand in hand with reporting goes managing the CRM (and more specifically the use of the CRM by the sales team). If the CRM is to be effective, your sales people need to use the CRM on a regular basis - capturing all the information they can about the customer and the communication with the customer. Not only is this critical in situations where a new person takes over an account, but it is also essential so that senior management can truly gauge the relationship with prospects and customers.5. Client Visits: While this is probably one of the most exciting thing for a sales manager to participate in, often it is the first to suffer given the pressures from all of the other items. During client visits the role of the sales manager is one of support (supporting the sales person), gathering information for coaching (whether in the moment coaching or scheduled coaching later) and observation. It also important for the customer/prospect to feel that they are connected to your organization by more than just the sales person. This adds credibility and strength to your sales person's offer to the client.


6. One on One Meetings: On a regular basis the manager will want/need to have one on one meetings with the salesperson. These meetings should focus on the mechanics of the position - what opportunities are hot, how can you help, where do you need to engage others in the organization. What these meetings are not is coaching meetings.7. Coaching Meetings: On a regular basis (no less than once a month), you need to meet with your people to provide coaching advice. The goal here is not only to provide feedback on a regular basis but also to give the employee the opportunity to implement feedback and improve on their results. If you do not have a coaching methodology, please feel free to look at my article coaching using the GROW methodology. I find that this approach works very well.8. Communicate: Your role is also to communicate both up into your organization as well as to your team members.9. Maintaining Morale: You must be prepared to support the organization and the direction it has been going. This means putting on a smile and being positive even when you may guess that things are going in another direction. With that said, you need to be transparent with your team when you can be.10. Team Meetings: Conducting these meetings in a clear, concise and transparent way will enable your team members to feel as part of the larger 'machine'. They will not only feel better about themselves and their colleagues, but also about your leadership and where you are taking the Team.Are there more items than those detailed above? Of course there are! One thing certain about being a Sales Manager and the role you perform is that change and chaos is inevitable. Your challenge is to be open, welcome these, and transform them for your Team.

Patience and the Art of the Sale - Growth Is Needed for Our Deals, Our Teams, and Our Clients

'Patience is necessary... One cannot reap immediately what one had sown' Soren KierkegaardIn today's high tech - instant gratification age we forget the basic truth that Kierkegaard shares. Patience is necessary in all things. Whether we are talking to the teenager that expects to leave school with no firm foundation to walk into a six figure income without putting forth the required work and innovative approaches required or a sales person that expects to close every deal without putting in the effort required to nurture the customer and the deal - in both cases we are really dealing with a certain level of immaturity and entitlement.We need to remind our team members that it does take time and patience for the seeds we plant to grow to a size that makes reaping a profitable venture. Just like the seed that grows to a plant that is ready to harvest - after nurturing and caring - so too our sales opportunities must be be tended and developed to the point where we can complete the sale. If we pull the plant too early we may end up with an underdeveloped yield. We pull the same plant too late and the plant may be past it's prime and only good for seeding the next crop. So too with our sales deals Pus the client before they are ready and your deal will not yield as much or provide as much benefit to the client. Wait too long and the circumstances around the deal may have changed so much that it may not resemble our initial vision of success.Given this truth, one must naturally ask why it is that the feeling of instant gratification and quick deals is perpetuated in our sales culture. Yes there are definitely those commodities and services that allow for the 'one call' deal yet the number of these do not align with the approach the majority of companies take. It is my belief that this is actually a failure in our organizations - a schism in the corporate culture that demands month after month performance from even the newest sales representative and does not provide sales management with the luxury of time to plant the seeds that will grow into deals. In such a case it is no wonder that uncertainty and self analysis/fear of the next months cause an unnaturally high stance of burnout amongst our middle management - one could argue our most critical level of management.


