The Kickass Entrepreneur
  • About
  • Blog
    • All Blogs
    • Create Wealth (Investing)
    • Entrepreneur Interviews
    • Featured Top Posts
    • Growing Profits
    • Growing Revenues
    • Marketing
    • Positive State of Mind
    • Real Estate Investing
    • Retirement
    • Sales
    • Selling your Business
  • Book
  • Courses
  • Podcast
  • Resources
  • Contact
The Kickass Entrepreneur
Subscribe
The Kickass Entrepreneur
  • About
  • Blog
    • All Blogs
    • Create Wealth (Investing)
    • Entrepreneur Interviews
    • Featured Top Posts
    • Growing Profits
    • Growing Revenues
    • Marketing
    • Positive State of Mind
    • Real Estate Investing
    • Retirement
    • Sales
    • Selling your Business
  • Book
  • Courses
  • Podcast
  • Resources
  • Contact
  • All Blogs
  • Growing Revenues
  • Sales

4 Essential Steps To Build a Successful Sales Team

  • August 29, 2022
  • 11.3K views
  • 6 minute read
  • Jeff Wiener
Build a successful sales team
Share
Tweet
Share

“You’re only as good as your last sale”.

That expression definitely rings true when you’re in sales.

Sales drive the organization. No sales means no business.

So what’s it like to work in a job where you’re always being measured, where your job success is posted on a board for everyone to see, and you live with the thought that if you don’t make your number, your job or business is on the line?

In my early days building my company, I spent the bulk of my time in sales. My sales cycle went from boom to bust and back again, and my emotions rode the same cycle.

When sales were great, I was at the top of my game.

When I hit a dry spell, I panicked.

I always had this nagging feeling that my prior month’s sales would mark the end of my sales career or business.

What if I couldn’t repeat the last month, quarter, or year’s numbers?

Would my business survive?

I lived in an almost constant state of panic, always worried that I wouldn’t have a repeat performance. I suspect living in that mental state is what drove me even harder.

The early days of building my business were challenging. For the first few years I brought the bulk of our business into the company, and as the business grew, and as I hired more salespeople, the sales cycles flattened out.

It makes sense, of course.

If you have only one salesperson, your business is going to fluctuate with the performance of that one person. The more people you have on your team, the more even the performance.

So if you want to build your business, you need to build your sales team.


The Challenge of Building a Strong Sales Team

I remember entering a computer-simulated business competition when I was in university in the late 1980s. (Yes, they had computers back then.)

The idea behind the competition was that you had to scale your business, build revenues, and improve profits. The team with the highest sales and profits at the end of the competition won.

The natural inclination was to pump as much of your budget into marketing and sales, but if your sales team grew too quickly and your operations (and inventory) didn’t keep up, then you upset your customers. Upset customers aren’t good for business, of course. Upset customers mean fewer repeat orders, which in turn impacts the sales team’s ability to deliver on their numbers.

The team that ultimately won the competition took a slow and steady approach to grow their computer-simulated business.

Yes, it was a computer simulation, but two messages resonated with me for many years.

1. The slow and steady approach to building a business is probably the safer way to grow. Watch your debt levels, contain growth to a manageable level, and maximize profitability.
2. Growing a sales team is a heck of a lot harder in the real world than it is in a computer-simulated game. Duh, of course it is.


For many years after I finished university, and well into when I was growing my business, I had always wished that building a business was as simple as plugging a few extra dollars into a computer game.

Sprinkle a few dollars into the sales department, and boom, you now have sales.

Sprinkle a few dollars into marketing, and boom, you now have inbound leads.


4 Essential Steps To Build a Successful Sales Team

1. Hire Slow, Fire Fast

I’m sure you’ve heard this saying.

Hire FireAccording to this Harvard Business Review article, “the best sales organizations have strong leaders who exercise control, monitor team performance, and establish internal processes that all team members must abide by. They hire talent of such high-quality that it challenges the more tenured sales team members to continually perform at the highest level. In addition, weaker sales team members who cannot contribute their revenue share are quickly removed.

While the company’s goal may be to go public or reach certain revenue milestones, the greatest sales organizations are on a never-ending mission to prove to the world that they are the best.”

Of course, the hire-slow-fire-fast mantra applies not only to the sales department but should be applied across the entire company. Any underperforming or, worse, a toxic individual can really damage morale and hinder productivity.


2. Did You Make Your number?

Higher performing sales organizations are measured, benchmarked, and held accountable to their quotas. I’m often surprised by the number of entrepreneurs I speak with who have a sales team with:

– no quotas,
– quotas that are way too low, or
– accept their salespeople constantly missing quotas.

None of the above are acceptable
Source: HBR

3. Measure, measure, and measure some more

In order to build a successful company, you need to have a clear set of defined KPIs (key performance indicators). Although that is the case across the entire organization, it is especially true in marketing and sales.

It makes sense that you measure total sales volume for each rep by month/quarter, but there are many leading indicators that also need to be measured. If you can’t measure it, don’t do it.

How many sales calls did your BDR rep make last week?

How many appointments did the BDR make last week/month/quarter?

