Kickfannie SalesEdge
by Allan Barmak for Kickfannie Sales & Marketing
We are hiring our first sales person. Any suggestions on how best to start growing a sales team in the early phases of a startup?
I have worked with several start-ups to help them build out a sales team, but the methods that I teach can easily be applied to any sales team who is challenged with growing revenue. It’s all about standardization and optimization.
No matter what stage your company is at, you can improve your sales numbers by first focusing on standardization. It is extremely important, especially when a company is just starting out, that there is a unified sales effort. You need to make sure that all of your salespeople are pitching the same value proposition to the outside world. If you don’t have this consistent baseline to start with, you will not be able to figure out where you succeed and where you fail.
The first step is to identify the characteristics of your ideal salesperson. You know your product, you know your ideal customer, and you know the ideal sales pitch. Now ask yourself- “Who is the best person to sell my product/service?” The ideal candidate will be different for different companies, and it may even be different for different products in the same company. For example, if you are selling a high-dollar value service, you need someone who has experience with strategic selling, since they will most likely be pitching CXOs and VPs. If you are selling a low-dollar value, high volume product, you may look for a junior sales rep that is willing and able to make 50-100 cold calls per day. In the end, you’ll probably land somewhere in between. Once you find your ideal candidate, hire 1-3 salespeople who fit that mold. I have seen companies hire huge sales staffs in a rush to get revenue, but they eventually end up working inefficiently and they lose control because they have not established the baseline.
Once you hire that initial small group of reps, work with them on a standardized pitch for the product. It is important that no one deviate from the pitch. The other important step of this process is for the salespeople to document everything. Make sure that they log every interaction with prospects and customers. Have daily or weekly meetings to review the successes and challenges from the field. By the time you have completed this stage of the process, you will have a firm knowledge of what hot buttons will help sell the product along with which answers to give which will overcome common objections. You may even find that feedback from the field requires you to make some changes to your product. This is great information to have, especially at the start-up phase, since you will be learning how to deliver a product or service that will resonate with your target audience. You will soon see an increase in sales as a result.
Lastly, once you are confident that you know all of the variables that will help you sell your product or service, it will be easy for you to expand the team since you will be able to accurately predict ROI for each new salesperson.
About the Contributor
Allan is a national speaker and author of “The Accidental Salesperson”. His live training events have been sold out all over the country. He leads a sales consulting and training firm which leverages his 20 years of sales experience in digital media. Over the years, he has worked with a variety of different companies, across a wide range of industries, helping each of them expand their sales operations by optimizing existing revenue streams as well as building new ones.
Throughout his career, he has an extensive history of success selling online advertising, including 10 years at AOL, and a total of 7 years with other digital start-ups.
For additional information on Allan check out his website at www.barmakgroup.com
Submit Questions for Allan to answer at SalesEdge@kickfannie.com