Last week, we discussed Understanding What Your Customers Want. If you are going to sell anything to another human being, you have to understand something about people as buyers because we respond to certain things in certain ways. With this in mind, there are two very specific sales “styles” that all human beings respond best to: Fact-based Selling and Story-selling. Below you will find a description of these two sales styles.

Fact-based Selling

This is the idea of using “facts” in the information you present to a potential buyer. A great example of this type of selling is any automobile ad you’ve seen on TV where they talk about how they were ranked #1 by J.D. Power in overall customer satisfaction. Whenever you use “facts” (usually presented as numbers) in a presentation, the buyer makes certain assumptions about you and your product/service. First off, because they believe that they could independently verify any “facts” you present to them, even though they never will, they believe that you won’t lie about facts. Because this is their overall belief, anytime you use a “fact” when selling your services they perceive you as more honest, credible, and professional than people who don’t use facts.

Specifically Using this Concept as a Recruiter

You would want to tie the facts you know about the service you provide with one of the items you know clients are going to care about. Let’s take speed as an example. If you want to impress upon a client that you understand that they care about speed and your process delivers quick results, you might say something like this to that client.

Jim, I know one of the things you care most about when deciding which recruiting firm you want to partner with is the speed of that firm: how fast can they deliver the candidates you need to you. Well, I can tell you we are fast, but I think these facts speak better for us. From the day we get an assignment until the day you have three qualified candidates on our desk is always less than 18 days. And the average time it takes us from the day we get an assignment until the day we have an excepted offer is typically less than 39 days. So you can see our process is very in tune with delivering quick results.

Story-Selling

Story Selling is another extremely successful style of selling. The concept of story selling involves telling a person the story of another person’s success. If the person you’re talking to wants the same results, they subconsciously transpose themselves into the other person’s story and imagine themselves getting the same results. A great example of this is any diet product commercial you have ever seen on TV. They tell you the story of how “Jane lost 18 inches off her waistline in only eight weeks.” And they show you a nice before and after picture. If losing weight is something you as the buyer would like to do you, imagine yourself getting the same results as “Jane.”

What this means to you is that you have to have stories ready that highlight your successes, and you need to look for openings to tell the story. Say a potential buyer mentions how they are so “tired of being flooded with worthless resumes.” You want to be ready to jump in with this: “Jim, it’s funny you mention that, because here at our firm we have what we call the “golden rule.” If I submit a candidate to a client, they have to meet at least 90% or more of the skills you require; they have to be willing to accept an offer in the range you give us; and they have to be motivated by at least one thing other than the money to want the job. If I were to send you a candidate who didn’t meet all three of those criteria, I get warned once and fired the second time. We had someone who worked here for eight years that was let go for just that reason.”

The bottom line: have stories of success ready for all the major points that we mentioned before; speed, accuracy, longevity, accepted offers, and hard-to-find people!!

How to Create the Ultimate Sales Fact Sheet

To be the most powerful salesperson you can be, you have to combine these two concepts and create facts and stories that are unique to your company and will help you present your information in a way that demonstrates you credibility. Below is a guide to help you discover what is unique about your firm. Simply sit down and answer the questions and you will start to discover what you truly have to sell to your customers.

Intro — History/Specialization/Brag Points (Quick little nuggets of information, not the centerpiece of your presentation)

• How long have you been in business? (Both you and your firm)
• Do you have a specialization that makes you unique?
• Have you received any awards?

Define Your Process:

You need to clearly define the process you use. It needs to be in simple easy to explain steps that anyone can follow; however, you have to define it in eight steps or less. Anything more than eight steps and people won’t be able to follow along. Here is the six-step process I use when talking over the phone.

1. Identification: In-depth analysis of position specifications; careful gathering of requirements with a “value” focus; results-oriented experience which effectively “sells“ company attributes so the most successful candidate is retained.
2. Research: Strategic planning for the most effective means for sourcing target candidates. Extensive integration of industry resources, virtual communities, magazines, and proven cold calling approaches.
3. Recruiting: Supported by an extensive database of candidates and companies, potential candidates are actively sought from direct competitors and parallel industries located locally, regionally, or nationally.
4. Assessment: The most important step in the process. Combining behavioral and targeted interviewing techniques, clients are ensured that the candidates presented possess all necessary, as well as many desired, skill sets which will prove their value as an exceptional performer within the company.
5. Interviewing: Complete and honest feedback coupled with tailored advice during the entire interview process, thus ensuring a smooth and seamless hiring transition.
6. Acceptance: Consultation and negotiation of all elements surrounding an employment offer. “Hands-on” involvement to ensure that the candidate identified gets hired and stays hired.

The big five selling points:

For each of these topics you need to know both a fact (knowing more than one is great but at least one is mandatory) and you also need a story to go with it as well. Some possible facts have been outlined under each category.

Speed

• Fact 1: Average number of days from the day you get a job order until you have three candidates submitted is:
• Fact 2: Average number of days from the day you get a job order until you have an offer is:

Accuracy

• Fact 1: What percentage of the people you submitted in the past year were brought in for personal interviews:

Accepted offers/Show-ups

• Fact 1: What percentage of offers you received in the past year were accepted:

Longevity

• Fact 1: What percentage of the people you placed five years ago are still at the company:
• Fact 2: What percentage of the people who have stayed have been promoted:

Closer — Fresh Talent

• Fact 1: What percentage of the people you placed in the past year weren’t in your database:

What if Your Facts Aren’t Good?

Do you find yourself in a position where your true facts aren’t as good as you’d like them. In these cases you sell your “mission” as a fact – to your potential customer they sound the same. You might use a phrase like this; “Jim, here at the ABC Agency we have a simple mission to put 3 quality candidates on your desk in less than 18 days.”

A Few Last Reminders Before You Get on the Phone

What you say is not always the most important issue – how you say it is more critical – sound confident, professional and personable whenever you’re talking.

Never script your marketing pitch – people call tell right away when you’re reading – just talk to people.

Don’t try to be “cute” with your presentation – tell them exactly how you can help them – be direct.

The Scripts That Work — 6-10

Welcome to the last installment of The Art of Marketing and Business Development series. Last week, we discussed the first five business development scripts that are working today:

1. Reference from an Internal Champion
2. C-level Approach
3. Vertical Market Approach — “Insight”
4. MPC/”A” Player Approach
5. Combination Approach

This article continues with highlighting the additional five marketing scripts, 6-1 0. Keep in mind: different selling situations will call for different scripts. As a recruiter, it is important to have as many options (clubs) in your recruiting bag as possible. Master them all, so you will be prepared for any selling situation and have the ability to pull them out when that shot is needed. Don’t forget, the goal is to achieve a large quantity of job orders coming in so you have the ability to continually ‘top grade’ the work you have on your desk. Until you get a large number of “A” search assignments (job orders), keep marketing every day. That’s right – every day.

