Think Twice Before Hiring Your Competitor’s Sales People

“Hire my competitor’s salespeople and let the dollars roll in.” It is all so tempting. Sure, you wouldn’t have to teach them the product or the industry. And, it certainly makes your job easy. But, there is oftentimes a missing ingredient… passion. And, you can’t teach passion.

Years ago, I took over a sales team and one of my reps had sold for a couple of of our competitors over the years. I traveled with her on a sales call and everything she said in the meeting was 100% correct. She certainly knew the industry and the product fundamentals. However, there was a big problem! While everything she said was correct about our company, it was also true about all of the other industry players. She had no passion about our unique solution. It all sounded gray… And a salesperson’s passion is a key motivator driving prospects to buy.

While hiring from competitors is easy, it doesn’t make it the best move for your company. Focus your quest on hiring the right salespeople who can be great in your company.
See you next time on the Sales Management Minute.

 AUTHOR:  LEE B. SALZ

Lee B. Salz is a leading sales management strategist specializing in helping companies build scalable, high-performance sales organizations through hiring the right salespeople, effectively onboarding them, and aligning their sales activities with business objectives through process, metrics and compensation. He is the Founder and CEO of Sales Architects, Business Expert Webinars and The Revenue Accelerator. Lee has authored several books including award-winning,  best-seller “Hire Right, Higher Profits.” He is a results-driven sales management consultant and a passionate, dynamic speaker . Lee can be reached at lsalz@SalesArchitects.net or 763.416.4321.