Peak Sales Recruiting

I ran across this great post  What Really Motivates Sales People.  The author, Jim Keenan, a sales exec who also writes the A Sales Guy blog, shares thoughts about the significance of money in motivating sales reps. He also shares comments from members of his linkedin group. The bottom line from his perspective is that [...]

We recently responded to the following question on Linkedin: Sure seems like nobody wants to work for commission only anymore.. selling software … Anybody know why? Its a job. Great question and I agree with the other posters here – this is a rough economy and people know that in many companies, the sales aren’t [...]

A few days ago I bought a new cellphone at a retail outlet and thought I would share the experience since it highlights how not to design a comp plan (no need to mention the company). The store rep was great, engaging me, asking questions, showing various different products and sharing facts and opinions on [...]

Now that Q2 is over, and you are focused on the new quarter, you might be expecting more results from your sales effort. Assuming you have right people on your team, you may be looking at ways you can get each of your reps to sell more. The comp plan is one of your best [...]

Grabbed another article from Colleen at Engage Selling (www.engageselling.com) The Best Laid (Compensation) Plans 1. Keep your plan simple. The more complex the compensation plan, the easier it is to misunderstand or manipulate. For example, if your salespeople are assigned to geographic territories, be sure to develop and communicate clear guidelines on how they can [...]

One of the most challenging areas in a company’s incentive plans are sales comp plans. We often get asked to provide input on comp plan strategy. I ran across this article on article on compensation from our good friend Colleen Francis at Engage Selling (www.engageselling.com). She offers a true or false quiz to evaluate your [...]

We often receive questions about the merits of various comp plan elements and alternatives. Recently received a question about the frequency of bonuses. The right mix of incentives and structure depends on what you are trying to achieve. While commissions are typically tied to closed sales, while bonuses are often linked to other sales events [...]

A lot more than you think. With so many reps currently below target, we thought we would show a quick and dirty calculation on what a bad sales hire costs. Let us assume we are speaking of an intermediate to senior position (depending on the company) with a base salary of $100,000 and a quota [...]

You need to hire sales people and you like the fact that these days more candidates are applying for your jobs, but the ones you want are the ones that are still employed elsewhere and they may not be inclined to move. In fact, sales candidates are generally reluctant to move in this economy – [...]

In turbulent times, we are going to see higher turnover and layoffs – even in sales. A big issue for departing sales employees is entitlements to commissions. We often see contracts that poorly define the conditions related to treatment of commissions after an employee departs (typically referred to as “trailing commissions”). For example, when someone’s [...]