Page 42 - The Sales Acceleration Formula: Using Data, Technology, and Inbound Selling to go from $0 to $100 Million - PDFDrive.com

referrals—do you know anyone?” I would say, “I am going to set a 20-minute
meeting with you tomorrow. Tonight, I will go through your 275 connections on
LinkedIn and look for salespeople in Boston to whom you are connected that
look like they may be a good fit for our team.” The next day, I show up to the
meeting with the 18 people they are connected to that fit the criteria mentioned.
They then proceed to tell me which prospective candidates are top performers
and whether they are comfortable introducing me.

This tactic is more work up front, but it is beautifully effective.

Understand the Sales Talent Pool in Your Area

The final tactic I used to find great salespeople was to develop a deep
understanding of the sales teams in Boston, where we recruited the initial team.
How large are the teams? How much does their salespeople make? Are they
inside or outside? What is the sales training like? Did they recently change their
compensation plan?

As I combed through candidates on LinkedIn, I developed a list of all the
companies with inside sales teams in Boston. It was not long before I had
interviewed at least one person from each of those teams. In fact, I purposely hit
each company. Even if the background of the salesperson looked mediocre, I
often took the interview to find out more about the company's sales team.

Here are some examples of questions I asked during these interviews:

1. How much does the company pay their salespeople? How are the
compensation plans structured?

2. What is the buyer context like? Is it transactional or complex? Is it enterprise
or SMB? Do they mostly have outbound leads or inbound leads?

3. How many reps are at the company? What are the different sales roles? How
is the sales team structured?

4. What is the company's sales training like? Do they use a formal sales
methodology? Do they invest in outside training or have a full-time staff?

5. Were there any major changes at the company that could cause top
performers to consider leaving? Did the commission plan change? Did the
leadership change?

6. Who are the top salespeople at the company? For example, you may ask if