Help! My Business is Growing
Help! My Business is Growing
How to hire, onboard, and compensate salespeople effectively, with Aleasha Bahr
Comments? Suggestions? Text the show here!
Hiring and onboarding a sales team can either make your business or break it. If you don't have a solid hiring process in place, you'll end up guessing who’s right for the job instead of making an informed choice and hoping they’ll figure it out on their own.
But wrong hires or weak onboarding cost money because it leads to high turnover, frustrated salespeople, and lost sales. You need a clear process to find the right talent, get them up to speed with your business, and keep them motivated with fair, effective compensation.
So, how do you build a strong sales team?
Which onboarding methods actually work?
And how do you create compensation plans that drive results without hurting your profits?
My guest today is Aleasha Bahr. She is a sales strategist, speaker, best-selling author, and founder of the Black Sheep Sales Method™. Because if it’s a fit, it’s a fact and there’s no selling involved. She has 15 years of experience customizing sales strategies to your personality, audience, and service (because sales is not a one-size-fits-all!)
Her methods empower business owners to effortlessly convert up to 80% of their leads without pressure, pitching or pretending to be someone else. Aleasha’s signature Black Sheep Sales Method is based on 15+ years of sales experience, tens of millions of dollars in services personally sold herself and sold by service providers she’s supported. She has been featured on Rocky Mountain Marketing Podcast, Sales Game Changers, Business Innovators Radio, and Outside Sales Talk.
Aleasha is also the host of the “Sales Is Not A Dirty Word” podcast.
We discuss: (timestamps)
02:34 What’s broken in sales hiring?
04:21 Why experience alone isn’t enough for sales success
09:03 When to hire a sales strategist
11:08 What goes into an effective sales strategy?
16:22 Positioning salespeople as experts
18:16 Helping clients focus on what they need
19:54 Rolling out a new sales strategy to seasoned salespeople
23:51 Red and green flags when hiring salespeople
27:10 How hiring for sales differs from hiring for other roles
30:47 Building a diverse sales team culture and compensation insights
33:36 Actionable next steps to take to develop a strong sales strategy
Resources:
Aleasha Bahr, Sales Strategist and Founder, Black Sheep Sales Method
http://www.aleashabahr.com/
LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/aleashabahr
Black Sheep Sales Method™:
https://aleashabahr.com/blacksheep/
Podcast:
Sales Is Not A Dirty Word
Kathy Svetina, Fractional CFO:
https://www.newcastlefinance.us/
Blog post | How to Hire, Onboard, and Compensate Salespeople Effectively
https://ww
Is your growth causing financial headaches? Sales up, but profits lagging? Financial practices stuck in entry level mode?
Don't worry, it's not you—it's your financial setup.
Introducing NextGen Finance Blueprint by NewCastle Finance. This CFO-led roadmap: • Brings fuzzy finances into focus • Gives you a clear money picture • Creates a step-by-step action plan
Ready to level up? Visit newcastle.finance/blueprint
Kathy (host):
Well, hello there, and welcome back to another episode of "Help My Business is Growing," a Podcast where we explore how to grow and build a business that is healthy and sustainable. I'm your host, Kathy Svetina, a fractional CFO and founder of NewCastle Finance, a company where we believe that everything that you do in your business is eventually gonna end up in your finances. And to get to healthy finances is to have a healthy business.
Kathy (host):
The question here is, how in the world do you get there? The answer to that is, that you can listen to this podcast, and we're gonna give you some good tips and tools on how you can actually get there. And today we're gonna be talking about sales teams, because sales teams drive your revenue, but building and managing them can get complex if you don't get it right. You need to make sure that you attract and hire the right talent, onboard them effectively, and keep them motivated with fair comp plans. So when businesses miss these crucial steps, they can face costly turnover, unmotivated teams, and lost sales opportunities, and you don't want to be one of those businesses. So what does it take to hire a great salesperson? How can you onboard them and set them up for success? And how do you create compensation plans that reward performance without draining your profits?
Kathy (host):
As a reminder, all of the episodes on this podcast have blogs and detailed timestamps, and we linked all of those in our episode show notes. So if interested in that, please go ahead and look at it. It's there for you as a resource.
