We’ve all seen the ‘50% off’ SALE signs. They usually apply to the products a company sells. But, for too many businesses, it actually applies to the salesforce they employ – ‘50% off’ their sales effort.
At least 50% of their sales team is delivering far less than they’re being paid to deliver. And the underperforming people are, often, being paid exactly the same as the high flyers. What a lousy investment.
When salespeople fail to close a vital deal, it can have a catastrophic impact.
“But surely every organisation misses out on some sales” I hear you say. And, of course, the answer is yes – but the level of that ‘failure’ should tell you pretty quickly if it’s the norm – or too much to live with.
There’s a fundamental question. Why do so many companies employ salespeople who can’t sell their product? We know they can SELL…after all they managed to sell themselves at the interview! But what goes wrong once the ink’s dry on the employment contract?
The old adage says that a good salesperson can sell anything – but nothing could be further from the truth. Imagine the requirements for someone selling high-volume commodity products as opposed to someone selling long-term consultancy projects…..it’s not surprising that so many salespeople disappoint their employers.
Even past sales success is no guarantee of a future till-ringer. Predicting future success from previous performance is a high-risk strategy, particularly if it was a different product in a different market for a different company.
50% of salespeople are selling the wrong product!
Rather more surprising is research (across multiple industries and every size of company) that indicates that a massive 50% of salespeople are selling the wrong product!
Even more worryingly, the research revealed that:
- 25% of salespeople don’t have the skill and abilities needed to be a successful salesperson (i.e. they can’t sell!), and
- 80% of sales are produced by 20% of salespeople.
So how do you avoid employing highly paid, but totally ineffective, salespeople?
Should you steal your competitor’s best salesperson?
‘Aha’ you might say, ‘if I steal my competitor’s best salesperson, I’ve eliminated the risk that they can’t sell AND the fact that they can’t sell my product.’
But you could be wrong. Sales success in one place can’t automatically be translated elsewhere because a large part of a top salesperson’s success is linked to company culture.
You may sell similar products but your business, its environment, its processes could be hugely different to that of your competitor, where the ‘poached’ salesperson thrived. Success in your business could mean you have to redefine the role, train the new person to work differently and get them to think about selling for your company in a completely different way.
In short, although prior sales success is often the only thing recruiting managers look for, you can’t, necessarily, import previous success without key changes – either to the individual OR your organisation.
Don’t let your search start and end with your candidate’s immediate past.
Of course, a previous track record is not a bad thing to look at – unless it’s the only thing you’re looking at. Following this process might help:
- Study your own company and customers and think about what you want sales excellence to look like.
- Look at people in your company who are already successful in sales and still growing, smashing ever-higher targets. They will provide you with the data you need to hire future top salespeople.
- From that data, you can create the benchmark against which potential recruits are measured.
- Use the benchmark you create, and the candidate’s results against that benchmark, as a key part of your recruitment process. When a candidate matches your existing stars, it means they’re capable of getting more of the same good results. All you have to do is manage them properly.
That same benchmark can be just as effective with poorer performers already in the business. It will help you identify the gaps between average or poor performers and the stars. If the gaps are small, you can coach those employees to perform better. If the gaps are large, you can consider redeploying them to a role that better suits their skills.
Extensive research by Hunter & Schmidt in the Harvard Business Review quantified the productivity difference between an ‘average’ performer and a ‘superior’ performer as 32%. In essence, if you recruit a superior performer, you will get 32% more from them than an average performer.
Better still, if you can coach your existing average performers to be superior, their performance could improve by up to 32% (it can be more for senior sales people). Even if you find yourself with no ‘superior’ performers at all, the productivity difference between a ‘poor’ performer and an ‘average’ performer is also at least 32%.
Take the Great People Inside performance check:
- Look at your current salesforce.
- Evaluate how many Superior, Average and Poor performers you have.
- Imagine being able to move even some of them to the next level and you will be able to quantify the size of the prize.
If you like what you see, contact Great People Inside and we will help you get where you want to be.
Great People Inside is the world’s leading provider of customised recruitment/development assessments. We offer proven, successful assessments to get your sales recruitment right.
If you want to know more about how our psychometric assessments can help your company measure every potential sales recruit’s suitability, before they join your team, CONTACT US.