How many sales calls did your account exec make last week/month?


4. Turn on the Taps and Let the Water Flow

In order to build a high-performing sales team, you need a high-performing marketing and support team.

The sales team isn’t an island. It needs a high-performing marketing team that can provide a steady stream of inbound leads and a high-performing support team that can support the sales team’s efforts.

The marketing team needs to be held accountable for the marketing results, and you need to measure marketing’s total contribution to the sales team’s overall numbers. The more marketing qualified inbound leads you can pass your team, the easier it is for the sales team to make their numbers.

The support team, including finance and administration, needs to understand that they work for, and support the sales effort. No sales, no business. No salespeople, no business. It’s the role of the salesperson to go out and sell, not to support the administrative minutiae of keeping the business going.

Keep in mind, and no matter what you do, you need to make sure that your salespeople know how to sell.  That’s a given of course. I discuss the nuances of evaluating your salespeople in this article:  Sell Me This Pen. I Tackle the Wolf of Wall Street Sales Riddle

And next, if you’re just building your sales team from the ground up, here’s another post I wrote that could help you in the earlier stages of the sales team development.  9 Steps to Build a Sales Team From The Ground Up


Conclusion

One of the main keys to growing a successful business is to grow a successful sales team. And one of the keys to growing a strong sales team is to hire amazing sales contributors, motivate and treat them well, set appropriate quotas and measure against them, and ensure that you have a strong marketing and admin effort to support the sales function.

The above is easier said than done. Figure it out, and you’ve now got the keys to build a successful sales team.  

___________________________________

My goal is to help entrepreneurs scale their business, improve profits, and, ultimately, create wealth. I post two blog posts a week.  You can subscribe here.

Want to know more about me and read some of the other interesting small business growth, profit and wealth stories I’ve written.

Here’s an interesting post I wrote:  The Top 2 Mistakes I Made When I Started My Business. That Was a Long Time Ago, and Entrepreneurs Are Still Making the Same Mistakes Today

Here’s one of the first articles I wrote:  My Journey Post Business Sale as I Sail Into a New Harbour.

Are you a younger entrepreneur? Here’s another interesting article I wrote:

My Response to an 18-Year-Old Who Wants to Become a Millionaire by the Time He’s 30.

Download my book and Amazon bestseller (number 1 in business and non-fiction).  You can get your FREE copy here.

Thank you for your interest in THE KICKASS ENTREPRENEUR'S GUIDE TO INVESTING. Three Simple Steps to Build Massive Wealth with your Business's Profits. Please check your email to confirm the book download. Form: 400529

There was an error submitting your subscription. Please try again.

Related Posts:

  • 9 Steps To Build A Sales Team From The Ground Up - Both Inside…
  • 5 Best Ways to Build an Enterprise SEO Team
  • Why and How To Build A Remote Team - It's About The Money and Talent
  • 9 Important Steps To Build A Business
  • Sales Team Motivation: 5 Tried-and-True Strategies
  • The key to a successful business is a skilled and driven team - Here's why
Share
Tweet
Share
Related Topics
  • grow a sales team
  • revenue
  • sales
  • sales management
Jeff Wiener

Jeff sold his company to private equity in 2017 and is now semi-retired. Jeff spends time traveling and with his family, writing this blog, managing his real estate portfolio of apartment buildings,  overseeing his investment portfolio, investigating angel investments, coaching other entrepreneurs, and managing his private equity holdings. Jeff is currently on a couple of boards, one for profit, the other not for profit, and now helps entrepreneurs grow their business, profits, and ultimately, create wealth.

Previous Article
virtual makeup
  • All Blogs

How To Create A Virtual Makeup Try-On App

  • August 29, 2022
  • Frances
View Post
Next Article
online consultation
  • All Blogs

What Exactly Is an EHR – and Does Your Healthcare Business Need One?

  • August 30, 2022
  • Meg Rivera
View Post
You May Also Like
Investment Strategies
View Post
  • All Blogs
  • Business

Digital Age: Top Investment Strategies for Entrepreneurs

  • December 1, 2023
  • Ashley Jenkins
Entrepreneurial Mindset
View Post
  • All Blogs
  • Business
  • Positive State of Mind
  • Sell Me This Pen

Thinking Like a Winner: Foster an Entrepreneurial Mindset

  • November 24, 2023
  • Jeff Wiener
Business Resilience
View Post
  • All Blogs
  • Business

From Setback to Comeback: Harnessing Business Resilience

  • November 17, 2023
  • Jeff Wiener
Sustainable Business Practices
View Post
  • All Blogs
  • Business
  • Finance

Green and Profitable: Sustainable Business Practices

  • November 10, 2023
  • Jeff Wiener
Remote Work Trends
View Post
  • All Blogs
  • Business

Guide to the New Normal: Adapting to the Remote Work Trends

  • November 3, 2023
  • Jeff Wiener
garbage bin
View Post
  • All Blogs

Saving Time and Money, Find Affordable Rubbish Removal Near Me

  • October 30, 2023
  • Meg Rivera
people play slot machines
View Post
  • All Blogs

How To Break Into The Online Casino Industry: Career Pathways and Tips

  • October 27, 2023
  • Meg Rivera
farm to table
View Post
  • All Blogs
  • Sales

What Is Farm-to-Table? Benefits of Locally Sourced Food

  • October 27, 2023
  • Jeff Wiener

Join 6,472 Entrepreneurs That Get My Business Building and Wealth Creation Posts by Email

I can teach you how to build a successful, profitable business, and turn that into millions in personal wealth.

