Most sales organizations provide internal mentorship programs that involve a senior rep supporting new rep development.

In theory, it’s a great idea.

The mentee learns the ropes from a proven rep within the company and has a go-to, trusted resource for help.

The mentors, on the other hand, get to flex their budding leadership skills and gain extra visibility when their mentees excel. Plus, sales managers and directors benefit as they have another shoulder to lean on to help ramp up new team members.

Sounds like a win-win-win, right? 

Not so fast. 

Some reps and sales leaders feel the mentor gets the shortest straw since it’s their time that’s getting pulled away. 

This raises the question: 

Should we compensate sales mentors for their time?

We ran a poll on LinkedIn, and the majority voted hard in favor of compensating mentors.

“As an individual contributor, I’ve always been willing to help without getting paid. But I will give my mentee a lot more attention if I can get something out of it as well,” said Byron Sierra-Mattos. 

In Byron’s previous sales roles as a mentor, he’d shadow sales calls with a new rep and offer feedback. Then, as the mentee began closing deals, Byron would earn a percentage of the deals for a designated timeframe. 

Alexine Mudawar, CEO of Women in Sales, agreed. For internal sales mentorship programs, creating sales comp with set milestones for mentors could be a nice setup.

However, for mentorship outside of organizations, she disagreed.

“I would never accept compensation externally for mentorship,” Alexine said. “Career coaching I would — but that would be different!”

Jason Conrey, Head of Sales at ElectroNeek, also believes sales mentors should receive additional sales compensation.

“Pay them,” Jason said. “As someone who heads a sales organization, when I leverage mentors for reps it takes a bit of work off of my plate and allows me to focus on other areas, while in parallel, it consumes the bandwidth of the mentor which could be the time they’d apply to further driving their own numbers.”

Factors to consider

If you don’t compensate your mentors but are now thinking about it, here are some points to consider:

What is the ask and time commitment of the mentor? For example, does your mentor sit on calls with the new rep and offer feedback? Or, is the mentee listening in to live demos? The latter requires no additional effort from the mentor as they would have conducted the call regardless. 

Compensation structure: What percentage of the mentor’s compensation plan is tied to variable pay? If their pay mix weighs toward variable pay (60:40) versus base pay, and their time is now shared mentoring a new rep, this may call for additional compensation. 

How to build a comp plan with sales mentor bonuses

We typically see four methods to compensate sales mentors.

1. Commission percentage: This is what Byron had in previous roles. When his mentee closed a deal within a specific length of time, Byron earned a small percentage of commission from the total contract value. The commission percentage model can be easily set up and executed from a commission tracking perspective and could be implemented in your comp plans similar to a SPIF.
   
2. Milestone bonuses: You could also set pre-determined bonus amounts, or milestone bonuses, that the mentor receives as the mentee progresses through larger onboarding accomplishments. Alexine mentioned this structure above. 
   
   For example, if the mentee books three demos, the mentor might receive $250. Or, if the mentee closes a deal within the first 60 days, then the mentor receives $500.
   
   Like the commission percentage model, you could set up the milestone bonuses like a SPIF throughout the year as your mentors take on new mentees.

3. Shared quota attainment: In situations where the mentor takes an active role in supporting the mentee in closing deals, you could consider retiring quota from the same deal for both the mentor and the mentee. Is this a logistical nightmare? Yes, it’s not easy. That, and your mentor might slack or sandbag a bit knowing they can hit their quota by using the mentee’s book of business to get there.
   
4. Create a senior AE role: The easiest and most effective way to compensate sales mentors is to design a senior AE role with a higher base salary that includes mentoring as part of their job description. This creates a clear career path with differentiated duties between your sale rep levels.
   
   You can use these compensation plan templates to build out base and variable structures appropriate for a senior role. 

So, there you have it. 

Still thinking your sales mentors should do it for the visibility and experience and not the money? 

We leave you with one more point from Jason.

“‘Visibility’ is an absolute joke to most successful AEs,” Jason said. “It’s important but leaders stand out based on other traits and results. My progress from AE to leadership was faster than the majority and my visibility has been high at every stop in my journey but I never did anything to be ‘visible.’”