Kathy (host):
My guest today is Aleasha Bahr. She is a sales Strategist, Speaker, best-selling author, and founder of the Black Sheep Sales Method, because if it's a fit, it's a fact, and there's no selling involved. She has 15 years of experience customizing sales strategies to your personality, audience, and service because sales is not a one-size-fits-all all. Her methods empower business owners to effortlessly convert up to 80% of their leads without pressure, pitching, or pretending to be someone else. Aleasha's signature Black Sheep Sales Method is based on 15-plus years of sales experience, tens of millions of dollars in services personally sold herself and sold by service providers she supported. She's also the host of the "Sales is Not a Dirty Word" podcast. Join us.
Kathy (host):
Hey, Aleasha, welcome to the podcast.
Aleasha (guest):
Thank you so much for having me, Kathy. I'm so excited to talk to you.
Kathy (host):
I'm excited to talk to you too, and we are going to be talking about something that a lot of businesses struggle with, and that is not just recruiting for their salespeople, but actually keeping them. And as we were prepping for this episode, one of the things that we talked about is how broken the sales recruiting is at this point. And let's talk a little bit about this. What is broken about recruiting for salespeople at this day and time?
Aleasha (guest):
Oh my gosh. Well, so there are few different philosophies around recruiting. A lot of times, companies will hire like five reps with the intention of keeping one, and they'll just throw them in and say, "Sink or swim." Like there's no direction or support, and whoever figures it out stays. And there's no other job that we would ever do that and expect results. Like, HR person comes in and we're like, "Just figure it out." Or like an accountant, or, you know, like—why can't I think of any other position but—project manager, for example? Project manager, just figure it out. Just shuffle through all of our emails and all of our websites and materials, and then just figure out the best strategy. And I need you to do that within the next 30 to 90 days, or you're gonna be fired.
Aleasha (guest):
Why is that the strategy for success? So that recruitment philosophy is based on them not having any support internally, and so there could be really, in this example of five salespeople, there could be really great salespeople if they just had a little help.
Kathy (host):
And what is that little help? Because I also want to differentiate this, because generally, the idea is, well, if I'm hiring someone who has 20 years of sales experience, why can't they just pick it up?
Aleasha (guest):
Yeah, that's such a good question, because it's such a like, literal thing that people say out loud. So there's a difference between sales strategy and sales skills, and they get confused a lot. So someone will bring on a salesperson and tell them to do everything and figure out how to position it, which is a different skill set than being—than taking a strategy and running with it, and you're going to be a lot more successful if you already have a strategy.
Aleasha (guest):
So sometimes, probably the best sales training that companies have at this point is usually "Go out with our top rep and hear how they talk about our offer." And so if a salesperson hears a talk track from someone else, they can kind of imitate it and go off of that. However, personalities are really different and backgrounds are really different, and there's going to be differences in every sales conversation. Prospects are going to ask different questions. They're going to have different needs. So just being able to—just hearing somebody present an offer once or twice to one particular situation or client isn't really going to apply to every situation that a new salesperson is going to be in, especially because they're going to present it in a different way, slightly different way than someone else.
Aleasha (guest):
So what makes a huge difference is having a sales strategist come in and understand your offer and put something together that is repeatable—a repeatable process and a unique value proposition, an angle based on your market, your competition and your audience, so that they can hand that to a new salesperson and they will succeed from the first day. And there are other materials that are going to help, like, what are our main differentiators? What are our deliverables? Access to the deliverables, so seeing what the client experiences when they're going through fulfillment is going to help the salesperson be a lot more confident. Testimonials, like a little training portal of all of these almost cliff notes for the offer and the audience.
Aleasha (guest):
And also a strategy is going to make it so that you don't have to hire five and fire four. You're going to be able to hire a couple and they're going to be really good, and you get to keep them. There are other things involved in keeping a good sales culture, because directly usually related to like, numbers and comp. Another area that's really off—like goals setting is very like, not based on data basically, or logic or trends, they just sort of pick a goal and place it on somebody a lot of the time. So that directly affects retention, how much money they're making, and if they're just required to bang out a certain number of calls without strategy or logic behind it. However, just having those basic training materials that are going to get someone up to date on your offer and how to position it are going to help them succeed from the first day.