Thank you for your interest in THE KICKASS ENTREPRENEUR'S GUIDE TO INVESTING. Three Simple Steps to Build Massive Wealth with your Business's Profits. Please check your email to confirm the book download. Form: 400529

There was an error submitting your subscription. Please try again.

We won’t send you spam. Unsubscribe at any time.

Recent Posts
  • canadian business landscape 1
    Navigating The Canadian Business Landscape: The Crucial Importance of PIPEDA Compliance
    • December 1, 2023
  • audit company 2
    Why Is Backlink Doctor The Best Backlink Audit Company?
    • December 1, 2023
  • remote work 3
    Beyond The Office Walls: Creative Onboarding For Remote Work Environments
    • December 1, 2023
  • Investment Strategies 4
    Digital Age: Top Investment Strategies for Entrepreneurs
    • December 1, 2023
  • data management 5
    Strategies For Reliable Server and Data Management
    • December 1, 2023
Featured Posts
  • Become a Decamillionaire
    How to Become a Decamillionaire, Grow your Net Worth to $10 Million, and Join the 1% Club
  • how to become wealthy
    The Entrepreneur’s Secret to How to Become Wealthy and Build a Personal Fortune
  • Most Profitable Small Businesses
    27 of the Most Profitable Small Businesses to Open in 2023
Categories
  • All Blogs (1,092)
  • Business (510)
  • Canadian Financial Products (4)
  • Create Wealth (Investing) (136)
  • Entrepreneur Interviews (27)
  • Featured Post for Main Menu (4)
  • Featured Top Posts (23)
  • Finance (134)
  • Financial and Investment Calculators and Economic Data (122)
  • Fitness (11)
  • Growing Profits (73)
  • Growing Revenues (115)
  • Growing Revenues (72)
  • Marketing (178)
  • Millionaire and Business owner interviews (3)
  • Positive State of Mind (74)
  • Real Estate Investing (18)
  • Retirement (13)
  • Reviews (14)
  • Sales (17)
  • Sell Me This Pen (9)
  • Selling your Business (13)
  • Starting a Business (1)
  • Startup Ideas (18)
  • Technology (223)
  • Top Products (4)
  • Uncategorized (62)
Follow us
Author
Jeff Wiener
Jeff sold his company to private equity in 2017 and is now semi-retired. Jeff spends time…

    CHECK OUT MY BLOG, AND SUBSCRIBE

    about
    The Kickass Entrepreneur

    Expand Your Business, Improve Profits, Create Wealth

    Expand your business, improve your profits, and create wealth. Each one of the three can be elusive goals. Follow the right steps, and you, too, can create financial independence. It is possible … you just have to take the right steps.
    NAVIGATION
    • About
    • Blog
      • All Blogs
      • Create Wealth (Investing)
      • Entrepreneur Interviews
      • Featured Top Posts
      • Growing Profits
      • Growing Revenues
      • Marketing
      • Positive State of Mind
      • Real Estate Investing
      • Retirement
      • Sales
      • Selling your Business
    • Book
    • Courses
    • Podcast
    • Resources
    • Contact
    TAGS
    apartment BATNA Business business failure business growth business sale Capitalization Rate CAP Rate cash cash flow Creating Wealth Discipline entrepreneur entrepreneurship excel extra cash Featured goal setting Growing Business investing investment real estate M&A marketing Marketing KPIs Mergers and Acquisitions | M&A | Entrepreneur Blog Millionaire millionaire next door mistakes MUR Peter Principle Profit profitability real estate retirement revenue Revenues sales sales management Semi-Retirement Blog | Entrepreneur Blog | Small Business Blog small business Stagnant stocks success Thomas Stanley wealth
    RECENT ARTICLES
    • Entrepreneurial Mindset
      Thinking Like a Winner: Foster an Entrepreneurial Mindset
      • November 24, 2023
    • man sitting
      How to Switch Off at the End of Your Workday So You Can Fully Recharge
      • November 21, 2023
    • mentoring
      Mentorship Magic: How Guided Relationships Can Boost Career Growth
      • November 9, 2023
    • Escape the Office: The Rise of Team-Building Escape Rooms
      • November 9, 2023
    • holding hand
      How to Support a Loved One Through Physical and Emotional Recovery After a Serious Car Crash Injury
      • November 8, 2023
    • Real Estate Brokerage
      The Role of a Real Estate Company in Texas Home Transactions
      • November 6, 2023
    The Kickass Entrepreneur
    • Coaching
    • Book
    • Blog
    • Contact
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms
    • Disclaimer
    • Facebook
    • LinkedIn

    Input your search keywords and press Enter.