“Visibility never paid a single bill, but bonus money sure as heck bought me a wake surf boat.”

About QuotaPath

To learn more about QuotaPath’s sales compensation automation and management software, book a time with our team. In the meantime, check out our free resource, Compensation Hub to guide your comp plan design process. This ungated library includes 20 adjustable free comp plan templates to run and test scenarios. Save a plan in Compensation Hub and see it live in QuotaPath for a free 30-day trial. 

*okay, so obviously I can’t GUARANTEE you hit your quota as a sales rep, but if you use these tips, you’ll crush your sales quota.

Understand your sales quota

I know this one sounds simple but without knowing what you’re expected to sell, it’s impossible to know whether you’re doing a good job. There are lots of different types of quotas. Traditional quotas require a sales rep to sell a certain amount of their product or service per month/quarter/year. There are activity quotas that require a sales rep to do an activity. This means the rep is supposed to make a certain number of calls, emails, or something else. A team-based quota requires your entire sales team (you and your team members) to sell a certain amount. Your whole team will get paid based on whether the sales team meets the quota.

If you’re lucky, your quota is VERY straightforward; something like $30,000 of new business revenue per month. Maybe it’s based on top-line profit for the company. However, a lot of companies have complex quotas that require upsells, renewals, new business, or meetings set. Ensure you have a good understanding of exactly what you’re expected to do first and foremost.

Keep yourself organized

Look, no one likes keeping their CRM up to date. It’s a chore that sales reps feel are busywork required by their manager/sales ops but I promise it’s worth it. If you carefully record all conversations you have with your prospects you’re more likely to close the deal — now or in the future. When a prospect tells you that they’ll be making a buying decision in 6 months, chances are you’re going to forget about them. If you use a CRM to remind yourself where they saw value initially, you’ve set yourself up to close that deal. I promise you that your CRM has a better memory than you do.

Ask for referrals

Many new business sales reps close a deal, hand it off to their account manager and move on to the next one. I always make an effort to follow up with the client 2 months after onboarding. First I check to ensure they are seeing value out of what I sold them. If they aren’t, I try to remedy the situation. If they are, I go through their LinkedIn and see which of their connections would benefit from what I’m selling. Then I ask if I can mention them or if the client themselves will make the introduction. I’ve closed countless deals this way.

Track your goals

Numerous studies have found that the more a rep measures their progress toward a goal, the more likely that rep is to achieve it. Want to lose weight? Get a scale in your bathroom, weigh yourself every day, and write it down. The same goals for your quota. If you track your progress every day, you’ll be focused on doing the right things to get there. P.S. this is where QuotaPath comes in handy!

Don’t get lazy

Have you ever been in a sales slump and said “I don’t understand what’s happening! I’m doing the same thing I’ve always done and not getting the same results!” Yeah, me too. Then I listened to my most recent demo vs. an old demo… it’s night and day. I thought I was doing the same things on both demos, but instead I hadn’t done the research on the client. I wasn’t asking closing questions, and I was letting them lead the demo… all the things I know not to do. So I put a post-it on my monitor that said “DON’T BE LAZY”. Every time I saw it, I remembered to do the things that win deals.

ABP: Always be prospecting

Yeah, I stole this from the most hackneyed sales scene of all time. Don’t let it distract from the message. If you’re not trying to add new deals into your pipeline all the time, your pipeline is going to dry up. It’s hard to hit quota with a dry pipeline. Set aside time every day to new opportunity generation. If that means cold calling, pick up the phone. If that means connecting with prospects on LinkedIn, go add them! Additionally LinkedIn prospectors and marketers, can use LinkedHelper software to automate the prospecting and engage with clients on the platform.

Try new things

This might seem a bit contradictory to a previous point about doing the same things on every demo, but it’s not. What I mean is that you need to be constantly experimenting in order to get better. Don’t entirely change your demo or cold call pitch immediately, make small changes slowly. Try calling during lunchtime one day per week to see if it improves your connect rate. Experiment with combining your discovery call and demo into one long call. Try speaking in a different accent! Okay, don’t do that one.