The inevitable question that arises for the leadership team relative to the balance of urgency and nurturing deals. How do we, as senior leaders, balance the need to 'feed the beast' (whether this is our shareholders or our next level of management)?We all acknowledge the truth that we cannot speed a plant to grow faster organically. Yes we can apply pesticides and genetic modification to increase the yield of the crops - but when we look at the ecosystem of a sale rarely do we have the opportunity to 'engineer' a deal for the greatest yield. Yet the demands of the organization and of the street drive harder and harder for the leadership team (and by trickle effect the entire organization) to attempt to deliver increasing amounts of profit without investing in the most critical element - patience.-------

Sixth Basic Principle Of Sales: To Be Aware of the Concept of Competition

In our world, competition existed, still exists and it will always continue to exist in every human activity. Many people believe nowadays that the bigger the competition is concerning a product, the less the possibilities are to sell it. This opinion is a huge mistake. Do you know which products are the most difficult to sell? Those that are characterized by the less competition!! Why? Because competition is equal to free advertising.Thus, competition does not play any important role. It does not even matter how many sellers have already spoken to our potential customer. The only thing that seriously matters is who we are and how professional we are regarding our job, in other words if we enter an enterprise in a professional way, if we deal with each one of our customers that enter our store in a professional way and eventually, if we show enough professionalism so as our potential customer can trust us.Let me tell you a secret: when you enter the place of your potential customer you should think that you are the first person who meets the customer to talk to him about this particular product. In fact, you are the first person: the customer may have heard all these things many times before but he had not heard them from you.Consequently, we should not be scared of competition but we should be aware of it. What are the other companies of the same field? It is helpful to carry out a research concerning this issue so as to form our own opinion regarding competition in our field. Do we know all positive features of our company against our competitors? Do we belong to a big or small enterprise of our field? If we belong to a small company and in case our customer asks us, do we know all advantages characterizing our company against a bigger enterprise?


Let's be more precise. A small enterprise:1. Pays greater attention to each one of its customers.2. It is more flexible. We discuss about something at this present moment and it can be implemented immediately and not in a week.3. It is more adaptable meaning that in case there is an initial agreement with a customer, everything is more positive in the future.4. It is more personal. Prices can be adapted to each customer's demands.5. There is an immediate delivery of the products.If we belong to a big enterprise, our strong points can be the following:1. Our company's power along with its extended clientele shows us that many people trust our company.2. Advertising as well as marketing of a big company enforce its products. This means that the customer knows its products quite or very well.3. Long-term cooperation: such a big company inspires safety for a long- term cooperation.4. There is the possibility of lower prices in the company's products compared to the average characterizing its competitors and this is due to the company's power.Thus, in any case regardless of the competition and the other companies existing in this particular field, we always pay attention to the positive features of our company so as to gain our customer's trust. Always remember: the market out there is really huge. Saturation will never happen. In case there is saturation of a product, sooner or later other similar products will come up. Human needs never end because this is exactly what human nature is.

Recruitment Training - 3 NLP Techniques That Will Send Billings Ballistic

When it comes to recruitment training for ambitious recruitment business owners, it generally spells one thing. Get my recruitment consultants billing more and consistently! The ultimate goal for any business is to increase revenue and profit. One sure fire way is to bill more. So what needs to happen for your consultants to send their billings through the roof? It comes down to a much used term and that is closing the sale. Before that can happen a few things need to have taken place first. Usually around the ability to set a realistic goal or target and a route to achieve it.Add into this ethical and elegant influencing skill and you will be on the home run. One way to do this is to utilise NLP. NLP is a great model that can show us exactly how to do this. The even better news is that it is based on the results others have achieved. NLP is the abbreviation for Neurolingustic programming. In lay man's terms this means how the mind and body all work together to achieve exceptional results. So here are three key NLP techniques that when you use them will increase your results.1. Start with the end in mindSo often consultants can take action on something without thinking about exactly what they want to happen. A great technique is to set a well formed outcome. This is where we start with the end in mind and then work our way through exactly what is going to happen, how we will feel and what the desired result is that we want. Remember this is what successful people do and their exact process has been studied.2. RapportSo now we have our well-formed outcome what next? Rapport my friend. This is one of the most powerful parts of NLP, especially if you are in the influencing professions, which of course as recruiters we are. In one famous book on selling there is a quotation that states that 85% of successful sales come through the ability to establish rapport. Now in this context we are not talking about the fact that you both like football or rugby. We are focused on something deeper and powerful. That is an unconscious connection that you make with someone. The amazing thing is that you can be in rapport with almost anyone, if you follow the process. An easy way to do this is through body language and voice. It is easy to learn fast and will bring results.


