The truth is...finding good sales candidates is not that difficult in today's electronic world. There are all the job boards, social networking sites like LinkedIn, and numerous other sources.
The real challenges are in the selection and attraction of a good hire. And in the sales role, the cost of a bad hire is very high. Because even an average salesperson can sell themselves in an interview, it is often difficult to get an accurate read on their true abilities.
One of our recent surveys revealed the following five challenges we think you should know about when recruiting sales people (and how to address them):
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Determining whether the candidate in front of you will translate into the star employee you're looking for. A star candidate is prepared. A star candidate exudes confidence and talks about specific accomplishments and results—not generalities. You want to hear things like, "Consistently exceeded quota", "top producer four years in a row", "met 150% of goal." And finally, a star candidate closes. One person surveyed illustrates these points: "Good candidates research us well. They read up on us, they go to stores to see our products on shelf, they go to stores in different channels to see what our shelf presence looks like and what that says about our strategy. They have prep notes for each interviewer because they've talked to the recruiter about who's on their slate and what role they have in the decision. They have questions for each person they'll meet. And they close each interviewer. If a candidate for a sales job doesn't close the interview, they aren't going to be any stronger with buyers."
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Affording the talent you seek. Sales people often feel like they are worth more than a company is willing to pay. Great sales people are good negotiators, so if they aren't negotiating with you...they won't negotiate with your customers well either. Make sure you have a realistic view of what sales people make, make sure your sales compensation plan is designed to incent for the results you are looking for, and finally never CAP your sales person's earning potential. Your top sales person may make more than you do...but that is okay if they are outperforming your wildest expectations!
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Selling the opportunity. When trying to recruit a star sales person (who is likely blowing out their numbers in their current position), you must remember you are asking them to give up their established success and start from scratch somewhere else. You need to be prepared to provide them solid evidence of how quickly they can start making an impact and closing deals.
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Differentiating between a Hunter and Farmer. As one person in the survey put it: "those who can sell an established product, for an established company within an established market, and those who can launch a product, build a company's relationships from scratch or open a market." As you review their experience/resume, make sure their past experience aligns with what you are looking for in a candidate. If you are opening a new territory with this new hire, only hire someone who has been successful opening territories in the past and ask them to detail their experience and/or successes in doing so.
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Assessing a candidate's "motivation." A motivated sales person is a successful one. One survey respondent shared clues on identifying a motivated candidate: "A motivated salesperson doesn't just participate in the interview they excite it. And frequently ask far more questions than normal. They are physically full of energy and enthusiasm. They also have a good reason for wanting the job and most often that reason is to have an opportunity they haven't had before. One of the most important things to understand clearly here is why are or did they leave the last position."
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Over 60 sales and marketing templates (DOC, XLS, PPT, and PDFs)
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Loads of "how-to" articles and examples
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8 Training sessions (MP3 audio files) for your computer or iPod