Now that you have a few tips and techniques, get out there and crush your sales quota! Do you need a calculator to help track your quota or commissions? You can use QuotaPath for free.

This is a guest blog from our friends at Dialpad.

Are you looking at developing and modernizing your business with the use of sales dashboards? You can use many different types of dashboards, depending on what data you want to show. We have found 10 of the most useful dashboards you and your team should familiarize yourselves with.

What is a Sales Dashboard?

A sales dashboard is a visual tool that helps you keep track of your data. Whether you are looking at the average time it takes to close a deal or how often your sales team is likely to queue a call, a dashboard can help. Data and analytics can be confusing. But a sales dashboard will show your data in a simple way that is easy to understand.

As a sales manager, you can use a sales dashboard to monitor the performance of your sales team. With the right dashboard, you can create a visual representation of your key sales metrics. Sales dashboards can also be helpful for teams to track their own progress.

10 Sales Dashboards To Familiarise Yourself With

1. Win/Loss Dashboard

A Win/Loss Dashboard shows the overall deals that were closed within a certain period of time. It also shows losses and open or pending sales. These dashboards are useful for tracking sales as they show strengths, as well as areas with room for improvement.

These dashboards are also useful for sales managers as they can track the performance of individuals within their team. Team performance can also be compared to previous periods to measure overall performance.

Why is a win/loss dashboard useful?

A win/loss dashboard is useful because it provides clear visibility into sales performance, showing which deals were won, lost, or are still pending within a specific timeframe. This helps sales managers identify patterns, strengths, and areas for improvement, allowing them to adjust strategies and coaching efforts accordingly. Additionally, it enables historical comparisons, helping teams track progress over time and refine their sales approach to improve win rates.

2. Sales Activities Dashboard

The Sales Activities Dashboard will help you learn more about what your employees do during the workday. This dashboard uses charts to show which sales activities are undertaken by each team member.

For example, if your company uses VoIP calling for its sales calls, you can analyze data, such as the duration of calls and the number of phone calls made to secure a sale. Using your dashboard, you can see which employees are more productive and how sales relate to the activities they are doing.

Why is a sales activity dashboard useful?

A sales activities dashboard is useful because it provides insight into how sales reps spend their time and which activities drive results. By tracking metrics like call volume, meeting frequency, and deal progress, managers can identify top performers, uncover productivity trends, and optimize sales strategies. This data-driven approach helps improve efficiency, coaching, and overall sales performance.

3. Time-Tracking Sales Dashboard

This dashboard is another way to track your sales team’s activities. But the Time-Tracking Sales Dashboard looks specifically at how much time is spent on each activity. This can be useful when looking for ways to increase productivity. If too much time is regularly spent on certain activities, you can look into ways to streamline that process.

Time-tracking can also be used to work out how much time is spent on individual clients. For example, to give a more accurate bill to clients who are charged by the hour.

Why is a time tracking sales dashboard useful?

A time-tracking sales dashboard is useful because it provides visibility into how much time reps spend on different sales activities, helping identify inefficiencies and opportunities for streamlining processes. By analyzing time allocation, managers can optimize workflows, improve productivity, and ensure reps focus on high-impact tasks. Additionally, it enables more accurate client billing for businesses that charge by the hour.

4. Product Performance Dashboard

A Product Performance Dashboard looks at the sales of individual products. This is very useful for keeping track of sales so you can create a realistic inventory projection. It should be easy for both your buyers and sales team to use and keep your business running smoothly

If sales have declined, a Product Performance Dashboard can help your team decide which lines to discontinue. It can also help build a bigger picture of trends in different periods. This keeps your business one step ahead with ordering in the future. This prevents surplus stock, selling out of stock too quickly, or bringing in new lines that will not sell.

Why is a product performance dashboard useful?

A product performance dashboard is useful because it tracks the sales of individual products, helping businesses manage inventory and make informed purchasing decisions. By analyzing trends over time, companies can identify which products to discontinue, adjust stock levels to prevent shortages or surpluses, and optimize sales strategies. This ensures smoother operations, better forecasting, and improved profitability.