Additional marketing scripts:

6. Job Posting Approach

Most recruiters are very familiar with searching and viewing the postings on the job aggregators (Indeed, Jobster, and Simplyhired) as well as the main job boards. These postings can be great sources for marketing opportunities if the appropriate approach is utilized. We don’t want to look like an ambulance-chasing attorney trying to make an extra buck. You have to be honest and upfront. It is most important to get the hiring manager’s name before the call. Calling into HR will do you little to no good. Get on LinkedIn or the company website and find out who the hiring manager is, then make the call as follows:

“Hi, Mr. Prospect, This is Jon Bartos from JSI. We haven’t talked before, but I need your help. Do you have a second? Great! We work with many of your competitors and focus exclusively on [name industry] Mobility Software. Here’s where I need your help: I had an email sent to me about a position your organization posted for a [position name] Mobile Software Systems Engineer. I recently concluded that same search for a competitor and have been working with a few “A” players that may be exactly what you are looking for now. If anything, it could certainly save you a significant amount of time in filling the position. Whom would I speak with at your organization to help you fill these openings?”

 If you get any resistance – you can try this:

“I was just trying to call to make your job easier. It’s proven that “A” players can be as much as 10x more effective than a “B” player. As you can imagine most of the “A” players are invisible to your job ads due to fact they are not actively looking; they are happy and knocking the cover off the ball with a competitor. The only real way to get hold of these impact players is through real relationships like I have with these individuals. Does it make sense to get a few of these “A” players in the mix and explore the possibilities?”

7. Flip Reference Check

Reference checks are an excellent way to get additional job orders and search assignments. By doing a very thorough and professional job conducting the reference check, you will have established enough rapport to ask for their help. Every reference check with a hiring manager should be flipped to see if there are opportunities to do business with their firm. At the end of the reference check, mention something like the following:

“Thank you for the time and the reference for [candidate’s name.] One quick question, since we work in the same industry as you do, who would I work with at your organization to help find great talent?”

You could also add in a few questions before this statement:

“How difficult is it for [organization] to find true “A”Players?”

“How are you finding your talent today?”

“How long does it take you to fill a position?”

“Really, what’s that costing your organization?”

“How are the current recruiting efforts working from your perspective?”

It is always good to find the pain in recruiting and maximize it – to open the door to the solutions you can provide.

8. Flip Recruiting Call and Strike a Deal

Recruiting calls are typically our biggest source of leads for job orders and search assignments. When talking to candidates daily about possible opportunities for them, it’s time to turn every one of those calls into marketing opportunities or at least a lead source for potential job openings. At the end of the call, the flip can be as easy as this:

“ I look forward to working with you on your job search and will do everything I can on your behalf to make sure you can be as successful as possible in finding the next step in your career. There is a favor you can do for me since we are working together. I have wanted to work with your organization for quite some time. Who would I need to talk to at your firm to initiate discussions on the possibility of helping them find the talent they need?”

 Or to strike a deal:

“ Let’s do each other a favor. I will look forward to helping you find another opportunity and do whatever I can do to help you be successful in your next career move. In return, can I ask that you help me with contacts at your existing organization to help them find the talent they are looking for?”

If it’s a hiring manager you are talking to, use the previous questions in flipping a reference check to gather further insight into the organization’s recruiting strategies and success.

9. Getting Exclusivity Approach

Being exclusive is imperative if you want to guarantee that if the candidates you bring the table match, you will make a placement. Getting exclusivity can be a challenge however, as there are many myths that hiring managers have about recruiting. Some hiring managers think that recruiters just have access to those limited people in their databases and that’s it. They think the more recruiters they have working on a search, the more candidates they will receive. The theory is correct, they will receive more resumes initially, however they will find themselves with very few after the first week or so. The reason being that when contingency recruiters find out they are not exclusive, the search turns into a race and every participant tries to throw stuff against the wall just to see if it will stick. The client will get a lot of volume (quantity) but very little quality. The perception of getting many candidates initially can be attractive, but most contingent recruiters will not place a priority on a non-exclusive search and will spend minimal time on it. Typically this results in only the low hanging fruit, which are individuals out of a job or desperately looking for a job. To combat this belief that many hiring managers have and to get exclusive searches, try this approach:

Explaining the Real Deal

“Mr Prospect, how many recruiters currently do you have working on your search(es)? … Three recruiting firms…Interesting… Can I share with you what happens in the mind of recruiters when they find out that they’re not working exclusive on a particular search? Recruiters are typically commission-based and tend to spend their time on the searches that will yield results the fastest. Once a recruiter finds out that they are not the only firm working on a search, it becomes a race. All firms involved rush through a search to find as many candidates that are close fits as possible and send them over as quickly as possible. These candidates are from internal databases as well as job board candidates. You will get an initial run of resumes, but then you will receive none. That’s because all the recruiters are not doing an “active” search on your positions to actually go after the “A” players who are gainfully employed and working for a competitor. They don’t have the time. It’s a race, remember. Unfortunately no quality control and close matching and selling happens due to time constraints. You, the client, end up being the quality control person and not the recruiting firms. That’s a lot of work. The end result is that you get to choose best player out of the poor to average talent you were given, choosing the best of the worst, so to speak.”

Sell the Alternate Solution

“My strong suggestion is to let our firm take this search exclusively. This will allow us to directly call in to the marketplace and go after the gainfully employed “A” players, who are over- achieving with your competitors. This will also put the quality control back into the search so you are not doing all the work and we can deliver 3-5 of the best players in the market place within about three weeks. The big advantage to you is that you get a chance to select the best individual out of the best players in your industry, instead of choosing the best of the potentially the worst. Make sense?”

10.  Question-Based Approach (Questions, What If I, Proof)

The Question-Based Approach is a method that uncovers realized and unrealized needs. One must first establish credibility and then ask questions to uncover the needs. It’s a fun approach and takes a detective-question-asking mentality to be successful at it. The process is to:

1. Ask questions
2. Uncover realized or unrealized needs
3. Quantify the need in dollars and cents as well as other costs; ”Maximize the Pain”
4. Provide an alternative solution
5. Offer “proof” and plan to move forward

For example:

“Hi, Mr. Prospect, My name is Jon Bartos with JSI. How are you today? Great. Mr. Prospect, we are one of the leading recruiting firms in the Mobility Computing space. We have helped these [name three organization]) in your industry build their teams with “A” players to help them achieve their goals. I don’t know if we can help your organization or not, but I would like to ask a couple of questions if you have a minute? Wonderful…”

Ask Questions

“Mr. Prospect… As you may know, Game Changers are individuals at organizations that can make a major positive difference in their organization to help them quickly attain their objectives. How do you find Game Changers at your organization? What methods are you using?”

Additional Questions

“How are your current methods working for you? How long does it take to locate the talent you are bringing to the table? How long does it take you to fill an open position in your area? How do you know for sure you have a Game Changer when you hire one? If you could change one thing about the process you are using, what would it be? What positions do you have now in which you could use a few Game Changers?“

Quantify the Need

“So it takes you about four months to fill a position? Who is doing  the job in the meantime? Really? How much is that costing the organization? What happens if you don’t fill the position – what would that mean to the organization? That’s a lot of time and a lot of money.”

Alternate Solution

“What if I could show you a way to reduce the time to fill each position as well as to reduce that $400,000 profit number that you are losing due to inefficient sourcing and hiring methods. Would that be justification for us to do business? Good.

“Here is what we have done for some of your competitors…. (Explain value proposition – why use you opposed to all alternatives.)

“I propose we work together this way, to solve your sourcing and hiring problems. (Explain the way to work together to solve their problems.)”

Offer Proof

“Don’t take my word for it, Mr. Prospect. We have worked with ABC organization for the last twelve months. We have brought their hiring time to fill from three months to just over six weeks – which saved the organization over $250,000 in hard costs, not including the soft costs. I would like to give you their number as a reference to call and to verify the results they have experienced.”

