Sunday, December 31, 2006

Smashing Through Sales Goals In a Weak Economy! Imagine Me... Smashing Through Sales Goals In a Weak Economy! One of the most fundamental sales hiring mistakes is practiced by virtually every company. Companies only start recruiting for salespeople when they are "down" one or two salespeople It's Crazy That Every Sales Manager or Recruiter Doesn't Follow This Rule The time to start looking for your next salesperson is not when you're down one or two salespeople! In fact, there couldn't be a worse time to start looking Desperation and a sense of pressure to "fill the slot" cause Sales Managers and recruiters to do things in a short-sighted way. Worse, in most cases it prevents them from building a great team. Starting the sales hiring process after a salesperson leaves is comparable to the salesperson who tries to make their sales quota during the month. The time for a salesperson to make their quota is BEFORE the month begins. Salespeople that try to make their quota during the month will fail as sure as the sun will rise in the morning. Successful salespeople have their month's quota made going into the month. The Book On Who Runs the Best Sales Teams in the World Sales hiring works the same way. The smartest approach is to  have the position filled before the old salesperson walks out the door. How does the smart Sales Manager make sure this is how they manage? They ask themselves the following questions: 1. How many sales positions will I need to fill this year through attrition, replacing weaker salespeople and planned growth? 2. In order to fill this many planned positions, how many applicants will I need to find? (This number is the answer they arrived at in Question 1 times 20. It takes 20 legitimate applicants to make one good sales hire.) 3. How much advertising will I need to run in order to achieve the goal I've set in Question 2? 4. Who on my organization's support staff can I train to process the incoming flow of applicants? (Since at best 3 out of 20 applicants are worth taking time with, it is good strategy to not waste time with the other 17.) Now is the time great Sales Managers sit down to answer these questions -- in writing. 8:16:12 AM    comment []

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