5. Deal Performance Dashboard

If you want to focus your dashboard on sales forecasts, you need to look into Deal Performance Dashboards. These dashboards use data from previously closed deals and current ongoing deals to predict sales for the upcoming year.

This dashboard is also suitable for analyzing the different stages of the deal process. You can track changes to ongoing deals, as well as how many deals each of your sales team has closed in each period.

Why is a deal performance dashboard useful?

A deal performance dashboard is useful because it analyzes past and current deals to forecast future sales, helping businesses set realistic revenue goals. It also tracks deal progression through different sales stages, allowing sales managers to monitor performance trends, identify bottlenecks, and optimize sales strategies. This ensures better pipeline management and more accurate sales planning.

6. Sales Manager Dashboard

This is the dashboard that every sales manager should familiarize themselves with. With this, they can look at day-to-day sales performances, or monitor them weekly, monthly, and yearly. They can use this information to manage their teams more effectively.

A Sales Manager Dashboard ensures that managers can keep track of targets. They can see how their team is progressing and make adjustments if they are not. Larger companies can also track their sales regionally. Being able to analyze regional sales gives managers the ability to measure performance better.

Why is a sales manager dashboard useful?

A sales manager dashboard is useful because it provides a clear view of sales performance over different time periods, helping managers track targets and adjust strategies as needed. It also enables regional sales analysis, ensuring better team management and performance measurement.

7. Sales KPI Dashboard

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are goals set by a company to measure its performance. But if you want a clear, concise way to analyze your KPIs with your team, you should create a Sales KPI Dashboard.

The Sales KPI Dashboard should be accessible to the whole team so that they can keep track of their own progress. You can use it during meetings to show areas to work on, give feedback, and help with training.

Why is a sales KPI dashboard useful?

A sales KPI dashboard is useful because it provides a clear, real-time view of key performance metrics, helping teams track progress toward goals. It also facilitates data-driven coaching and feedback, ensuring continuous improvement and alignment with company objectives.

8. Sales Cycle Length Dashboar

A Sales Cycle Length Dashboard is used to monitor how long sales take, from identifying a lead to closing the deal. This dashboard is ideal for teams looking to shorten their sales cycles. You can also look at average sales cycle lengths over certain periods. 

Your team can monitor exactly which parts of the sales are more time-consuming and which parts can be easily streamlined. You can also analyze individual team members to see if they have found a better process that the whole team can utilize.

Why is a sales cycle length dashboard useful?

A sales cycle length dashboard is useful because it tracks how long deals take to close, helping teams identify bottlenecks and streamline processes. It also allows managers to analyze trends and optimize strategies for a more efficient sales cycle.

9. Sales Conversion Rate Dashboard

A team’s sales conversion rate is how well it converts leads into paying customers. Your sales team may be getting a lot of leads but struggling to follow them through to close a deal. Alternatively, you may be getting fewer high-quality leads with a higher conversion rate.

If you are keen to increase your sales rates, this is the dashboard for you. It can highlight your lead-to-sales ratios, as well as loss rates. A Sales Conversion Rate Dashboard will give you a clearer look at the bigger picture.

How is a sales conversion rate dashboard useful?

A sales conversion rate dashboard is useful because it measures how effectively leads are converted into customers, helping teams identify strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities to improve sales processes.

10. Sales Opportunity Dashboard

If you are looking to expand your business and build on your sales, you need to look at the Sales Opportunity Dashboard. You can monitor how new customers and sales channels will increase your revenue, as well as identify challenges.

For example, is your sales team using all the resources available to them? A potential customer may have a query a call operator can’t answer. Are they using call transferring to redirect the customer to a colleague who will be able to help? Or do they regularly keep customers on hold while they look for answers?

Why is a sales opportunity dashboard useful?

A sales opportunity dashboard is useful because it tracks potential revenue growth by analyzing new customers, sales channels, and team effectiveness in handling opportunities. It helps identify gaps in the sales process, ensuring teams maximize available resources and improve customer interactions to close more deals.

How to Create Your Sales Dashboard

• Establish why you want to create a sales dashboard: Are you making it to track sales, monitor employees, or is there a specific problem you want to address?
• Decide what sales metrics you will be tracking: There’s no one-size-fits-all dashboard, so you need to know exactly what data you want to show.
• Choose your dashboard: There are many dashboards to choose from, so make sure you are choosing the correct one for your purpose.
• Decide how you want to use the sales dashboard: Your dashboard will be different depending on what it will be used for, who will be using it and what period it covers. You may want to simplify it if your whole sales team needs to use it.
• Choose a sales provider (or do it yourself): If you have the know-how, you could create your dashboard yourself using Excel. But if you don’t have the technical skills to make one yourself, there are many sales tools to choose from

Some examples of popular sales data software providers are Klipfolio, Zoho Reports, Hubspot CRM, and Salesforce.

• Create your reports: If you are using a sales provider, you just need to input the information, and everything will be put together for you. But you will still need to choose how you want your sales dashboard to be laid out. If you are creating it yourself, you will need to create your own charts and graphs.
• Keep it simple: This is not the time for overdesigning. Choose a clear layout that is easy to read. You need to think about how the sales dashboard will be accessed. Will employees use their phones, laptops, or desktop computers? Can the sales report be seen clearly on small and larger screens?

Metrics to Include in Your Sales Dashboard

A well-designed sales dashboard provides a clear snapshot of your team’s performance, helping you track progress, identify opportunities, and optimize sales strategies. Below are key metrics to include and why they matter.

Win Rate: The percentage of closed deals compared to total opportunities. A high win rate indicates strong sales execution, while a low rate may signal issues in qualification or closing techniques.

Sales Conversion Rate: The percentage of leads that convert into paying customers. This helps measure lead quality and the effectiveness of your sales process.

Quota Attainment: The percentage of quota achieved by individual reps or teams. This metric shows how well sales targets are set and whether reps need additional support or incentives.

Average Deal Size: The average revenue per closed deal. Tracking this helps businesses optimize pricing strategies and identify trends in customer purchasing behavior.

Sales Cycle Length: The average time it takes to move a lead from initial contact to closed deal. Shorter sales cycles generally indicate a more efficient sales process.

Pipeline Value: The total value of all deals in the pipeline. This provides insight into potential future revenue and helps with forecasting.

Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC): The total cost of acquiring a new customer, including marketing and sales expenses. Lowering CAC while maintaining high conversion rates improves profitability.

Churn Rate: The percentage of customers who stop doing business with you over a given period. High churn indicates potential issues with customer satisfaction or product fit.

Lead Response Time: The average time it takes for sales reps to follow up with a lead.

Sales Dashboard Examples

The following our sales dashboard examples available in QuotaPath and through our key integrations.

Your Sales Dashboard

Sales dashboards are a visual tool to enhance your business. It’s not just about data. Dashboards assist with employee communication, reaching targets, and finding problems as they arise. You should be asking yourself exactly what you want from your sales dashboard.

Keep your dashboard simple, clean, and clear. It should be easy to read and interpret by anyone on your sales team. Don’t worry about pretty colors and overcomplicated graphs. Make it accessible to everyone.

The most important thing to think about when creating your sales dashboard should be whether it is user-friendly. A sales dashboard is an example of modern data architecture, meaning it should be designed and structured well. It should be a reliable way to access and process data. 

About the author: Jenna Bunnell, Senior Manager, Content Marketing, Dialpad

Jenna Bunnell is the Senior Manager for Content Marketing at Dialpad, a call recording software and AI-incorporated cloud-hosted unified communications system that provides valuable call details for business owners and sales representatives. She is driven and passionate about communicating a brand’s design sensibility and visualizing how content can be presented in creative and comprehensive ways. Check out her LinkedIn profile.

Every sales team either just wrapped up rolling out a new sales compensation plan or is about to.

That means meetings — and lots of them — to ensure every commissionable rep understands the circumstances of when they are paid, how they earn variable pay, what happens if a contract cancels, and more.

