SALES MANAGEMENT
Sales tales: the first sales hire is the hardest
By Stephen Allott, Venture Partner, Seedcamp Sales Tales
“How do I build out my sales team and what sort of salespeople should I hire?”
This question is close to the top of the list for founders doing sales themselves. I call it the “Founder Sales Phase”.
What prompts this question? Several things bring founders to me. One came to me with more inbound leads than they could handle, a great problem to have. Another founder wanted to get out of the sales role having led sales from the beginning. Another founder could not get sales going and needed help.
In my last Sales Tales blog I set the scene by explaining that “You’re selling not buying, when sales hiring”. Now, let’s get down to the real details of your first sales hire. By the way, I’m covering enterprise sales not digital sales. That’s for another time.
Normally I advise hiring 2 sales reps and not just one. Why? 3 reasons. 2 reps learn from each other and spur each other on. Second, if one fails then you are left with at least one good one. Third, it’s nearly the same effort to hire two rather than just one.
More decisions start popping up; like what exact role are you hiring for? There’s a lot of choices to make.
“Inside (desk based) sales or field sales”
“How much experience do they need” Common possibilities are: a seasoned trained rep with say 2 or 3 years of sales experience or a product of a sales training company who put raw graduates through a sales course or a raw graduate pure and simple.
“Would someone with experience of our industry who we can put through sales training be better than a sales professional who has to learn our industry?”
“How much do they cost?”
“What Job title? Is an “account manager” the same as a “sales executive” or “business development manager?”
Should we get a “full cycle sales person” or should we split the role into:
- Suspect list building by a “Market Development Rep”
- Calling the list to get meetings — done by a “Sales Development Rep”
- Closing the deal; done by a “Sales Executive”
Do we need a “Sales Natural” who can whiteboard and invent a sales process from scratch or should we get a “Product Rep” who can pitch a script but cannot invent one?
“Should we split hunters and farmers i.e. new business and existing account management?”
Who do they report to?
Can they work from home or must they come into the office?
Should we hire a sales manager and let them hire the sales team? Ie build top down or bottom up? I often prefer using an interim to hire bottom up for several reasons. It’s quicker. It’s cheaper. It’s less risky. Getting the sales manager hire wrong means the people they hire could well be wrong as well. Great sales managers are often more harder to attract to a start-up than a good quality rep (who has less at stake) but once you have some sales traction, it will be easier to attract a great sales manager.
The answers to these questions go into the “This role” page in the example deck mentioned in my previous blog.
Now you have a clear idea of the role you are hiring for, how do you source candidates, what are the selection criteria and whom should be on your interview panel?
Calling a specialist sales recruitment agency or headhunter (search firm) can be a reliable if expensive option. Get recommendations on good ones. Be prepared for a negotiation on fee levels. Agencies charge up to 20% of base salary as a success fee. Search firms do not do success fees. Rather they charge up to 30% of base salary often split into 3 tranches; brief, shortlist and start. The devil is in the detail on their contract terms. For example, check if you get refunds if the hire doesn’t work out.
Sweat other candidate sources. I researched where my great candidates came from and was surprised to find that they could come in from any source. There was no clear best one. Sources can include:
- Your web site. Make sure you post the role and upgrade your web site to top class standards. Red Gate Software have some good pages for example.
- Staff bounty scheme. Get an intern to ask all your staff for leads.
- AngelList
- Internal promotion
- Candidates who have inbounded before
- Your investors
- The Seedcamp Mobilize platform
- I have even seen job bill boards on roundabouts and railway stations.
Get a clear idea of what great looks like. I have learnt that the most important quality in a great sales hire is:
MOTIVATION
Sales can be a tough job and involve a lot of rejection. Motivation is what matters. Sales people can be motivated by success (coming top of the company sales league table and going on that “Club Trip” or “Presidents Club”) or just by money. In which case they are:
COIN OPERATED
Next check sales ability. Ask the candidate in the interview to sell you their mobile phone or pen or their car. Ask them to make a presentation. What you want to see is previous:
SALES SUCCESS
Ask for their commission statements to see if they beat their sales targets in previous jobs. Great sales people put their % performance against quota in their CVs. Put all these attributes into the deck.
For first time Founders I often recommend getting help. Hire an Interim Sales Manager on a one day per week consultancy and let them lead the process working as a team with you. This is a trick that works and it gets you from Founder Sales to First Sales Hire.
Your interim will lead your sales hiring and teach you how to do it for the future while maximising your short term sales success through coaching you on closing your current deal pipeline. Your interim will present a professional image to candidates, shaping their territories, targets and comp plan design. They will install best practice sales management processes such as forecasting, deal closing and account planning. They will onboard your new reps.
I learnt this technique at my consulting firm Trinamo and used it in some 75 engagements with great results.
Think about what a great job ad would look like. Here is one of mine.
Organise your interviews well. Details matter. Both from selecting the right candidate from your point of view to making a good impression on the candidates you want to hire.
And here is the destination. 2 new reps on board and having fun. That was hard but worth it.
Your first sales hire is the hardest.
Get them working well and before you know it, you’ll be hiring more reps and thinking about “how does your team grow.”