We are now well in to the second quarter of 2011 but there is still time to implement the three key principles (the Quantity/Quality/Starving Man Principle, the 7 Selling Situations Principle, and the Insight Principle) in to your marketing approach and to give these scripts a try based on what is applicable to your situation. Start now; you may be surprised at the positive results they yield.

But as most successful recruiters know, it’s really not about “how great your script is” or “how good you sound” on the phone. The key is making the calls!! Just pick an approach, pick up the phone and make the calls! Make 20 calls a day minimum – but make them every day. Most people who are unsuccessful in this business fail simply because they do not make the calls. They are unable to obtain enough assignments to even apply the quantity/quality principle. Don’t let this happen to you. The reality is that “quantity” solves all your quality job order problems. As a matter of fact, it will most likely solve all of your money problems, too!

The Scripts That Work — 1-5

Earlier this week, I shared with you three key principles to establishing a strong marketing foundation. Of course, it all starts with obtaining high quality searches.

After that though, you need to know how to have an appropriate conversation with potential new clients, and the best way to do this is by having a pre-written script to help you. Today, I bring you the first 5 of the top 10 marketing approaches that rock the recruiting world today. 

1. Reference from an Internal Champion

As discussed, the quickest way to bring in new assignments is with existing accounts. To get high and wide in those accounts, the first step is to ask your existing contact for a reference. It may sound like this:

“Joe, It’s Jon Bartos with JSI. How are you?… Good to hear. Joe I have a question for you. How have I done in providing your team with the talent you have been looking for over the last few years?” (You may have to remind your client of whom you placed with them.) “I’m glad you’re satisfied with how we are doing. Based on our success with your business unit, I would like to be able to help the other teams in your organization as well. Here is where I need your help. Who else in your organization is looking to hire talent in the next 3 to 6 months?…  Tim Brown… in Engineering is bringing on engineers? Great. As a favor, would you mind giving Tim a quick call or dropping him an email to let him know I will be reaching out to him to introduce myself. If you could share with him how your experience has been with my organization that would be fantastic and I certainly would owe you one.”

Once you have an internal reference, with or without a written or verbal testimonial, your marketing approach gets pretty simple.

“Hi Tim, this is Jon Bartos from JSI. I have worked with your organization, specifically with Joe in Marketing over the last few years. He suggested I might want to reach out to you to see if you need help finding talented engineers. I have helped Joe to successfully build his team and I would like to discuss the critical needs you are trying to fill on your team in the next 3 to 6 months…”

2. C-level Approach (“Rick Ball” Approach)

Selling to the C Suite (CEO, CIO, CFO, COO) can be intimidating to some. A great book to read about selling to this level is Selling to VITO by Anthony Parinello. In his book, Parinello talks about the language you need to use for the C Suite is different than that of a rank-and-file manager or director. The C Suite is interested in: increased revenue, decreased costs, increased profits, and their critical metric — increased shareholder value. Here is how the script goes:

Existing Client: “Hi, Mr. President, this is Jon Bartos with JSI. We haven’t spoken before, but my organization has helped your company save over $300 million last year. We did this by finding the best talent in the market place for your VP of Supply Chain position in Rick Ball. I wanted to reach out to you today to see if there are other places on your executive team or in your organization that you could use another superstar like Rick Ball.”

New Client: “Hi, Mr. President, this is Jon Bartos with JSI. We haven’t spoken before, but my organization has helped one of your largest competitors save over $300 million last year. This gave them the opportunity to reach a record profit year and achieve their best year in over 25 years. I don’t know if we can do the same for your organization, but I would love to share the details with you and thought it may be worth a five minute conversation.”

By knowing the successes and impact your placed candidates have had with their organizations, you can use that data to create additional business.

3. Vertical Market Approach – “Insight”

The vertical market approach is one that adds value based on your experience in the market place that you work in. This works well and applies if you have a specific market or a specific position that you focus on.

“Hi, Mr. Prospect, this is Jon Bartos from JSI. Have you heard of us before? We work with many of your competitors in the industry, focusing specifically on the Mobility Software Marketplace. We have helped organizations such as Syclo and Dexterra grow over 30% per year in revenue and increase profits by over 40% by finding the critical talent they needed to achieve their goals. We have done this because we are niche focused and are in touch with the “A” players in your market place on a daily basis. We have relationships with the individuals who are blind to job boards due to performing at high levels for your competitors and not looking for other positions. I don’t know if we could help your organization or not, but thought it may be worth a five minute conversation.”

4. MPC/”A” Player Approach

The MPC or “A” player approach has been used successfully for over 40 years. The simple reason — it works. The reason it works is because it’s a “Proof Statement” of your work. It’s proof that you know your market and know what you are doing – going to the market with a true “A” player. The marketing approach sounds like this:

Intro: “Hi, Mr. Prospect, this is Jon Bartos with JSI, we are a firm specializing in finding “A” players for the Mobile Computing Software market place. The reason for the call: I was doing a search for one of your competitors (name) and came across one of the top sales reps in your industry, and thought of you.”

Feature – This killer was the top sales professional at one of your top Mobility Software competitors – producing over $5 million in revenue per year.

Achievement – He has personally brought in their top four largest accounts they have today.

Benefit – Which means that his next employer will not only get a big producer, a true producer that only knocks down???, but also understands the value of what major accounts bring to an organization.

Close: Does it make sense for you and this individual to sit down to explore the possibilities? Does Monday or Tuesday work better for you next week?

5. Combination Approach

The combination approach is a combination of the Vertical Market Approach and the “A” player approach. This is probably the most effective approach in the market place. It shares with the prospective client not only your insight into the vertical market you are in, but also backs it up with a proof statement – the “A” player you have. There is something significant about actually having the ability to “SHOW” a client your capabilities.

“Hi, Mr. Prospect, this is Jon Bartos from JSI. Two reasons for the call. First, have you heard of us before? We work with many of your competitors in the industry focusing on the Mobility Software Marketplace. We have helped organizations such as Syclo and Dexterra grow over 30% per year in revenue and increase profits by over 40% by finding the critical talent they needed to achieve their goals. We have done this because we are in touch with the “A” players in your market place on a daily basis. Those are the individuals who are blind to job boards due to performing at high levels for your competitors and not looking for other positions.

Which leads to my second reason for the call…

 I was doing a search for one of your competitors (name) and came across one of the top sales reps in the mobility software market, and thought of you.”

Feature – this killer was the top sales professional at one of your top Mobility Software competitors – producing over 5 million in revenue per year.

Achievement – He has personally brought in their top four largest accounts they have today.

Benefit – Which means that his next employer will not only get a big producer, a true producer that only knocks down, but also understands the value of what major accounts bring to an organization.

Close: Does it make sense for you and this individual to sit down to explore the possibilities? Does Monday or Tuesday work better for you next week?

Implement the three key principles in to your marketing approach and give these scripts a try based on what is applicable to your situation. You may be surprised at the positive results they yield.

But as you, know it’s really not about how great your script is or how good you sound on the phone. The key is making the calls!! Just pick an approach, pick up the phone and make the calls! Make twenty a day minimum – but make them every day. Most people who are unsuccessful in obtaining enough assignments to see the quantity/quality principle work fail simply because they do not make the calls. Don’t let that happen to you. Start with closest to money marketing calls — existing customers first. The reality is that “Quantity” solves all your quality Job Order problems. As a matter of fact, it will most likely solve all of your money problems too!

