5 Tips for Creating a Great Sales Team

In today’s competitive business environment, your business is only as good as your sales team. Your business revenue and the success of your products highly depend on your sales team, and it’s crucial you take time to design and develop a sales team full of top notch players. This article outlines tips for creating a great sales team that can set your business up for high growth potential. 

1. Hire right

Building a successful sales start in the hiring process and continues throughout an employee’s lifecycle. A bad hire can be costly, and that is why you have to pay more attention to bringing on board the right sales reps. Before you can truly understand the kind of people that will fit into your team, take a look at your current sales team. Who are your current team members, and what skills do they lack which could be met with a new hire? You also need to prioritize the core soft skills your team members need to have. Consider prioritizing these traits: 

• Excellent communication skills
• Interest in the product
• Passion for sales
• Energetic
• Non-traditional
• People-oriented
• Resilient
• Competitive
• Self-starter
• Quick learner

1. Train and motivate

Your duty doesn’t end with hiring the right people; you need to consistently train and keep them inspired. Create a training program that is tailored to the needs of your business. In addition, you should come up with a comprehensive training program that you can repeatedly use to train future hires. Utilize tools like sales training software to identify coachable moments, personalize training, speed up the onboarding process, and make your training program effective. 

1. Define your sales goals

Ultimately, what everyone wants from sales is an increase in revenue and financial growth. However, when managing a sales team, it is crucial to have specific financial goals and KPIs. Set clear and realistic goals for your sales team to meet. Unrealistic goals tend to demotivate employees. You can set your goals on a weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, or quarterly basis. Be sure to involve your team when setting your goals; sometimes someone may have better ideas than you. On top of your business goals, encourage your sales team members to set their own personal goals. 

1. Equip your sales team with the rights tools

For your sales team to succeed in the 21st century, you need to equip them with the right technology. Top sales tools help you to outperform your peers. They help your team members to establish potential customers that are highly likely to make a purchase, the most appropriate time to contact those prospects, and how to convince them. Sales tools categories include: 

• CRM software
• Video conferencing apps
• Marketing automation software
• Sales intelligence
• Scheduling software
• Sales analytic software
• Customer service software

1. Encourage collaboration instead of competition

Older notions may have encouraged sales reps to compete against each other, but modern notions encourage sales reps to effectively compete together. Competition against each other may create a toxic work environment, but collaborations can help to create strong teams, helping to move the company goals forward. 

Endnote

Creating a winning sales team takes time and effort, but ultimately, your efforts will pay off. Implement these tips to build a sales team that will drive your business to success. 

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