Aleasha (guest):
And the issue, a lot of times, is like a business owner or a CEO or founder knows everything about their company. So if it's their first time bringing on someone, or even not their first time, they've tried to bring on lots of people, and only one person performed because "everyone else sucks." It's usually because they don't know how to transfer the information in their brain to someone else, because they have decades of experience with their offer and their audience and your salesperson doesn't need all of that. They only need certain things that are going to matter to the client, and the business owner or founder or CEO usually doesn't know what those things are, because they're not a sales strategist, so they'll just overwhelm the salesperson with all this information that they have to filter through and decide what matters, or they'll say like, "Oh, just sell exactly like me," which isn't going to work because they don't have 20 years of experience with all of these different client scenarios. So you really need somebody who's skilled at coming in and pulling the information out of your head and organizing it in a sequence that someone can pick up and run with.
Kathy (host):
So would you say that when would be the time that is like the perfect time to hire a sales strategist? Would it be after you have burned out a couple of times and you try doing it on your own and figure out, "Hey, this is not really working, because I have hired all these salespeople and they keep leaving me," or they're just not performing the way how I needed to? Or would the ideal version be to when you're thinking about, "Okay, I need to hire a couple of salespeople, but before I do that, let's take a step back and let's hire a sales strategist first, and then hire the salespeople?" Like, what would you think would be the best time to do that?
Aleasha (guest):
I mean, definitely ahead of time. So when an owner is at a point where they're like, "I don't have time to take these sales calls anymore." There are a few different scenarios—the owners like, "I hate sales and I hate taking calls," and they want to offboard it sooner. But sometimes owners are very precious about it, like, "This is directly related to my revenue. I can't trust anyone else to do these calls, and I really love them." But the truth is, it's very time-consuming.
Aleasha (guest):
So when you're at that point that someone—you need to duplicate yourself, basically, and have somebody selling on your behalf. You want to bring in a sales strategist ahead of time, because the thought is, "I'm going to bring on somebody, and I'm going to have all this time back," but if you don't have things in place, you're going to spend a whole lot of time managing that person, reviewing their calls, training them, trying to improve them, without knowing what you're doing and you're going to be losing money at the same time.
Aleasha (guest):
So most people have to experience it first, the pain of it, before they're like, "Okay, let me bring in someone who actually does this and can help with this." And I don't know why they want to try it themselves first, because it is so directly related to how much income you make that it seems like you'd want to be really certain about that strategy before you implemented it. But if you can bring in somebody who's just going to set things up in the beginning, that's when I have the most success with clients. It's a lot easier than inheriting something broken and refining it.
Kathy (host):
And I think the reason why people first go to the most painful way is because A) they just don't know that there's an alternative out there, which is why this podcast is there as a resource. Is like, "Hey, we're trying to save you time and money and mistakes." So that's why we have these conversations on this podcast, and that's why I started this podcast because it's so important to get this knowledge out. And you might not be in this particular area right now when you are in a position to hire more salespeople, but there's going to be time in your business where you are, so let's avoid that, and let's use these tools and these strategies to avoid that pain in the future. But I think the other way too is also that when you think about the sales strategy, it just sounds so like, what does that really mean? Like, how does that really look like? Right? Let's talk about that, like, what needs to be in a good sales strategy.
Aleasha (guest):
So glad you asked this question. Somebody asked it recently, and I realized sometimes you're so close to what you do that you don't realize exactly what someone's asking, but now I know what you're asking. You're asking, like, basically, what questions is somebody asking—the sales strategy is the words they're saying in the conversation with the prospect. How are they—what questions are they asking to understand if a prospect is the right fit for a company solution, and how are they communicating the value of the offer to somebody?