Stay tuned for Part 3 next week, which will include the last five marketing scripts that are hot in today’s environment.

The Three Critical Business Development Principles

Finding the perfect candidate for an open search assignment is an exciting moment in any recruiter’s day and contributes significantly to the overall success of achieving their goals. More important than fulfillment, however, is the role that business development plays in the process. Effective marketing is the biggest factor in any recruiter’s success.

There are three key principles to establishing a strong marketing foundation. It all starts with obtaining high quality searches. The better the search you have to recruit on, the more placements you will make. Period. Most of us agree with this concept, however practicing it seems to have become a lost art. Time is money and you want to make sure you are spending your time on searches that will result in placements. Ask yourself about the searches you are currently working on – are you guaranteed a placement if you find the person you are looking for? Resources are too valuable today to be risked on uncertainty. A good search means that “if” you find the right candidate, your client will hire them — no maybes and no excuses.

1. The Quantity/Quality Principle (Starving Man Principle)

Quality is everything. How do you achieve it? It’s not just about getting Job Orders. It’s about continually improving them so you have great Job Orders. The better the Job Order you are working on, the better chance you will net revenue from your efforts. This is true for Contingency as well as Retained Search. The best way to increase the quality of your searches is to increase the quantity of Job Orders that you have. Here is how the principle works. A starving man will eat a moldy loaf of bread. Why? He’s starving; he will eat just about anything. However the more food he has to eat, the more particular he will become. The principle works the same with recruiters. The more Job Orders you have to work on, the more selective you can be about the ones you will chose to work on. If you have an abundance of only “C” Job Orders, chances are you will not see great results and you will have to start focusing on getting “B” Job Orders to improve your results. This is done by doing more marketing and doing volume — getting more Job Orders on the go. Once you have upgraded to “B” job orders, you will no longer want to take any more “B” job orders, and will want to start looking for the true “A” Job Orders, or real “Search Assignments.” A critical step in this evaluation process is utilizing the Job Order Matrix, a fantastic tool that will help you to qualify the Job Orders that you get.

Once you focus on quality and have continued to upgrade your Job Orders to “A” Search Assignments, continued marketing will allow you to then focus on the next level, getting money down and retained work. The quantity of Job Orders you achieve (volume) will resolve the quality of the Job Orders.

2. The Seven Selling Situations Principle (work the process)

When recruiters focus on marketing, it’s really exciting to get new business in. Managers like to see new LOGOS, increasing the recruiting footprint with more companies in different regions, giving the company larger potential. Yes, we all agree that “Volume” is the key to quality, however here is where I suggest caution. Diverse marketing efforts could be killing your productivity in your office and costing you thousands in revenue. Most million-dollar producers today don’t have twenty accounts they focus on and do business with. The average number is between three and seven. New business is critically important but we often overlook the easiest and quickest way to achieve more business. And that is developing additional business within existing accounts first.

The graph below illustrates seven different selling situations in business today. They are listed in descending order from the easiest to get to the hardest, with the percentage of success rate on the right hand side from top to bottom. If obtaining good search assignments is your objective, the place to start is with existing accounts first and with the existing contacts you have. Work the process by going down the chart to “new” contacts within existing accounts next. After contacts are exhausted go to the next level of business development to “C” level and keep moving down. This will ensure you are working as efficiently as possible in developing new business and increasing the amount of search assignments on which to work. Once again, by increasing the volume, it will help to solve quality problems by allowing you to continually ‘Topgrade’ each search as you get new ones in. The goal is to maintain a solid book of business that you can continually work on to upgrade the quality.

3. Insight Principle

In addition to developing volume in marketing to achieve a higher level of quality in search assignments and working the process to market the most effectively, it is equally important for a recruiter to include insight in all marketing efforts. Insight is knowledge of a person, market, company, or anything that adds value to the person you are talking to that is beyond the ordinary. The more insight you can share, the more value you bring to the other party. Combining a strong insight statement with each marketing approach will double your success rate. For example,

“Mr. Prospect, did you know that Gartner research stated that in 2011 the mobility software market is poised to explode due to mobile phones having the bandwidth to support mobile applications that only rugged mobile handheld computers could do previously? Are you ready to take advantage of this growth opportunity?”

The more insight you have when making business development calls, the more “value” you bring to your clients and the more effective and successful you will be. It’s all about Value – and insight immediately gives you that.

By implementing all three principles in to your marketing plan – only working on quality search assignments, achieving volume to insure the ability to create quality, and by providing insight to your clients — you will dramatically increase your success in achieving your goals and objectives.

Are you ready now to make it happen? Stay tuned later this week for Part 2 — “Scripts That Work”…

The sales team is the primary revenue source for most businesses. However, this revenue is not without significant cost. If not carefully managed, this revenue source can easily become a money pit. There are five areas business executives should watch to ensure they make a wise investment in their sales team.

Hiring

In most organizations, if a new idea is proposed that will cost $20,000 to implement, blue ribbon panels are commissioned, meetings are held and a decision is ultimately made. After all, the company is considering a significant investment, which requires careful consideration.

However, when a company is hiring a business development person at a salary of $20,000, there isn’t nearly the same level of due diligence performed. Yet, it’s the same $20,000! In essence, the worst mistake a company can make is to hire business developers. Adding headcount to a business development team should be viewed as an investment made in revenue. Recognizing that this is an investment is a critical first step toward driving sales team profitability.

As executives evaluate candidates, there is a perception that they can hire great sales people. Unfortunately, there are no great sales people. They don’t exist! The issue is the word “great.” Greatness isn’t a stand-alone quality, but rather an attribute of the relationship between the sales person and the business development role in your company. Don’t believe it? How many people have you hired – great resume, fantastic track record, polished appearance – who have failed in your company?

If you believe that there is this entity called “great sales person,” you must also agree to one of the two of the following statements:

“When the sales person arrived at my company, she completely forgot how to sell.”

“Our company and our clients are the absolute worst to sell for in the history of business.”

After all, what other choices could there be if this person is truly a great seller? Companies with highly profitable sales teams don’t search for great business development people. Their quest is to find the right people who have the potential to be great in their role. While this may seem subtle, its impact is not.

This quest begins with the development of a highly-detailed, ideal business developer profile which identifies every factor that affects a seller’s ability to succeed in the role. Once created, a sales talent screening program is put in place that allows them to compare and contrast the candidates with this profile. With that in place, instead of looking across the desk wondering if this person is a “great seller,” potential investors (which are what the management team becomes when adopting this philosophy) are looking for synergy – or lack thereof – between the candidate and the profile.

Onboarding

Many business owners believe that once they’ve hired a business developer, the hard work is over. And, why shouldn’t they believe that? They’ve just hired a great sales person! Hand the new sellers a phone book and send them off to sell.

Highly profitable companies recognize the real work is only about to begin when a new seller investment is made … for both the new business developer and the company. This work comes in the form of an onboarding program. Onboarding is commonly seen as completing new hire paperwork and getting the office ready to go. While administrative work needs to be done, it does nothing to protect the new investment or ensure a healthy return.

