“Sales is Easy” We are all in sales aren’t we? Sales often gets a bad rap. I believe that selling is an essential element in any business and, often, it’s your own beliefs around “sales” that prevent you from being successful.
I invite you to move into the mindset that “sales is easy”. Within my book, I will show you the importance of creating the right system and sustaining the right environment.
Every person involved in the selling process has to understand that it is actually a journey. The buyer and the seller are traveling on parallel paths.
You have to know that journey inside and out to get better at selling. It’s not a mysterious process. There are several common steps.
The first step is cultivating an open mindset.
Step two involves developing thorough product knowledge.
Then, you move on to learning how to ask the right questions.
A little further down the path, you and the client work at identifying the client’s needs. Further still, it is time for an offer, or a presentation.
You have nearly made it to the end of the path when you begin to negotiate terms, but, remember that the path never really ends.
You should continue looking after that client to ensure that you will meet again, down the road.
Mike Brunel started mikebrunel.com after being a successful entrepreneur and founder of NRS Media. He co-founded NRS Media in Wellington, New Zealand, expanded it into a global powerhouse in media sales and training, and was eventually responsible for opening offices in London, Atlanta, Toronto, Sydney, Capetown, and Bogota. His products and services are now sold in 23 countries and in 11 languages generating $350 million annually in sales for his clients. Mike sold the company in 2015 and now spends his time following his passions which include rugby, travel. His promise: “I can find thousands of dollars in your business within minutes – GUARANTEED” TRY ME!
If you’ve read my last few posts. you’ll see that I’ve been discussing the mistakes business owners make ( I have made every one of them- no kidding!) when it comes to getting the right salesperson on your team.
I want to give you as much value as I can, so here are three important hoops (as I call them) that you might want to think about when it comes to employing new salespeople.
Structure Not Gut
Hoop 1- Company Culture FitCompany Culture– While we believe that fitting in with the company culture is important, as demonstrated in the graph on our FREE report, it makes up only 10%.
Don’t get too caught up in making sure this is a major part of the recruiting process.
Create a good job description.
This is a critical factor in hiring good salespeople. When you advertise for a salesperson what do you ask?
How do you define the role? What are you looking for? What is the remuneration?
*Chet Holmes, one of my early mentors, always did this exercise when advertising for super salespeople.
Write down three initiatives that you would love to hire someone to do in your business.
Three only. Next to each one, do this:
What would it mean to your business?
How would it change your business?
Now list what you could afford to pay such people if they really performed.
Do the exercise. This forms the foundation of good a job description.
Hoop 2- Structuring an interview – History of Success.
Once you get the CV’s for the position, look for a history of success. Somewhere that you can see a challenge; a life experience that they overcame.
Structuring an interview- A structured interview process makes up 30% or a third of the process (FREE report). That’s a lot. In your structured interview, you should have some questions to ask, after reading the CV. Here are a few to start with.
How do you function as a team?
How do you feel about operating in a team environment?
Do you like working on your own outside of that team?
Can you tell me about a time when you were asked to do a project on your own? What was it?
These questions might just get the process moving.
Challenge the candidate– You are hiring salespeople to do a specific job. Human beings inherently will do anything to avoid pain. However, in the business of selling, rejection is part of what selling really is, and it can be painful.
If everyone got 100% of the business every time they presented a product, the salesperson would be out of business.
If you are hiring a salesperson to sell your product and prospecting is part of that, would you not at least ask them “What happens when you get a ‘ No!’ – How do you react?”
Ask them this, and see what happens: “ You know what, I’m not convinced that you are the right person for this job.” Observe their reaction. Do they just sit there? Or do they do something that indicates to you they might do the same with a client?
Hoop 3- Assessment Tools
This also makes up 30% of the job evaluation- We personally take a lot of guidance from these types of assessments and we go into more detail here: Download my FREE report We used to call these the B.S. detector.
We carried these assessments out in my company specifically for the roles we were looking for, in salary and performance-based positions.
Our salespeople had to work alone. We had salespeople sprinkled all over the world; usually unmanaged, working in an unstructured environment.
We had to be really clear on what we were looking for. That’s where traits/ behaviours come into play. We knew we had to hire for the task, not just the attitude.
In my next post, I explain what I look for in a salesperson, and how I came to that.
