If you want your sales teams to succeed, you will need a strong sales manager leading them. However, finding the perfect sales manager is not always easy and despite challenging economic times, great managers are always in high demand.
Here are our 5 guidelines for finding and selecting the perfect match for your sales manager vacancy:
- Be clear on what you are looking for
“Sales manager” is not a very precise job description, a lot of people can qualify as sales managers. What are you looking for exactly? To find the perfect sales manager for you, you will need a detailed job description with the functions this sales manager will need to perform and their day-to-day deliveries. Then, based on that precise job description, think about the ideal candidate and your wish list in terms of experience and competencies. With the detailed job description and your wish list, you will have a much better idea of what you are looking for exactly: what is the role you are looking to fill and who do you need to fill it.
- Design a competitive compensation package
Here it is important to do your research and dedicate some time on designing a competitive compensation package. Your sales manager will be leading your sales team and should provide you with great results. This is not a position you will want to scrimp on because let´s face it, average reward probably also will only give you average results. Research the market and see what your direct competitors are offering, find out what the going market rate is for a sales manager with the experience that you are looking for. Even if you can´t afford to pay top rate in the market, think about other ways to make your compensation package more attractive. Personalized compensation packages are more and more appreciated and can give you an edge as compared to the other companies.
- Stay up to date
If you want to hire the best candidate, make sure you will be able to give them what they need to be successful. Working with old systems or outdated sales procedures will probably not attract the best sales manager to your company. If your company is not up to date with for example sales software, policies and tools, your new sales manager might not have all the tools they need to achieve the success you expect from them.
- Define a targeted sourcing approach
Since you know what profile you are looking for, make sure to really target your sourcing approach. Just throwing your job posting online will probably get you a lot of applications of which the majority will be useless. So save yourself the time and the effort and direct your vacancies towards the relevant target audience. For example, work with agencies specialized in the sales profile you are looking for or share the job posting in specific LinkedIn groups for sales professionals.
- Focus on behavioral interviewing
Don´t just hire the perfect resume. If someone was a successful sales manager at his or her previous job that does not always mean they will be able to replicate that success selling your products or services. During the interview process you will need to judge their ability to be successful within your company and to sell your products or services. Therefore, use behavioral questioning in your interviews to evaluate the candidate´s ability to achieve the same level of success by giving them cases and really digging deep into how they would approach these types of cases.
How do you ensure you will find the perfect sales manager?