During the recruiting process, the sales talent screening program helped the investors make an informed decision prior to extending an offer to the candidate. Now, the new seller arrives at the company with potential, but a program is needed to ensure the potential becomes reality – in as little time as possible. After all, every minute that the seller is on the bench, not yet ready to sell for the company, she is merely a cost on the books.

The starting point in the development of a sales person onboarding program is the end. In other words, without identifying the program objectives, it’s impossible to create an effective onboarding program. The investors need to clearly identify the finish line for the onboarding program based on expectations they have of those new sellers who successfully complete it. Those expectations are identified in the context of KNOW-DO-USE.

What do they KNOW?

KNOW refers to information like product knowledge and territory analysis.

What can they DO?

DO refers to actions like conducting sales calls or delivering a client presentation.

What can they USE?

USE refers to tools or systems like a CRM, ATS, or back-office utility.

KNOW-DO-USE provides the framework to identify the finish line for onboarding. With that, the sales person onboarding program is then designed to lead the new sellers to this finish line and should conclude with testing and assessment. After all, investors want visibility into the performance of their investments. Completion of an onboarding program is one of the milestones providing that visibility. Testing can come in the form of written exams, practicals and mock sales calls.

If the new seller is not able to demonstrate proficiency based on what the investors have documented as their expectations of someone who has successfully completed the onboarding program, it’s an opportunity to protect the company by ending the investment early.

Managing

There is an age-old debate on micro- versus macro-management. Micro-management is often defined as constant, in your face management. Macro-management is aligned with the French laissez-faire philosophy of leave them alone. The debate seems to be limited to these two extremes. Yet, top performing companies cast this debate aside and take on a different philosophy.

Hiring and onboarding are seen through the lens of an investment in revenue. Managing the business developers falls in line with the investment philosophy as well. Each person on the team represents an investment made on behalf the company. When investors consider opportunities, they look for a well-developed business plan. This is the same philosophy highly-profitable sales teams have in place to ensure there is a strong return on investment.

The investor team develops a sales business plan template which is structured in a “wizard-format.” The plan is designed so that the investors can get a high level of confidence in the strategy, tactics, and measures for each business developer. Once the plan is completed by the sellers, an investor call or meeting is held during which the sellers present the plan for acceptance. During the meeting, the investor team asks questions to instill confidence in their investment decision. Once accepted, periodic meetings are held to update the investor team on sales business plan implementation progress.

Rather than argue micro-management or macro-management, these companies have a management structure in place that positions them for a high return on their business development team investment. Those sellers that perform well receive additional investment (time, dollars, resources, etc.). Those that don’t, they find their business ventures no longer funded.

Metrics

There is no end to the data associated with sales and it’s easy to get lost in it. Worse yet, it’s common for executives to focus on the wrong data points. Companies that recognize that the sales team is a revenue investment develop their sales metric management system designed to help them analyze performance.

Many start their system with “revenue” identified as their first metric. Yet, revenue is not a metric. It’s a result of the right metrics being delivered upon by the business development team with the right frequency. Companies can’t affect revenue, but they can affect the behaviors that lead to it. The investor team identifies a series of metrics that indicate that the business is on track. There are four criteria for each metric that is to be included in a sales metric management system:

1. Measureable. It is easily quantifiable as opposed to merely gut-feel.
2. Meaningful. The data point indicates something of importance to the business and seller performance.
3. Trainable. If a seller is deficient in this area, training can be provided to improve performance.
4. Goal-oriented. As it is measurable and meaningful, a driver is needed to ensure it is achieved.

With a sales metric management system in place, the investors have the ability to monitor the investment and take swift action.

Compensation

“You’re only as good as your last sale;” or in the recruiting world, your last placement. This is one of the worst expressions ever uttered as it conflicts with how businesses are measured. Wall Street looks at tomorrow much more than yesterday. And, it is this expression that leads companies to develop flawed compensation strategies.

Traditional thought is that sellers are paid an incentive over their salary because they sold something yesterday. Profit-focused companies pay an incentive to get more sales in the future. Their focus is on growing a healthy sales pipeline in addition to winning accounts. When companies pay for yesterday’s news, their performance chart resembles an EKG.

The common starting point when developing a sales compensation plan is to ask, “How much do we want our sellers to make if they achieve plan?” While this is an important question, it should not serve as the foundation for the compensation plan. Since paying dollars beyond salary is a further investment made by the company, the foundational question to be asked is:

“By paying an incentive (bonus, commission, etc.) to our sellers, how will that help us get more of the sales we want in the future?”

The answer to that question helps to guide the development of a sales compensation plan that not only rewards for yesterday’s results, but for a healthy sales pipeline as well.

Each of these five areas has a major impact in the profitability of your business development team. While it may seem like a large undertaking, the result of transitioning your team to a revenue investment philosophy is exactly what your company’s bottom-line needs.

Lee’s eBook, Sales Person Onboarding Best Practices, was recently published and is available FREE for a limited time. You can access your copy by clicking on this link.

image source: Patrick Hoesly

…only without strategy!

There is a common mistake that I see repeated across the recruitment and staffing industry. From a development and training perspective over 80% of the recruiters I encounter are seeking to develop their sales skills: opening techniques, killer questions, Jedi-like influence skills, and robust closing skills. Each of these is a potentially valid training need. Each an area that I know I can help them to develop, although for some it is a case of putting the cart before the horse.

Let me explain further. Becoming a ‘great’ sales practitioner is clearly the goal of every sales person. Developing the techniques to win more clients is undoubtedly an important focus area for a self-sufficient recruiter. What benefit is there to develop such skills if you are pointing in the wrong direction? Developing the salesmanship of the individual alone is not going to generate more business.

I would say that many of the individuals (and businesses) I have worked with have had a stronger development need to refine their sales strategy before considering developing their sales skills. In fact, the bigger the business, the less ‘strategy’ the recruiters had for their business development.

As a recruiter within software development, having a strategy to focus on permanent C# development jobs in London is relatively weak. Why? Because it neither creates the ability to target business or to present a reasonable proposition to the prospect as to why they should do business with you.

Every recruiter must have a stronger strategy. What do I mean by strategy?

A distinct plan on how to identify prospective clients, engage with the relevant decision maker, and convert a satisfactory level of prospects.

What does a good strategy look like? Each strategy is likely to be different from firm to firm. Below I have listed a series of questions that create the foundations of a good strategy:

What is your service?

Beyond recruiting, beyond filling jobs, what does your service actually do for your clients? Go deeper than the surface transaction. What are the reasons your current customers do business with you? Build genuine value propositions as to what makes you stand out in a competitive market. Truly understanding this will highlight exactly why another business would want to trade with you.

Who is your target audience?

Build a model of the target client, this may include: Industry, sector, product range, market position, size of company, growth, financial position, department size, locations, staff attrition levels, current recruitment methods, volume of business available, level of decision maker to target, and buying process. The clearer you can make this the easier it is to find them. Building a list of businesses that satisfy these criteria may take some energy but certainly gives some focus to your client qualification calls!

How will I identify and qualify my prospects in the market?

When does a company become a client? When they give me a job to work or when I fill it? What is going to be my source of leads? How will I generate target clients to approach? What are the key qualification questions I need to ask? What are my current conversion ratios, how many leads do I need to create a new client?

What is going to motivate a client to want to buy from me?