Aleasha (guest):
So there are so many different ways that you can position something, for example. So I just heard about a company that is trying—that sells meats, really high-quality meats to consumers, like as a gift, and they're trying to break into the corporate market. So there are lots of ways you could position that right, like, "Ooh, client gifts." But what if you focused on client gifts that make you more memorable—you're able to create memories for your clients with really high-quality meat? You know, can you remember some of the best steaks that you've ever had in your life? Yes, because it's that important in a human's life, the food we eat and the people we share that food with means more than—I don't know what other corporate gifts they're getting, probably wines, what—mugs, for example, but mouse pads, portable batteries. So this is a gift that is going to make a bigger impact on your client's life make you more memorable and increase client retention. So those are all the points that you want to hit. Is like, what does your client retention look like? So the questions you would ask would be like, "What does your client retention look like? How much is client retention worth to you? Like, the lifetime value of a client. What are you doing right now to keep a client? Do you have gifts in place at the moment? Do you have other processes? What if you could give a high-quality meat every month? We have these monthly subscriptions that would be great for your highest-end clients." So that kind of thinking through that positioning and those sequence of questions to help the prospect understand the value of what you're selling, then you're able to position it across all these points. That's the sales strategy. If a salesperson just goes in, they're like, "We have the best meats ever, and people love our meats. And you know, our cows do whatever they do with their cows. They feed them special citrus diets, and they massage them for 90 million days." Nobody cares, right? They want the result of the thing. So a lot of times, if someone's just left to their own devices, they're not going to talk about client retention, what that's worth to you in a tangible money signs kind of way that the client can hold on to.
Kathy (host):
Yeah, and, you know, in the in the SaaS world, I guess in the technology world, it's people are selling the features versus the outcome. The same thing here too. Like, yes, I do as a consumer, I do want to know that the cows are treated well, and the meat is done, you know, sustainably, and that they treat animals well, but I don't need to know every single thing. It's like, yeah, it's a part of why I'm buying it, but I have an outcome in mind that I want to get to.
Aleasha (guest):
Yes. And what's really undervalued about a sales strategy are the questions to ask somebody that are going to communicate that outcome even better than you saying it, talking at someone. So being able to say, you know, "When you retain clients, like, can you think of a time when you gave a gift and a client was super appreciative? And how did that come up later? And, you know, how did you leverage that in other conversations?" And those kind of questions are going to get your prospect thinking, "You know, damn, we don't do that. Like I didn't even think about all the ways that this could integrate into really increasing our revenue." And this person knows what they're talking about and is talking about it in a different way than any other vendor has talked to us about it before. So there's just those questions alone can position you as an expert and give the client insight that they wouldn't have had otherwise.
Kathy (host):
And as you were talking about positioning your salespeople as experts, here is, I think, an important question: do they need to truly be experts in what you're selling, or can you position them as an expert without the expertise just giving them the, you know, with the right materials?
Aleasha (guest):
Yes, they do not need to be an expert. Yes, they can just look like an expert with the right materials. What they do need to be an expert in is their prospects, their clientele. What are—what is important to my prospects? What are my prospects' biggest concerns and challenges? What's their mindset? What information do they have about gifting? How are they prioritizing gifting? Those things they need to be an expert in, but we can give them that information so that they are an expert. They don't really need to be an expert in meat and how it's farmed. The people that created this company are ranchers, so they know all about that. And it would bore the hell out of a prospect. You know what I mean? Like, there's no need to know these nitty-gritty details about, like, regulations on meat and or any—you know what I mean? So a lot of times, like, owners will get really caught up in that. And there are lots of instances, like, for example, especially with you Kathy, like as a CFO offering fractional CFO services. There are so much detail and nuance to offering fractional CFO services that it would be really easy to get stuck in all these if-then scenarios and variables in a sales conversation with somebody which just confuses and overwhelms them. So being able to step somebody who doesn't have your intimate experience is actually going to be better to able to better sell you because they're not going to go down these weird rabbit holes in the weeds and stuff.
Kathy (host):
I really like that, because when you're so close to a product or service that you're providing, it's really easy to go down into the detail level. And I see that too—like, when I'm buying from other people, like, if they go and they start talking about these things, like, I get it, I see it's valuable, but that's not really what I need. Like, I need a specific thing. Let's talk about this versus everything else that you offer and this, because it just then it just becomes overwhelming and turns people off.