Download my FREE report to learn more, or email me… mike@mikebrunel.com
Mike Brunel started mikebrunel.com after being a successful entrepreneur and founder of NRS Media. He co-founded NRS Media in Wellington, New Zealand, expanded it into a global powerhouse in media sales and training, and was eventually responsible for opening offices in London, Atlanta, Toronto, Sydney, Capetown, and Bogota. His products and services are now sold in 23 countries and in 11 languages generating $350 million annually in sales for his clients. Mike sold the company in 2015 and now spends his time following his passions which include rugby, travel. His promise: “I can find thousands of dollars in your business within minutes – GUARANTEED” TRY ME!
Throughout my recent posts, my message has been: hire the wrong person and it’s going to cost you money…Heaps! Simple really.
The old chestnut ‘Hire attitude and then train’, in this brave new world of data and measurements, is an old belief.
Don’t get me wrong, a good attitude makes a difference, but traits or behaviours are key, in my view.
These were our main trait preferences:
Able to work on their own
Good prospector
Motivated by the Challenge
Understood what we did and how to sell it- then got on with it
Good people person
Curious
And many more.
How did we know:
We put all our people through the hoops that we talked about in previous posts. Then, after searching high and low, discovered an assessment to find those traits. FREE REPORT
This product provided us with a comprehensive objective assessment of a potential salesperson’s core character traits, and how they relate to success in a competitive sales position.
Simply put, it assessed how natural a fit to a sales career would be for this person.
Mike Brunel started mikebrunel.com after being a successful entrepreneur and founder of NRS Media. He co-founded NRS Media in Wellington, New Zealand, expanded it into a global powerhouse in media sales and training, and was eventually responsible for opening offices in London, Atlanta, Toronto, Sydney, Capetown, and Bogota. His products and services are now sold in 23 countries and in 11 languages generating $350 million annually in sales for his clients. Mike sold the company in 2015 and now spends his time following his passions which include rugby, travel. His promise: “I can find thousands of dollars in your business within minutes – GUARANTEED” TRY ME!
Hire in your own likeness- A potential salesperson comes in to meet with you, and within a short time you have hit it off, you may have even shared some key rapport-building facts about each other.
Of all the applicants that you have spoken with, this one is the one that you like the most. Your gut feels great, you like him, he reminds you of a younger you. You hire you.
Now you might be the best salesperson in your business, but if you want to grow, you better make sure that you do more than just hire on your gut.
It’s a good feeling to have, but there are other factors that come into play.
Fill a hole, find a salesperson.
This is a big mistake that I see all the time. Hiring under stress. As the saying goes “Hire slowly Fire quickly.” As a business owner, we do feel the pressure of getting a position filled.
Maybe, as a sales manager, you may feel the pressure to fill the quota and get the sales back on track. It’s natural that you push them through quickly. I have been guilty of this myself until I learned that hiring to fill a hole is a recipe for failure. How do you learn? Watching that money flush down the “you know what”!
“No one can sell as well as you do”
This one is a beauty. You are afraid to hire because they might just not be as good as you. I remember taking on a position of Sales Manager in a company, to find that the amazing sales manager I replaced had all the top clients, held onto them, and starved the team of success.
No one could sell like him I was told. Well, guess what? When I gave some of his clients to the other members of the team, the business never looked back.
If your business is going well and you want to grow, this attitude will stop you in your tracks.
Growth only comes in a business if you are prepared to hire more ‘how’ people that can free you up to help you make better decisions around what you are good at.
I can pretty much guarantee my clients a foolproof way to multiply their business tenfold. Hire more people to do the how and you do what you get excited about.
Those are the big three mistakes that business owners make when it comes to hiring salespeople.
Mike Brunel started mikebrunel.com after being a successful entrepreneur and founder of NRS Media. He co-founded NRS Media in Wellington, New Zealand, expanded it into a global powerhouse in media sales and training, and was eventually responsible for opening offices in London, Atlanta, Toronto, Sydney, Capetown, and Bogota. His products and services are now sold in 23 countries and in 11 languages generating $350 million annually in sales for his clients. Mike sold the company in 2015 and now spends his time following his passions which include rugby, travel. His promise: “I can find thousands of dollars in your business within minutes – GUARANTEED” TRY ME!
To coincide with releasing this free report, I wanted to share some of my thoughts around how I have hired salespeople and some key takeaways I have learned, through good and bad hires.
Who is this for?
It’s for any business owner, Sales Manager, or a startup who needs to hire a salesperson who is rewarded by a salary and performance-based performance-based
If you’ve ever hired any salespeople, like I have, you’ve usually made or have made one of these mistakes.