What stands out in my service? Why do my current customers do business with me? What are the value propositions that demonstrate my capability? What case studies and testimonials do I have to prove it?

How will I manage my client contact and keep in touch with them?

How would I rate my CRM database? Can I track relationships? How frequently do I want my prospects to hear from me? How should I be keeping that contact going? Whom will I broadcast to and whom will I narrowcast? How can I start to segment and target my market based upon business value?

Answering the above questions will start the process of building an effective strategy. Combine good strategy with robust activity planning and the activity itself and you will generate good levels of business. If the strategy and the planning are sound but the results don’t follow then perhaps then it is time to look at your sales skills and you ability to “cold call.”

The perpetual quest to develop your cold calling skills without strategy and planning though can often be misdirected energy. The really nice thing about sales strategy is that once it is done, you only to need to review it quarterly to ensure it is still valid for today’s market conditions.

In Part 1 of this article series, we addressed the fact that many fine recruiters have extreme difficulty making the transition from “salesman to manager” when they decide to take on those different responsibilities. The reason for this is that they forget the many long years of concentration, study and practice involved in learning how to “work a desk,” and presume that their skills enable them to automatically become an effective manager. 

The Answer

The best way to become quickly knowledgeable about the practice of management is to undertake a study of those practices – and this is most easily achieved by purchasing, reading, underlining, and implementing the books that have proven to contain the requisite information.

While the field of “management books” is vast, the following are brief summaries of some of the best of them. These books are clear, concise and highly appropriate to our industry. If a book should be out of print, Amazon probably has it used.

In Part 1, we briefly reviewed two excellent books on management; the following are two more.

Managing – by Harold Geneen

Has there ever been a master of professional business management like Harold Geneen? Maybe. But outside of Peter Drucker, you’d be hard-pressed to find him. Drucker, of course, is a consultant; Geneen just goes out and does it.

Try this. He took over ITT when it was a faltering $766 million corporation. When he left seventeen years later, sales were at $22 billion, the 9^th largest firm in the world! Profits? From $29 million to $562 million. Increased earnings for 58 consecutive quarters! The man is a legend. But more that that – “Geneen University,” as ITT was dubbed, spawned a host of top-flight executives who transferred Geneen’s culture of accountability, success, achievement, enthusiasm, and creativity to their own firms. Hal Geneen wasn’t a genius. He was a leader with a system. And he spells out that system in this remarkably lucid book on real-world managing.

For those who think that building a giant corporation is so divorced from their business that there is nothing to be learned, Geneen’s blunt, honest irrefutable home truths – “inspiring doses of good sense,” wrote the New York Times – will change your mind. Buy and underline this book. You can learn to manage effectively. Geneen will show you how.

How Managers Make Things Happen – George Odiorne

Professor George Odiorne is now to the field of training what Peter Drucker is to management – a legendary figure who has single-handedly created a segment of life that radically altered our society for the better.

But in 1961, he was just George Odiorne, former manager with American Can and General Mills, then instructor at Rutgers, and now with the American Management Association. That year, George Odiorne wrote his first book – on management. It is quite possibly the finest and most specific book ever written on the subject. This is it.

The book is realistic, straightforward, and well-written. In 21 chapters it defines the topics, explains the benefits of learning the material, and then states the exact steps and rules of implementing the procedure. Odiorne’s “Ten Rules of Identifying Business Stagnation” will cause many managers to wince – and then he tells them how to change that stagnation. His extensive chapter on management discipline of subordinates deals masterfully with an important, sensitive, and rarely discussed management skill. The sections on “Rigid Managers – How to Make Them More Flexible” and “Harnessing Aggressiveness in Management” should be read by many in our industry. “Coaching a Winning Management Team” with his ten rules for good coaching is excellent.

Robert Louis Stevenson once said of a particular essay that it was “so good there should be a tax on those who had not read it.” Those managers or aspiring managers who have not read and absorbed this flawless work are paying a tax – reduced profits. Join the Tax Rebellion. Read this book. Study it. Abolish marginal performance. Odiorne will show you how.

To know the sales portion of your business – whether permanent, temp, or contract – is obviously necessary to generate personal revenue. The ability to transfer those skills to others, then develop and supervise those new people, however, requires a very different body of knowledge. Unless sufficient time and effort is taken to accumulate that knowledge, frustration and failure await. These books contain the information you must have to grow your firm quickly, profitably, and well.

Main image source: Royalty-Free/Corbis

The Problem

It’s one of the most common stories in sales. A sales rep starts with a company. He studies, learns, plans, practices, perseveres. After some years, be becomes an excellent producer. As a result of his achievements, he is made a manager. Or perhaps, in our industry, he decides to start his own firm. And soon nothing goes right. Time spent to interview, evaluate, and train new hires reduces his sales effectiveness. His new people produce poorly. When they do produce, they start to argue with him as to methods and strategies. He cannot motivate them beyond adequacy. Turnover is constant, further draining his personal productivity. Frustration sets in. An excellent and happy salesman has become a mediocre and unhappy manager.

“How do you ruin a good salesman?” goes the old joke. “Make him a manager!” is the sarcastic and frequently accurate answer.

Is this a common scenario in our business? You bet it is! 

The Reason

In large part, this entire difficulty stems from a single root misunderstanding – the lack of realization that selling and managing require different sets of skills! To learn those skills necessary to become a good manager will take almost as much time, effort, and study as is needed to become a good recruiter. We all recognize the enormous investment to become truly skilled at “working a desk”; yet, how much time is invested in learning management skills? Especially in today’s economic climate, management skills must be maximized!

The Answer

The best way to become quickly knowledgeable about the practice of management is to undertake a study of those practices – and this is most easily achieved by purchasing, reading, underlining, and implementing the books that have proven to contain the requisite information.

While the field of “management books” is vast, the following are brief summaries of some of the best of them. These books are clear and concise. If a book should be out of print, Amazon probably has it used.

The Effective Executive – Peter F. Drucker

And in the beginning there was Drucker.

It is easy to forget the pre-Drucker days, when managers everywhere echoed Henry Ford’s sentiment: “To ask who should be boss is like asking who should sing tenor in the quartet. Obviously, the man who can sing tenor!” There are those who were bosses and those who were subordinates, and only fate dictated who was who. And … then came Drucker.

Everything we now take for granted, from management by Objectives to Time Management to decision making with a modicum of logic to it, springs from Peter Drucker’s incredible mind. The title of John Tarrant’s fine book, Drucker: The Man Who Invented the Corporate Society, says it all. The Effective Executive is one of his best.

Want to accomplish more? “If one cannot increase the supply of a resource, “says Drucker, “one must increase its yield. Effectiveness is the one tool to make the resources of ability and knowledge yield more and better results.”

As a consultant, Drucker has met many effective executives – all different. “Some are eccentrics, others painfully correct conformists. Some are men of great charm and warmth; others have no more personality than a frozen mackerel. There are men who make decisions easily, and those who suffer agonies every time they have to move.” And then, “What all these effective executives have in common is the practices that make effective whatever they have and whatever they are And these practices are the same…”

For a riveting 174 pages that changed the world, Drucker explains and describes five practices of top managers and decision makers with examples from Alfred Sloan (developer of General Motors) Robert E. Lee, Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Carnegie, Franklin Roosevelt, and others. He ends with a memorable chapter on self-development. What are these five practices? Sorry. To state his conclusions would be to have you judge Drucker. One does not judge Drucker; one learns from him.

