The 4 Critical Systems you MUST have in place before you hire your next (or first) salesperson

by John Blake | John Blake Sales Breakthrough Solutions 

I keep having the same conversation…

The business owner asks, “so what do you do?”

and I tell them

Then, with a look of tortured angst in their eyes it starts...

“We hired a guy to to do sales…”

And suddenly, I know what’s coming next…

They hired a sales guy - paid him 120K plus commission, plus super plus plus

He worked for them for over a year and…

He didn’t sell anything…zip

not 1 cracker...

My immediate thought…

“Wow ! how could you call yourself a salesman, work for someone for 12 months, take a 120K wage and not sell anything?”

Often, however it’s because the business isn’t setting the salesperson up for success and therefore they tend to fail...

In fact, data shows that 48% - 75% of new sales hires fail

What follows are the 4 (often missing) critical systems you must have in place to set your new sales hire (and therefore your business) up for success and give yourself (and them) the very best chance of succeeding.

• Selection System
• Induction system
• Training System
• Ongoing Management System

Failure to put these four systems in place will almost certainly lead to them leaving either through lack of results or lack of faith in themselves, you and the business.

Selection System

You can save yourself a stack of pain and frustration by getting super clear on the exact profile of the person you want. The best question to ask yourself BEFORE you hire anyone is…

Who is most likely to succeed in this role?

Read that last question again because if you get this bit right the rest will flow really nicely

Induction System

The best way to set your business and the new sales hire up for failure is to hire them and then leave them to their own devices. In this situation, they will immediately revert to the bad habits they picked up in their last role which you absolutely do - not - want.

What you do with them on…

By the end of the first day
By the end of the first week
By the end of the first month
And by the end of the first quarter

Will be critical and will ultimately determine the quality and length of their tenure with your company. If you’d like my sales superstar induction template simply contact me through my website and I will email it to you www.john-blake.com.au

It should go without saying but you also need a clear job description including commission structure.

Training System

You need to have a high converting, documented, tested and proven sales process to teach your new hire. Without this, it’s highly unlikely they will succeed.

Ongoing Management system

To get this right you need the following in place

A CRM - so you can track opportunities and more importantly the activity your salesperson is doing

A regular cadence of 1 on 1 meetings and group sales meetings - if you have more than 1 people in your sales team

The right meeting structure - how these meetings are structured and what you examine in these meetings is also crucial. If you want my 1 on 1 and group meeting structure simply contact me through my website and I will email it to you www.johnblake. com.au

As you can no doubt appreciate, there is a lot more to getting these four systems in place in your business so they continue working for you, however, if you simply do as I have said above, you will increase the likelihood of success by a factor of 10 or more.

For more information about the contents of this article please contact John Blake at john@john-blake.com.au

Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash