Top sales people constantly prospect for leads that may lead to new accounts. As a top hiring manager, you should be constantly prospecting for the strong sales people you need to hire. However, leaving the door open to new hires that promise a good fit for your company is only one component of a successful recruiting strategy targeting top sales people. Firms must also present value to sales candidates, thoroughly vet candidates pre-hire, and ensure that candidates can deliver on their potential. Improving your recruiting strategy in these three key areas can improve your recruiting results for top sales people almost immediately.

Make an Investment in Your Team

Time and time again, employment surveys reveal that top sales people in virtually every industry have core traits in common, including ambition. The best sales people aren’t happy with simply being good, or even the best; they constantly push to raise the bar and set personal goals. For many, this includes a career track leading to positions in management.

Before making the transition to your company, these motivated individuals will want to know what you will do to promote their success. Having training programs and clear career tracks available for all of your employees will not only improve your attractiveness as an employer, it will improve your bottom line by motivating your entire sales team and equipping them with the tools they need to succeed.

Recognize the Value of Assessments

Candidate assessments are not just a useful tool – they are an absolute requirement when you need to hire top sales people. Assessments can tell you how a candidate is likely to respond in real world situations, uncover true personality traits, reveal candidate motivations, and more. Several recognized assessments are particularly suited for use in sales recruiting, including:

• The Selling Skills Index
• The Sales Achievement Predictor, or SalesAP
• The Employee Personality Profile (EPP)

Combined with a telephone screening and in person interview, such proven assessments will set up reasonably accurate expectations for a given candidate. Additionally, the costs of such assessments are far lower than the cost of a bad hire, which can be many times the hire’s expected annual compensation.

Don’t Take the Easy Hire

As an experienced hiring manager, you already know that as a general rule sales people tend to interview well. This can make it hard to uncover top sales people, since in a basic interview it can be difficult to tell a star interviewer from a star performer. If you reach the offer phase and the sales candidate is not asking questions about the offer, much less attempting to negotiate for an improved compensation package, either your company has unbeatable compensation for its industry or the candidate might not be one of the top sales people you thought he or she was.

One of the best ways to avoid this outcome is to use sales recruiters as a normal part of your firm’s recruiting process. The success of a sales recruiter relies on your satisfaction with their services, and knowing this, recruiters work hard to ensure that only top sales people are recommended for your consideration. Sales recruiters also have daily exposure to the sales interview process, enabling them to quickly spot candidates who are simply good interviewers from the top sales people who bring real potential to the table.