Can a person be a good manager without having read Peter Drucker? Of course. You can be a good major league pitcher without a fastball, too. But if you have a choice, why would you want to? You have a choice. Read Drucker. Learn from him. Start with The Effective Executive. History can’t be wrong.

No-Nonsense Management – Richard S. Sloma

This masterful work is the book a best-seller ought to be – and never is.

Sloma is a former Division President of ITT, has served on the board of six major international corporations, and is an intelligent, straightforward writer and thinker who is not without his humorous side. (He dedicates his book to his wife “who has shown me over a quarter of a century that management by dictatorship definitely works.”)

Sloma subtitles this as “A General Manager’s Primer” and divides his 157 page book into 70 bottom-line principles.  Talk about “back to basics.” A monthly reading of this book would benefit every manager alive!

Where the “social worker” school of management (Sloma’s description) whines about how “everyone is a winner, “ Sloma comes on with “it is easy to sympathize and empathize. The first and foremost social goal of business is to make a profit!”

For the search and placement firm owner concerned with what to do with marginal employees, Sloma minces no words. “Never try to salvage an individual. Remember, you are measured by “earnings per share,” not “converts per share.” His comments on management controls, accountability, and taking numbers are direct an irrefutable. “Your control will continually be tested … individuals can perform at their best only if they are regularly, formally, and objectively measured.”

Buy this book, read it, and re-read it frequently. A tough, profitable, well-written, intelligent book, and a contribution to your firm.

* * * *

To know the sales portion of your business – whether permanent, temp, or contract – it is obviously necessary to generate personal revenue. The ability to transfer those skills to others, develop and supervise those new and experienced people, and then to guide them through difficult economic times, however, requires a very different body of knowledge. Unless sufficient time and effort are made to accumulate that knowledge, frustration and failure await. These books contain the information you must have to grow your firm quickly, profitably, and well.

In Part 2, we will cover two more books that will significantly increase your management skills and your profits.

Main image source: Royalty-Free/Corbis

Candidate screening is one of the most difficult tasks that recruiters and managers face. Most will tell you that screening sales talent is the toughest of all. Why? Sales people are trained in the art of persuasion. They know how to provide the desired responses to the questions. Even more daunting is when you are interviewing sales people that worked for a competitor. These sales people know the language and industry buzz words making it even more challenging to screen them. Fret not! It is possible to successfully screen sales talent, but there is work to be done before you even look at a résumé.

The most important step a company can take is to develop a sales talent screening program. This helps bring focus to the initiative. The mission of this program is to provide data that allows for the measurement of the candidate pedigree versus the desired profile. Think in terms of formulating a marriage, a sales marriage, that is.

This program should be fully documented showing step-by-step the components of the screening program. It is best to define who will be interviewing the candidates and their role in the interview process. It should define the tools that will be used as well as their purpose. Below are seven key components of an effective sales talent screening program.

1. Ideal Sales Person Profile

It has always surprised me how many companies have fully documented profiles of their ideal client. Yet, few have a profile of their ideal sales person. How can you screen when you don’t know for what you are screening? Many of you have a clear picture in mind of the profile of your ideal mate. My bet is most of your close friends can rattle off your profile in a heartbeat. The same principle applies to sales talent. If you don’t know exactly what you are looking for, how will you find it?

This profile should be fully detailed. Some of the areas to address in the profile are the experience you expect that candidate to already have, the skills that the candidate should already possess, and the skills you are not willing to teach. Truth is, this is an extensive topic about which I have dedicated another article. (Send me an email and I’ll send you a link to that article.)

The lack of a fully-defined profile of the ideal sales person is the most common cause of bad sales marriages. It is also the major point of frustration between sales managers and recruiters. Recruiters often tell me that they feel they are throwing darts while blindfolded because they have so little detail about the desired profile.

2. Always Be Recruiting

In sales, there is an old expression. “The toughest time to make a sale is when you really need one.” The same holds true for recruiting. When a slot is open on the sales team, it becomes an all hands on deck exercise to fill it. While the seat is open, revenue targets are in jeopardy. This leads many to forget the profile of the ideal sales person profile in the interest of filling a seat. Playing this forward a bit, the seat becomes vacant again a short time later when either side determines that it is not a good fit.

Sales recruiting is a year-round exercise. The best sales forces are always on the look out for strong sales talent. Find a company that identifies a strong candidate that meets their profile who wouldn’t find a way to hire this individual. It is a rarity to say the least. Sales teams have turnover either driven by the company or the employee. It is best to have a candidate portfolio at the ready than to begin a process of surfacing candidates when a seat is open. Poor hiring decisions are made out of desperation to fill a seat. The open seat is a cost to the company every day it is unfilled. Yet, the cost is more painful if the seat is filled by someone who doesn’t fit.

3. Reverse Interviewing

Since the intent of the process is for both sides to be able to determine if a marriage should be formulated, a wonderful technique is reverse interviewing. This is an interview performed by a member of the sales team who would be a peer if the candidate was hired. It is important that the individual(s) selected to participate in this step are loyal to the company, knowledgeable, and make a favorable impression. However, the “interviewer” does not ask any questions of the candidate. As you know, it is very easy to get yourself in hot water if illegal questions are asked. Thus, you don’t want untrained people asking questions. There are two purposes of this component of the sales talent screening program. The first is to provide the candidate with an opportunity to ask questions of someone who would be their peer if they were to be hired. In essence, it is a way for them to get a picture of a day in the life of this job.

The second purpose is to measure how the candidate prepares for a sales call. A debrief is conducted with the “reverse interviewer” to see what questions were asked. If the candidate took advantage of this opportunity, they brought prepared, insightful questions and wrote down answers. If they didn’t, what kind of preparation will the candidate do for a sales call? How interested are they really in this job? Every once in a while, a candidate will ask a question of the sales person like, “Can you take off at noon on Fridays?” Needless to say, the lapse in judgment raises a red flag of concern?

4. Standard Interview Questions

Often times, many candidates are screened for one job slot. This creates a need to be able to compare candidates to each other, in addition to the profile. To do this, a standard set of interview questions are needed. The responses are documented during the interview and reviewed after a candidate leaves the office. These questions are not designed to provide right or wrong answers. They are designed to see if this candidate’s thought process is congruent with the needs of your business and with the profile of the ideal sales person.

When formulating your list of standard questions, it is helpful to include some sales scenarios that are common in your environment. “Your client balks at your fee. What do you do?” It is also helpful to have questions that show what makes this person tick. Since few colleges have “sales” as a major, it is always interesting to find how someone arrived at a sales career. “Of all of the careers you could select, why did you pick sales?”

The hot topic in today’s recruiting world is behavioral interviewing which is a powerful tool. Behavioral interviewing, also called competency-based interviewing, focuses on past behavior. As a doctor friend of mine always says, the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior. The idea here is not to ask arbitrary questions, but rather to ask questions that help to expose areas that affect the sales marriage. If your company is always changing, you might want to determine how the candidate handles change. “Please share with me a time where you had to adapt to change.” Like with any good interview, additional probing is necessary to get to the root of the issue. “How did you deal with that? What did you learn from the experience?”

You can probably imagine just how hard it is to formulate questions that demonstrate if this marriage will work if you don’t have a profile against which to compare. If it will help you, send me an email and I’ll send you my favorite 28 standard questions when interviewing a sales person.