3. LanguageLanguage is powerful at any level from the words we say to ourselves to the voice pitch and tone we talk in. Words do influence. One of the ways to use this to your advantage is to identify language preferences that people use and then use similar words and phrases. The guys who developed NLP were called Bandler and Grinder. Something they noticed is that as humans we have three main preferences in the language we use. We are visual, auditory, or kinaesthetic. In reality we are a mixture of all three. You can spot this easily. The visual people will use words like; "See what I mean", "Show me how that works", if we are auditory we might say, "Sounds logical", "I hear what you are saying". The kinaesthetic people might say; "I feel that this is not the best thing to do". You get the picture! Matching language like this is powerful and builds an unconscious connection with people. Have a go and see.So there you have just three things that you can help your recruitment consultants embrace that will skyrocket their billings.

The Importance of Leading and Real Time Indicators for Sales Leaders

When sales leaders look at their sales team success they often only key in and look at the actual sale. The sale or the closing of a prospect is of course important - but it is only one piece to the puzzle. Sales leaders have to look at Leading, Lagging and Real Time indicators when they are evaluating sales performance of their teams.The closure of the sale is a lagging indicator and unless you are closing sales daily, you could already be in trouble.So how do we as sales leaders create effective indicators that assist us in evaluating the behaviors required today for sales tomorrow as well as into the future? The answer is the utilization and management of Key Performance Indicators or KPIs for short, specifically by managing the following three indicators, Leading, Lagging and Real Time. These key three will ensure you have a healthy sales funnel and future business. They provide an objective form of measurement that if done correctly allows you to see into the future allowing you to change direction swiftly or solve roadblocks within your team.To effectively implement these KPIs as a sales leader you will need to determine how you will measure them correctly is to clearly differentiate with your team what a sales pipeline is and that of a sales forecast. A sales funnel provides clear visibility into all of your opportunities, regardless of their probability of closing, whereas a forecast is a subset of the pipeline that only includes qualified opportunities that are expected to close within a defined period.A properly defined funnel and its sales stages help you organize your sales process and create effective tools and benchmarks for your sales team, making it easier to forecast the future success of your sales team. In fact, using KPIs, you'll know not only how your team is currently performing, but also what roadblocks they are encountering.Implemented correctly a sales forecast becomes yet another forward planning tool you can use for budgets, spending, lead conversion success, cost per lead, and help you appropriately and accurately predict your revenues.Every sales leader should measure the following:Leading indicators - Funnel development• Sales cycle length• Number of qualified leads in the pipeline• Proposals to qualified prospective clients• Total length of time to qualify a new prospect• Number of new (first) client meetings per month• Cold calls to qualified prospect ratios and conversion rates


Sales leaders need to not only measure their teams opportunity-to-close ratio's but also the conversion from each stage of the sales process. Keeping an eye the length of your sales cycle, the number of new client meetings you have each month, and the conversion ratio of new leads to qualified leads will provide insights on whether you will be ahead or behind your companies sales goals and how you can best adjust them quickly and effectively when needed to ensure the accomplishment of said goals.Lagging indicators: Quota focused• Number of sales per quarter and year• Proposal to closed ratio• Average sales size• New clients versus existing clients• Annual sales quotaReal time indicators: Client management, retention and growth• Average client growth quarter over quarter• Client retention ratesDepending on your particular business, you may need to have additional KPIs. A payroll company might measure checks cut per client.The best sales leaders rely data when establishing KPIs. Each KPI should have an appropriate benchmark that is based on actual data derived from past sales history or if you are a start up or relatively new company utilize benchmarks from your particular industry. Review your sales from prior months, quarters or years to assist you in calculating averages and quotas. Knowing your average deal size and then combining that with lead conversion rates will give you a very accurate idea of how many opportunities your team will need to have in the funnel in order to exceed your sales quotas in a very objective and process driven way.Once your measurements are established they are only helpful if they are used. Know each of your KPIs, and review the data weekly. Manage the system and watch for any trends-both worsening and improving so you and your team can react appropriately. It's vital to include your sales team in this process; review each person's KPIs once a week in your coaching session. This will help them to understand what is important and help them see any issues in their performance early and allow them to make adjustments quickly based on data.KPIs allow sales leaders to more accurately predict the future of their sales team, their goals, and training needs that will ensure success.Bret J. Brockbank is a management and leadership expert with skills in sales, operations and human resources developed from years of experience all while delivering bottom line results.