Aleasha (guest):
It does. And a lot of times when somebody's giving all that information, what they're essentially trying to do is manage expectations. They're like, "But I don't want—I want them to know that it could be different if this happened." And so that's where sales strategists can come in and say, "Okay, what are you trying to overcome here? What are you trying to offset, and what is a better way to do that?" How about just telling them the only time that this could be different is when I get in your books and I see that you have 18 months backlogged or something, you know, give them the specific scenario and ask them, "Is that you?" If not, "Okay, great." You know, instead of, like, a lot of times, we'll sort of run in circles and over-explaining all this stuff, hoping that what they get from it is, "Oh, they're saying that the answer depends based on these"—you know, we're like having the clarity of just saying, "Is this you or is this not you?" Everybody can feel confident moving forward—the seller and the buyer.
Kathy (host):
But you need to do the background work to be able to get to that result. So once you have the strategy in place, how do you roll that out to salespeople, especially with the salespeople that are non-new, but they have been in the business for a while, and they're like, "Well, I don't need this. Like, I know how to sell."
Aleasha (guest):
That is always a tough thing when you inherit salespeople and try to get them to do something new. The best strategy with any team of salespeople is collaboration. So never say, "This is what you're doing now." It's really getting their feedback. So if I were to come in and work with a team that already is established, I would want to ask them, "What do you come up against? What would support you? Does this sound like it would support you if you had this? Would it make your job easier? Would this help?" So once they're part of creating this strategy, then they're going to be more likely to implement it. And as a sales strategist, if you already have a team, they should absolutely be talking to your sales team, because they're the front lines. They're the boots on the ground, they're gonna have the information that your marketing or your C-suite has no idea really what people are saying, and that information is so important to create materials, like marketing materials that are gonna bring in the right people. Like one that comes up a lot is people try to educate and sell in the same conversation, and you can't do that—if you educate in the conversation, the person is like, "Okay, I have to go process just that part before I even know if this is right for me." So like, for example, with fractional CFO services ahead of time, you could be like, "This is what fractional CFO services do for somebody and the benefits of them," like, ahead of time, "This is when it's time to bring on a fractional CFO. And this is when it's not time," you know. So, like, if you just have a tiny little book, like a little book of business, like, you don't need a fractional CFO. You know, when you're at this point where you have payroll and you have inventory and you have, you know, those things if you don't have someone overseeing them, I've seen situations where people have been losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in a year—hundreds of thousands of dollars that contractors aren't getting paid, that they're delayed on getting paid from other people, invoices aren't paid. There's all kinds of things that can happen, and those details are annoying for business owners, so you want somebody who likes that level of detail and is going to see those gaps and proactively bring it up to you. And sometimes you know what I mean. You get the impression here, right? Like you're giving them this information ahead of time, so that when you have the sales conversation, you can just be like, "Okay, what's going on with you," instead of having to explain, "Well, sometimes people don't realize that."
Kathy (host):
Yeah. And also, I mean, it's when you do that it—you make some more about you and your service versus the prospect's pain, their situation.
Aleasha (guest):
Yes.
Kathy (host):
And, I mean, I have been in sales situations that other people have done that to me. I'm like, "Yeah, I know that's a problem, but that's not my problem right now. I need to fix this." Yes, I might go into that one, but let's fix this one right now.
Aleasha (guest):
You know, you bring up a great point too, where people try to sell all this stuff at first, and it's like, let's just start with the first solving the first thing, and then we can discuss what the next steps are. It's really important with like proposals coming in, with like a phased process, and having a milestone—once we know x, or once we see x, then we can talk about doing y—right now, let's just do this. And it's so much easier, because you trust the—they trust you. They trust working with you. They've had the experience. They're happy to spend more money. It's just scarier to spend more money at first when you don't know if somebody's full of it or not.
Kathy (host):
So we've talked about the sales strategy, and now let's say we fixed it. We have it. Yay. Yay for us. We have it, and now we're ready to hire the salespeople. What do you think are some of the things that you should be looking for in a salesperson that are green flags and red flags? Let's start with red flags.
