How You Can Recruit Sales Super Stars - Part I - Recognising Sales Sheep And Wolves

Ted Nicholas, the author of "Magic Words That Sell" once said,

"Marketing mistakes are by far the primary surmise businesses do not survive. This includes associates which consider themselves direct marketers as well as those who do not".

The Wolves

Of course Ted is quite right make mistakes in marketing and you'll end up paying through the nose with as a matter of fact no results. Yet associates continually make mistakes in sales.

How You Can Recruit Sales Super Stars - Part I - Recognising Sales Sheep And Wolves

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 result because they're at the limit of their possible already.

What About The Owners As Salestaff?

Often the owners in small associates 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, Menagerial clerk, Vat returns clerk, receptionist and normal "muck in and get the thing concluded or delivered" guy too.

We all know about 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, doing that we can't quite bear to tear ourselves away from working in the business.

I've been a advisor for over 20 years and I've rarely met a firm owner or director who's felt able to step back and consider the strategic aims of the firm as it grows.

It'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 firm reaches a point where you and your current staff are working all the hours there are to naturally stand still.

Growing the organisation is just an additional one item that stays on the "to do" list.

Before you reach that point you need 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.

It all comes down to recruiting the right salesman to take the firm to the next level - and tied to good marketing too of course.

Broadly you can break salesMen into sales sheep, sales wolves and sales super stars. Let me illustrate what that means to you as the firm owner.

Sales Sheep

They wait for buyer to come to them, or the phone to ring to take an order. Or they wait in a shop and sell purely because the buyer wants to buy something from anyone who wants to take their money. They think the buyer is all the time right even if it means that they'll lose money on an issue that the buyer created themselves. Or they'll give the buyer some stock they had lying around. What about the salesman who drops by and entertains their contacts to "touch base", "to see if there's anyone for me today" and who "nearly gets a sales but doesn't quite?"

Sales sheep cost you money. Let's count the ways:

• Their basic pay to sales ratio is higher than your own, or other sales staff
• They give stock or services away as sweeteners, or to get out of a problem
• They entertain clients on expenses and still don't get sales
• They entertain population at the clients who are not remotely associated to the sale process
• They don't follow-up and lose sales to competitors who doHow do you recognise one? There is a way before you even recruit them...

Sales Wolves

They approximately run out of your door and can't wait to close a sale. They're so keen they can make population buy your products and services even though they may be wrong for those customers. They know what you sell and try to sell it all to every customer, either there's a need for it or not. They're equally upfront in-house anyone that affects their sale, and often their commission, is bulldozed out of the way to make sure that sale gets done. Sometimes it's pushed through to the detriMent of other customers or sales people.

Sales wolves cost you money. Let's see how:

• They sell lots but you get a higher returns rate
• You get more external complaints, affecting your reputation and therefore referrals
• You get more internal complaints and lose staff or morale drops
• You lose sales by them tying up staff that other sales population need
• They don't want to know about buyer issues after a sale. They're too busy on the next saleHow do you recognise one? There is a way before you recruit them...

Sales Superstars

A good salesman gets in more firm than he costs you to run and make your firm more money than that. A bad salesman is a drain on your company. It can be approximately impossible to sort the good from the bad. Almost, but not impossible.

When you recruit a salesman you need to aim for the star salesman. Don't be put off because you think can't afford them.

The star salesman psychological profile is formed during their early childhood and you may catch one before they realise they're great. Or you may find one who was burnt out and is ready to join the fray again.

Either one doesn't want vast amounts of money. Remember even if you paid them 5 times what you pay yourself and they brought in 20 times more in behalf would their wages even matter?

According to psychological explore a star salesman is driven by two factors: Ego and empathy. Too much ego and they get the sales but at a huge cost to you in terms of buyer and internal relationships bruised or destroyed by the ego-driven salesman. Also known as a Sales Wolf.

Too much empathy and they end up discounting so deeply and being so wholly on their customer's side that you'll lose money on deals that would usually be profitable. Also known as a Sales Sheep.

Now you know how to tell sales sheep from sales wolves you want to find out how to get sales superstars. Check the next narrative in this two part series.

How You Can Recruit Sales Super Stars - Part I - Recognising Sales Sheep And Wolves

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