You Decided to Hire a Salesperson: Other Tips

Image by Ev Kamikawa

We've talked about how you know if it is time to hire a salesperson and what to pay a salesperson.
Small Business Owners, and anyone else looking to hire salespeople, here are some more things to keep in mind:


-As an owner you CANNOT STOP prospecting. You may think that is one less thing on your plate by hiring a salesperson. If you think you can lie around in the sun now that you have a salesperson to prospect for you, YOU ARE WRONG! It is still your business. You need to continue to build the business and expand your network. It will take some time for your new salesperson to build a nice base of customers. You can't afford to stop prospecting during this time. Your network needs to grow so you can continue to mine it for sales. Even if you have a great sales staff  who are selling like crazy, you need to be doing some prospecting and selling to make sure you have credibility with your team and in case they were to all leave tomorrow they don't take all your customers and contacts with them. You also never want to be "held hostage" by your sales staff. At some point you will have to fire someone or someone will leave you. You don't want to be stuck going all the way back to square one and have to start finding new prospects.


-As an owner don't expect your salespeople to have 24-7 passion for your business. That is your job. That is not to say your salespeople won't care about the company or the products, but they get to go home and leave your business behind till the next day. It's one of the perks of turning over 80%+ of the sale to you. If the salesperson hits a rough billing patch or decides to go somewhere else, don't tell everyone they left or you fired them because they "didn't have the passion for your company or business." Salespeople leave for more money, or bad managers in general. People might call that "Conditional Passion" and that CP is bad. I would argue that CP is a natural part of life and we all do it every day. We choose what we are passionate about. Everything from TV shows, hobbies, music, to people. People who are married choose to stay together each day. When one partner gives the other reasons to doubt that choice or no positive reason to choose them then the marriage fails. How many ex girlfriends or boyfriends do you have? At some point someone chose not to continue the relationship. Sometimes someone is at fault. Sometimes both agree it isn't right in the long run and part on good terms. Same with a job. Give employees a reason to continue to choose your company every day and they will continue to be passionate about it. Sometimes they will leave because of something YOU did that may have been minor to you but important to them. Sometimes salespeople will leave for no obvious reason, it just wasn't going to be their long term future. If they were a good employee part as friends and be respectful because you both can hurt or harm each other very easily and odds are you will run into each other again. If the parting was bad because the person was a terrible employee then good riddance.

-If you do have to fire a salesperson or a salesperson leaves on good terms, be very careful what you say to anyone in the business community about the break up. There will be some circles where the salesperson is seen as the good guy and you the bad guy no matter what the situation was. The opposite is also true. Since you will indubitably encounter someone that knows you both, keep your thoughts to yourself. 


-As an owner NEVER come up to your salesperson and imply in any why that if you don't collect a non-forgivable draw that the company won't meet payroll (or in the case of two VP's I worked for, say that they will be fired). Salespeople have enough pressure hitting goal without you standing over them like a vulture waiting to grasp their money. That leads me to...


-Don't share every detail about the company's finances with your employees. All they care about is of the company is making money, will meet payroll, and will provide them the tools they need to be a success. This is different than having a company goal that everyone knows about and works toward.
If people ask or you want to share information, use phrases that won't worry them and get them to think they better start looking. I'm not saying lie to employees or never tell them anything, just not every nickel and dime and how you might be shifting money from one account to another or using a personnel line of credit, etc.

-Don't share details about the company's finances with your customers. If you are in a situation of cancelling your bill payment system (i.e. an online payment site or credit card processing) because no one uses it and you want to save the monthly fees because companies just send you checks, don't tell the customer that you are cancelling when they ask if they can pay the invoice online. It can make you look cheap. I've seen more than one owner say something like this and the customer goes from "yes" to "let me think about it" every time.

-Respect the salesperson for what they know. Teach them what they don't know.
Remember that they might have a better understanding of a client or situation than you do. Don't be bent on always doing it your way. You might be screwing up a deal or relationship. This is partner with...


-Don't tell your salespeople (or any employee) to "F off" under any circumstance and especially in front of other staff. If you don't want to hear an opinion that might not agree with yours...DON'T ASK! You've made the choice to invite someone else to share your passion for your business. Understand that there will be times that they might have a better understanding of a situation, client, or problem because they are not seeing it through the eyes of an owner. In the case of a client, understand they might have known the client longer than you and understand how the client thinks. Just because they have a different idea or way of doing something doesn't mean that they are somehow usurping your authority.

-If you are hiring a salesperson to sell you (like a consultant or speaker) or services you personally provide (i.e. an accountant, photographer, contractor), you have to always make sure they believe that you are the best in what you do. Don't give them a reason to doubt your ability to deliver the best service in the market. I'm not talking about new products that are trying and don't work, or new methods of delivering your product that ultimately doesn't work. I'm talking about you as a person and how you interact with clients and other staff. Don't lie to your staff or constantly belittle them. As soon as you do something that makes them think you are a jerk, they'll have a hard time selling you to a client because of that little bit of doubt about how you will interact with the client.

Just my two cents. Take it or leave it.


If you need to recruit some good salespeople, I've written several blogs about how to recruit salespeople so just search this blog for "job ads."

In the future I'll talk to salespeople about things they should be respectful of YOU for.

Thanks for reading!
Ev
"A Heck of A Nice Guy"