5. Mock Sales Call

What better way to see if someone fits into your company’s selling environment than to put them right in it! To do this effectively, you need to create a scenario for the candidate. I’ve found it most beneficial to give the candidate the scenario with one day’s notice so they can prepare. They should be provided with the same amount of information a sales person in your company normally has before making an initial sales call.

Those members of your company who participate in the exercise should be somewhat scripted. I say “somewhat” because you don’t want it to be so dry that it is unrealistic, but without any scripting it can be hard to stay in character.

The last piece you need to do this well is a score sheet. Know what you are looking to measure in the process and score accordingly. Can they conduct a thorough needs analysis? Did they identify the challenges faced by this prospect? Would you buy from them?

It is best if the scoring is done by a non-participant of the mock sales call. It is very distracting for the candidate if someone jots notes while they are speaking. What happens is that the candidate spends the rest of the exercise trying to read what was written.

6. Online Assessment Testing

There are a myriad of tools that are very helpful in the screening process for both personality and skill. Where some err is in the application of the data from these tools. Few, if any, of the online assessment companies suggest that their tool should be used to make a hire/no hire decision. The most appropriate application is to treat it as an additional data point in the sales talent screening program.

Linda Moeller, Product Director of market leader Employee Continuum, has seen companies use this great tool incorrectly. “We have seen many organizations fail to take the context of an organization into account when deciding the most appropriate assessment to use. For example, many organizations assume that implementing a sales assessment will guarantee them improved sales performers. This is not necessarily the case. For example, the personality characteristics required for a sales person selling office supplies to purchasing agents are very different than those required for a salesperson selling everything needed for a dentist office. In order to be successful, an organization needs to consider the type of relationship they have with their clientele and the competencies that will make these relationships successful.”

7. The Ultimate Screening Tool

Writing is a lost art. Yet, we are more dependent on written communication than ever before. Email! Is there anything worse than a poorly written email that is sent to a prospect? It doesn’t matter how good your product or service is, your company now looks sloppy and unprofessional.

An effective technique for screening sales talent is the use of the mini-business plan. When the candidate has satisfactorily completed all of the other steps of the pre-offer process, the request is made for a one-page business plan that shows how they would approach the job. I mention three times that I’m only looking for a one-page plan and ask when they can send it to me. It is important that the submission date be asked of the candidate, not the other way around as you will see in a moment.

Of all of the techniques that I have used over the years, this is the one where I have the most candidate fall out and I was always happy to learn that this sales marriage wouldn’t work, before it was formulated.

This technique allows you to evaluate a number of important areas:

• Can they communicate in written form coherently? If you were a client receiving this document, what message do you get about its author?
• Do they understand what the role entails? Since this component is performed late in the process, they should have a clear picture of the job and expectations.
• Is their approach consistent with the expectations of management? It is best to know now if you don’t feel comfortable with their game plan.
• Can they meet a self-imposed deadline? If the plan is late, the candidate is no longer considered for the role.
• Can they follow directions? I asked for a one-pager, not an epic.

Having a sales talent screening program has many benefits. The most obvious impact is a longer sales tenure of your sales team which means an increase in sales performance and a reduction in personnel turnover. This can do nothing short of helping the bottom line of any company.

When asked about the NFL’s decision the next day, Governor Rendell made his stance clear: “My biggest beef is that this is part of what’s happened in this country. We’ve become a nation of wusses.”

This nation of wusses has extended into the field of sales. There’s no hiding that sales is difficult. Day in and day out you face rejection, you must constantly be filling the pipeline with new leads, you have quotas you must meet, and results are often inconsistent.

Yet too many sales people use these difficulties as excuses and let them hinder their own success – they wuss out.

How can you tell if the wuss factor is dragging you down? Look out for these five symptoms: 

1. Need for Approval

Everyone wants to be liked, but when it gets in the way of asking the tough questions, it deters your ability to move the prospect along the sales process and close the deal. If you are constantly seeking approval from your prospects, you don’t ask about budgets, never understand the buying process, and generally don’t probe deep enough. You avoid any hard questions that you think might negatively affect the relationship and end up making too many assumptions, never fully understanding the prospect’s situation well enough to craft an appropriate solution.

Don’t confuse need for approval with relationship and rapport building. Rapport is essential and relationships are important. But relationships are ultimately built on professionalism and respect, not acquiescing to every circumstance that might lead to a confrontational moment.

2. Difficulty with Rejection

How you respond after hearing a “no” greatly affects your sales success. This is especially important in prospecting. Prospecting, even for the best, is a losing proposition; you will obviously hear “no” many more times than you will hear “yes.”

Good salespeople accept this, and realize that a “no” from a qualified prospect means no for now. It allows you to put them back in the pipeline as a long term lead and focus your efforts on more fruitful opportunities. Prospecting is a numbers game at a certain level, and if you never seek rejection, you will spend too much time chasing unqualified prospects when you could have moved on.

3. Buy Cycle Issues

The way you make major purchases affects the way you sell. If you like to comparison shop, look at a years’ worth of consumer reports, read hundreds of reviews, and consult with friends before making a major purchase, you’ll think it’s normal for your prospect to do the same. You’ll accept put-offs and allow the sales process to drag well beyond what is normal.

Time kills sales and the longer you let the prospect hem and haw over the decision, the less likely you are to win the deal. Be prescriptive, and your prospects will benefit. Always lay out a next step and don’t accept prospect put-offs when they say they want to check other prices or consult with a colleague.

4. Discomfort Talking about Money

“Don’t talk about money; it’s not polite conversation.” I’m sure we can all remember our parents saying this to us when we were young. However, at the right time in the sales process, it’s a necessary conversation to have. All too many salespeople simply avoid this conversation because they are uncomfortable talking about money.

This is deadly. Flying blind – not knowing if there is money, where the money is coming from, and most importantly, what the prospect is thinking of spending – will result in wasting a lot of time with unqualified prospects. You don’t want to be writing Cadillac proposals when the prospect is shopping for a Chevrolet.

5. Self Limiting Beliefs

We all intuitively feel we are good at some things and not so good at others. You may think:

• I am not good at making cold calls.
• I have difficulty getting referrals.
• I have to discount.
• I can’t get past gatekeepers.
• I can’t sell to CEOs.
• I don’t need goals to succeed.

We call these self-limiting beliefs. These beliefs manifest themselves over time and don’t always correlate to reality. In fact, self-limiting beliefs tend to develop from a germ of an idea and grow because you don’t do anything to stop them. They become self-fulfilling. You don’t like cold calling so you avoid it, then over time you start to believe you are not good at it. You simply accept the belief without ever validating it, examining it, or creating a strategy to overcome it.

The more you tell yourself these things, the more they become true.

Despite what you think of Ed Rendell, his fearless attitude and obvious lack of need for approval would have made him an excellent salesperson. This type of determination will serve you well.

Unfortunately, Rendell may have been on to something when he called us a “nation of wusses.” I’ve seen my fair share of salespeople fall victim to these 5 symptoms.

So if you or anyone on your team is experiencing any of these symptoms, it’s time to get help. A coach, a sales manager, or a change of mindset can go a long way to help treating and overcoming the wuss factor. At a minimum, it’s time to try something new – roll the dice and be bold; you don’t have much to lose and have everything to win.