Aleasha (guest):
Yeah. So one of the things I always like to ask a salesperson is, "What are you looking for, financially and culturally, in a position?" I don't like lone-wolf salespeople. If somebody's like, "I just want you to leave me alone and let me do my thing," I'm like, "No, not a team player." Like, resistant to, you know, input and improvement and feedback. You want to hear somebody who's like, "I want to be part of a team that cares. I want to be part of a company that cares about the delivery and their clients, and that's really that—that level of integrity is important to me. And I really like always improving and a team that supports each other" and that kind of thing.
Aleasha (guest):
If the person is just like, "I like to be at the top of the leaderboard"—some people think that's like a really good sign, but that's usually like a very cutthroat, a sales diva type of person. In my experience, I don't really like those people. They ask for a lot and they don't do much in return. Like, they complain about admin work and logging things in CRMs, and it's like, "I'm sorry, that's just part of the job." I know we all wish that we could just show up and just sell and then get paid, but it's just not the deal. So, like, let's all move on and accept that that's part of it.
Aleasha (guest):
The other thing I really like to ask is, "What is your sales style?" And I'm really hoping that they mention curiosity and empathy because if you can't be curious, you're gonna miss a lot of sales. So a lot of salespeople are trained to just like, talk and be charming and smooth and have like a lot of rapport, they go down like, what I call a rapport hole, where they talk about everything but business, but there's just so much good conversation, and they relate so well, but that doesn't make anybody want to work with you, necessarily. So curiosity is going to be a lot more important for that and empathy, because if you have empathy, then you're not just shoving your solution on people. You're understanding where they're at and where they want to go, and that there is emotion behind that, you know, like that. This is an emotional thing. It's scary to be buying something—you want to make sure that you're making the right choice. You're scared of making the wrong choice, you know, so somebody that can balance all those things.
Aleasha (guest):
And then I also like to ask, "What's the favorite offer you ever sold, and why?" And I really like somebody to talk about the impact that what they sold had on the person they sold it to. So "I loved seeing how it changed their life in this way." And your prospects are gonna be able to feel that in a salesperson, that they actually care about the other person and what's in it for them, instead of like, their commission, which sometimes salespeople will be like, "Oh like this—this offer was my favorite because I sold the biggest—it was so complicated, and I made this huge commission, and it was a huge sale." And like, I don't really—that person, as sales is evolving, prospects are becoming more and more resistant to that "I'm in it for me" approach.
Kathy (host):
I really love, love these three questions, and I've never heard anyone talk about these three questions. So I love this as a resource for our listeners because that is such an important piece of an interviewing process for salespeople. And I think a lot of people treat the sales interview process the same as they would for any other employee. That's—and I think it's, I think there's a difference between people that are going to be that close to the revenue and that close to your business. Because especially when they're interacting with your potential customers, they really need to be on board with your culture and what you're trying to project because they are an extension of you out there in the world. So whatever they're going out there, you know, it's going to come back to you as a business. So it's super, super important. And, you know, let's talk a little bit about this, like, if you're thinking of hiring people, how you should think about hiring salespeople versus other employees, and what should the differences be?
Aleasha (guest):
Yeah, I mean, so, I mean, the biggest difference is you really want somebody who's driven by money and impact, like not just money, but for example, something you can do is have a compensation structure. One has a higher guaranteed salary and a lower commission component, and the other one has a higher commission component and a lower base salary component, and if the person picks the higher guaranteed component, it's not a great sign—like that person's not trying to push and is not excited about making money. They want to play safe. They kind of want to be more order takers. So in salespeople, you definitely want them to be like, excited about being able to make more the more that they sell. So, like, with compensation, a lot of times it helps to have like, a ladder. So knowing what is the goal that I need them to make, to be okay, what's the goal that I would be really happy about, and what's the goal that I'd be like, "Hell yeah, I'll pay you whatever you want," and having a commission structure around those three and like being able to talk about that with the salesperson and them to be bought in on that. I mean—communication is so important. A lot of times, salespeople work in their own little silos. So being able to workshop—I always want to hear collaboration when it comes to salespeople like you're going to come to your manager, you're going to come to your teammates, you're going to talk about, "How are you approaching this?" And have ideas and insights for that, rather than just being in your own little world. So, I mean, I think that those things you want, those kinds of like in every employee, like driven and good communication, but they're really, really important in salespeople, but they can't be a safe person. I think that's the biggest difference. Salespeople are a little bit more of a risk taker, right? Big risk, big reward. They're a little more fast-moving. Usually, they're usually less detail-oriented. Sadly, it would be great if they were more detail-oriented. So if you can find that unicorn, definitely do it. But a lot of time the detail-oriented person is going to be a lot slower, right? They're not gonna move as fast. And salespeople need to be like, making stuff happen.