You have to inform leadership. Then leadership typically holds a meeting with the entire sales organization, and individual one-on-ones follow. (For 10 best practices and a complete example compensation communication plan, check out this blog.)

The final step involves putting a formal document in place that outlines the compensation policy and includes signatures of acknowledgment from the rep and the organization.

Get your AE compensation policy template

We’ve seen this legal document called both a commission agreement and a compensation policy. And, it serves to protect the company and the commissionable employee from potential compensation disputes in the future.

In fact, in some states, having a commission agreement in place is mandated by law. See: California and New York. 

However, for those who fall outside of those states, we consider this a must-have comp plan best practice as it deepens understanding of your compensation structure and provides a point of reference should questions arise. 

Below is an outline of a commission agreement.

How to write a compensation policy

Every commission agreement should include a detailed breakdown of the following: 

• On-target earnings (OTE)
• Quota frequency, quota, and on-target commissions
• A commission table with commission rates tied to progress toward quota
• Additional comp plan mechanics that impact commissions rates (such as accelerators and decelerators)
• Payment terms that include when your org. pays commissions
• SPIFs 
• Clawback language
• Dispute resolution
• Accrual and payout
• Signature 

Write your own, or feel free to download our free AE compensation policy template. 

For other compensation resources, visit Compensation Hub for free comp plan templates, or discover our sales compensation calculator and more on our Resources page. 

About QuotaPath

QuotaPath automates commission tracking and sales compensation management for scaling GTM teams. Integrate your CRM for real-time, accurate, and transparent commission payouts and communications. Align your teams with a compensation source of truth and motivate your reps by showing how their pipeline translates to earnings.  

This is a guest blog written by SetSail CMO Peter Mollins.

It’s impossible to lead a high-performance team without trust. 

And to build trust, you need transparency – openness, honesty, and two-way communication.

Transparency is one of the most critical factors employees consider when assessing whether they should stay at a job, or take a job, to begin with. 

Why is transparency important for sales teams?

According to the Society for Human Resources Management, one out of five workers said they can’t always trust what their supervisor tells them.

Another study showed people who believe their leaders are transparent feel nearly four times as high a sense of belonging with their teams and report more than six times as high satisfaction with their work environment. 

It’s not just about keeping your sales team happy – it’s about creating a place they feel they can do their best work. Companies with engaged employees are 23% more profitable.

So many leaders talk about transparency, but how do you put it into practice as a revenue leader? 

It starts with thinking about transparency as a behavior, not just a value. Here are six actionable ways to inject a healthy dose of transparency into your sales enablement strategy:

How do you build transparency in a sales team?

• Show the whole sales team what the high performers do 
• Show every sales rep how they measure up 
• Don’t make sales compensation and commission a secret 
• Help your team learn from losses – not just wins 
• Make it easy to ask questions and get answers
• Communicate clear expectations from every coaching interaction 

#1: Show the whole sales team what the high performers do 

The high performers aren’t just arbitrary favorites. They’re on the top of the sales leaderboards for a reason. 

They do the right actions at the right times and achieve revenue outcomes. 

In large sales teams, the average performing rep likely has the drive to get better – they may simply not know what to do. They probably don’t have visibility into the high performer’s process. But by providing transparency into top-performing actions and empowering your middle performers to raise the bar, you’ll have a huge impact on the bottom line.

How your top reps close revenue shouldn’t be a secret. It’s critical to centralize your sales activity data, study what’s working, and give your entire team a transparent view of what they should be doing to hit their targets. 

#2: Show every sales rep how they measure up 

Every rep should know where they fall on the performance scale – and why. 

That’s how you can get every rep thinking about what they need to change in order to rise in the ranks. 

Your goal should be to show each rep where they stand today, and pair it with information on how they can do more of the right things – not just “more” in general. It’s not an email-sending competition – it’s a revenue-closing competition. 

#3: Don’t make sales compensation and commission a secret 

Make it easier for your reps to calculate how winning will affect their paycheck.

When they can quickly pull up a dashboard that shows how the latest deal impacts their commission, you’re giving them a new level of insight into what’s possible. 