Just so you know, I’m fully qualified to be writing about this stuff – I’ve hired, fired, coached, or managed hundreds of salespeople, over too many years to remember, in many different countries and languages.
It’s fair to say that I’ve been through the school of hard knocks.
I hired magnificent salespeople beginning with one wonderful amazing woman, a single mum, who through sheer hard work and effort exceeded her targets in her job as a sales manager in a small media company in New Zealand.
With my main business, I was lucky to find two brothers for my U.S. operation who brought in millions of dollars.
These two superstars have certain traits, talents, and habits, that we knew would leverage our sales systems worldwide, if we could duplicate their process…. which we did.
As a result, I noticed traits in these people, secrets that I always look for. I think I know by now, what they are.
Before I go into that, let’s talk about two of the mistakes that we often make, when we go to hire salespeople.
What not to do
What’s the cost of Hiring Badly?
Think about these stats for a moment. According to a Harvard Business review article, the cost of replacing a salesperson that was hired badly ranges from $75,000 to $90,000, while other sales positions can cost a company as much as $300,000.
These figures don’t reflect the lost sales while a replacement is found and trained.
One of my good friends who owns a telecommunication company has told me a bad hire for him costs a least $1 million over time.
That’s horrendous. This may not change as we enter this new world of communication. As a company or small business, you simply cannot afford to hire on gut alone.
Is Fit Important? Maybe.
A culture fit in any business is important, there’s no doubt about that, but what you need to discover firstly is “Does this person have the ability/talent to do the job?”
That is the underlying question that needs to be asked by you as an employer of salespeople.
In the next blog, I am going to cover off some of the common mistakes that we made when we hired a salesperson for our business.
Mike Brunel started mikebrunel.com after being a successful entrepreneur and founder of NRS Media. He co-founded NRS Media in Wellington, New Zealand, expanded it into a global powerhouse in media sales and training, and was eventually responsible for opening offices in London, Atlanta, Toronto, Sydney, Capetown, and Bogota. His products and services are now sold in 23 countries and in 11 languages generating $350 million annually in sales for his clients. Mike sold the company in 2015 and now spends his time following his passions which include rugby, travel. His promise: “I can find thousands of dollars in your business within minutes – GUARANTEED” TRY ME!
Throughout my 30 years of selling advertising to companies of all sizes, I learned many valuable lessons. I began as a door-to-door stationary salesperson in Sydney, selling everything from pencils to exercise books. I then moved on to selling carpet services in London, utilizing promotional brochures to generate leads. It was during this time that I realized the importance of face-to-face sales.
Direct media selling was my next endeavour, where I discovered the challenge of selling something invisible – a service, rather than a physical product.
Selling the Invisible
Advertising is intangible, existing in the form of airtime or a gap in a TV program. Building trust became critical to my success, and I quickly learned the value of meeting clients in person to establish a relationship.
As my career progressed, I discovered the power of selling to many.
When I started NRS Media, my partner Doug Gold introduced me to the concept of a “membership program.” Advertisers could purchase advertising time at a discounted rate, but only if they committed to a 12-month automatic debit payment plan.
This approach generated over $1 million in advertising commitment before the media company even launched.
I developed a sales system around this model, generating over $1 billion in revenue for our media partners worldwide.
Our seminars, using a “one-to-many” presentation model, boasted attendance rates of 70-80%, with closing rates as high as 50%.
The key to success lies in developing a process for your product, which can be easily accomplished through digital means. Many companies are already doing an excellent job of utilizing the one-to-many approach to distributing their information.
In conclusion, while face-to-face sales remain essential, selling to many through a free seminar or digital process has become increasingly crucial.
I encourage you to have fun selling your products this week, utilizing the power of technology and personal relationships to build lasting connections with your clients.
Mike
Mike Brunel started mikebrunel.com after being a successful entrepreneur and founder of NRS Media. He co-founded NRS Media in Wellington, New Zealand, and expanded it into a global powerhouse in media sales and training. He was eventually responsible for opening offices in London, Atlanta, Toronto, Sydney, Capetown, and Bogota. His products and services are now sold in 23 countries and 11 languages generating $350 million annually in sales for his clients. Mike sold the company in 2015 and now spends his time following his passions, including rugby and travel. His promise: “I can find thousands of dollars in your business within minutes – GUARANTEED” TRY ME