Kathy (host):
And I think it's also you have to realize that you're never gonna find an employee that's gonna be perfect in everything. I mean, obviously that would be a unicorn if you find someone, kudos to you, but generally, you're not going to. So I think it's really important to like, rank the things that are the most important to you and the company, and look at it, do they have those top three? Because those are the most important things and the rest of it, you can also, maybe you can train them on it. Maybe, I think the other thing is, like looking at a personality wise and culture fit as well. And I know this can get a little bit tricky, because you also don't want to have a company when everyone is the same as well, like everyone's thinking the same. So that can get, that can get a little bit—you need diversity of thoughts. So you have to be cognizant of that when you're creating this culture that you're not just like hiring for specific type of people, because you, you know, a good company should have a diversity of thought. But going back to these commissions, I have to ask, how do you feel about 100% commission?
Aleasha (guest):
So if there are inbound leads, you can do 100% commission, because that person doesn't have to work to create a pipeline. If there's work to create a pipeline, they have to be given a base, yeah, because they're going to be putting in all this work for—for nothing. So it really depends on the company's setup, and then obviously, like, you know, you want to give higher commissions when there's not a base too.
Kathy (host):
So would you say that the company that it's mostly inbound leads—should they drive more towards the commissions versus the base?
Aleasha (guest):
Yes, definitely. And that's like a selling point, right? You're not going to have to do your own hunting. I mean, obviously you want them to do some of their only generations like, that's something to look for too. You don't want just an order taker. You don't like salespeople who can be lazy. They can be like I, I want it to be just as easy as possible, like that person. And also you. They need to be hungry. So sometimes salespeople are like, I could get by on 3000 a month. They're gonna make 3000 a month, and they're not gonna push any not gonna push any harder. Like, you need somebody who is who, who's hungry, but it's, it's just kind of messed up to not compensate someone to create their leads when they have no opportunity to make a sale. Like, it's, it's wrong, and it's not an exciting opportunity for somebody. So they're probably gonna leave. So like, yeah, you you want to have, if you have inbound leads, like, you can give higher commission for leads, they generate themselves. That's kind of a way that you can incentivize them to do their own lead gen, rather than a base. Or you could have, like, a small base,
Kathy (host):
Yep, makes sense. So Aleasha, if someone is listening to this, and they're like, "Well, I get it. I need to have a sales strategy before I can hire more people." But there's sales strategy doesn't just magically appear within a day. We all wish we did it did. But if someone is trying to put this together so that they can be successful in hiring salespeople the future salespeople that they're gonna hire, what is the one thing that it can do within the next week or two to get them closer to that goal?
Aleasha (guest):
Ooh, that's such a great question. I would say, start collecting and putting in one place information about your offer and your target audience. So whether that's like creating a Google Drive with docs in it that works just fine, you know, have a doc on your audience and their challenges and their concerns and their goals and have a doc on like what is delivered on your end.
Kathy (host):
Love that. So Aleasha, where can people find you?
Aleasha (guest):
So you can find me on my podcast, Sales is Not a Dirty Word. I have solo episodes that go into detail about all kinds of sales, different elements of a sales process and hiring salespeople and stuff. And I did just write my book, which will be out very soon, and you'll be able to get it on my website a. Shabbar.com the book is Black Sheep sales, how to win more sales without acting like a douche bag.
Kathy (host):
Love that title. It's awesome. Thanks. Aleasha, it's been a pleasure. So fun.
Aleasha (guest):
Kathy, thank you.