They can track deals in the pipeline and instantly see what it could translate to for them – plus see how their quota is projected compared to others. 

According to Visier’s Pay Transparency report, 79% of all survey respondents want some form of company-wide pay transparency. In fact, 68% of employees would switch jobs for greater pay transparency, even if compensation was the same.

While sales teams have typically had a higher level of pay transparency than other parts of an organization, making compensation easy to view and understand is a major way to build trust.  

#4: Help your team learn from losses – not just wins 

As a revenue leader, it’s tempting to drill down into the details of every big win. After all, it’s a major high point when someone on your team reels in a huge deal. 

About 41% of sales teams reported their win rate was between 1-40% in 2022. 

That means if you only focus on your wins, you’re missing out on 60% or more of your sales data. And this data could tell you a lot about how to get better. 

Questions you can ask: 

• Is there anything we can do now to help us close this deal in the future?
• What could we have done differently in each step of the process? 
• If we lost to a competitor, what did they offer that we didn’t or couldn’t? 

Here’s the most important part of all: empower your reps to come up with real answers to these questions, and reward them with positive feedback when they do. 

A high-level, “we’ll get ‘em next time!” isn’t going to help you be more effective. What you want is a substantive perspective from your reps and an accurate analysis of your data. 

By getting to this level of transparency about your losses, you’re encouraging your team to focus on what you can control to get better results.

#5: Make it easy to ask questions and get answers 

Transparency doesn’t have to be complex – it’s as simple as giving every individual a sensible, safe way to ask questions, and making information easily accessible. 

One in five sales reps believes they don’t have the right resources to keep their sales process on track. So just making sure your reps don’t feel this way can go a long way. 

And transparency needs to go both ways. Allow your reps to provide feedback or inquire about a topic. Then immediately supplying helpful answers. That’s how you maintain the trust you’ve built and keep motivation high. 

#6: Communicate clear expectations from every coaching interaction 

Fifty-nine percent of companies say the biggest barrier to effective sales training is reps not being held accountable for applying the skills they’ve learned. 

Don’t let this hold your organization back. It’s up to you as a revenue leader to set clear expectations on how you want your sales team to implement the techniques you’ve shared.

Be 100 percent transparent with the changes you expect, and what you want your reps to do with the information. 

Get a transparent view of your sales activity data

Are you able to track who’s doing what, and report on it accurately? Use SetSail to connect your entire go-to-market tech stack and automatically update your CRM with complete, accurate sales activity data. 

It’s the starting point for insights into what’s working in your sales process – insights you’ll want to share with your team. Get a quick demo to see if SetSail is a good fit for your revenue operations workflow.

Peter Mollins Bio 

Peter Mollins is CMO of SetSail. With over 20 years of B2B marketing experience in Europe and North America, Peter has helped fast-growth companies like iMediation, KnowledgeTree, and Spreedly expand their revenue and market leadership. He previously led product marketing for the Borland portfolio at Micro Focus and began his career with Netscape in Paris. He holds a master’s in international management from Thunderbird.

This blog explores the intricacies of offering startup equity compensation to employees. 

Startups offer equity as a way to attract and retain talented employees and to raise capital from investors. 

In doing so, startups gain an edge over some of the larger tech corporations by opening up stock option ownership. The idea is that employees who get in early take a salary cut in hopes of a healthy payout upon the startup’s exit. 

But it’s not so simple as offering up a percentage of options and calling it a day. 

“Startup compensation equity is a tricky thing,” QuotaPath CEO and Co-Founder AJ Bruno said. “There’s definitely been an evolution of options over the last decade.”

A lot of founders and venture capitalists have done a pretty good job of teaching their companies and their teams about it, AJ said. But usually, the topic lives internally — leaving those outside of the organization quite clueless. 

To help clarify, AJ offered some best practices around the challenges surrounding equity compensation plans. 

Before we explore those, let’s begin with the basics of startup equity. 

Basics of startup equity compensation

Startup equity refers to a percentage of ownership in a company offered to employees, founders, and investors in exchange for their contributions to the company. Equity represents a share of the company’s assets and profits, and its value fluctuates depending on the company’s performance and funding. 

Employees who accept equity typically receive stock options, which give them the right to purchase shares of the company’s stock at a fixed price (the “strike price”) at a later date. That later date, we refer to as the “vesting period,” which is the time an employee must work for an employer in order to own outright their shares of company stock.

“To understand options, you first have to understand how the company is organized,” AJ said. “C Corp, Delaware, B Corp, S Corp, Sole proprietorship, individual. They all have nuance.”

But they all tie back to what’s called a “charter.” The charter is what governs the organization and changes over time with more funding. 

Additionally, the amount of equity depends entirely on the stage of the company and the employee’s position and experience. 

Meaning, the younger the company and the more senior your role, then the more likely you are to get a bigger percentage of options. Whether you’re in a technical role or not also impacts your options.

“In my experience, if you’re in a business or sales role, you can expect equity to range anywhere from 0.1 to 0.9%,” wrote Belicia Tan, manager at Ladder. “For engineering or product roles you can expect 0.2 to 1.25%, and if you’re a designer, you can expect 0.2 to 1%. However, not all startups will follow these bands, and some are flexible to adjusting the weight between your base salary and equity based on your preference.”

Benefits of offering equity

By offering equity, early-stage startups can substitute or complement cash with ownership options. This comes in handy for young startups without a lot of cash available to pay for top talent. 

Other benefits include:

Alignment of interests: Employee equity aligns the interests of employees with those of the company, as they now have a financial stake in the success of the business.

Motivation: Ownership in the company can serve as a powerful motivator for employees, as they will be more invested in the company’s success and will work harder to make it happen.

Potential for long-term wealth creation: Employee equity can provide employees with the potential for long-term wealth creation, as the value of their equity may increase as the company grows and becomes more valuable.

Sense of belonging and pride: Equity also can give employees a sense of belonging and pride in the company, which can lead to higher employee retention and job satisfaction.

Of course, paying via equity brings a few challenges. 

The challenges

For starters, at this point in people’s tech careers, they’ve probably seen a friend “get rich” from getting in early at a startup with a successful exit. 

“They think it’s easy money,” AJ said. “And that’s just not true. The fact remains that 90% of startups fail.”

AJ turned to today’s market dip for a sobering lens. 

“The downstream effect from the economic downturn we’re in right now is that the ability for companies to raise capital will dry up,” AJ said. “Then comes the threat of layoffs or restructuring. It’s a tough position for the team and company to be in and the company’s chance of going under increases significantly.”

As a result, startups will have to offer competitive salaries and compensation if they want a shot at exceptional talent. Equity isn’t enough in today’s world. 

Another challenge stems from the volatility of the market. Stock information communicated by founders to employees grows quickly out of date due to the market and fundraising. This clouds transparency. 

“Further complicating this is the amount of venture capital that flowed into organizations and pumped up valuations,” AJ said. “Now, you have stock prices — even for private companies — that are underwater.”

Best practices for employees

To align employees and promote transparency around compensation and equity, AJ recommends putting an equity management solution in place, such as Carta. 

“Being able to zoom out and have the total picture is the first step to understanding what options exist in an organization,” AJ said. 

For employees considering equity compensation packages, AJ recommends taking a step back to understand your goals.

“Is the goal to learn, or is the goal to earn? If it’s to learn, you could join these companies that may or may not be overvalued, inherit a lot of responsibility and learn. You take the risk-reward because your options might be worth something,” AJ said. 

If it’s to earn, go to a bigger company and push for that cushy salary. 

Also, instead of focusing on the amount of options, learn the number of total outstanding shares relative to the number of your shares and the strike price. 

“If I were a new employee, I would want to understand how long it’s going to take for the company to grow into its valuation,” AJ said. “Because, yes, you usually get more equity as the company grows, but that equity gets more expensive.”

Startup equity compensation best practices for leaders

Be honest. Be open. And give people as much information as you can to help them make an informed decision.

“That way, when they get here, it doesn’t feel like a bait and switch like I’ve seen a lot of startups pull,” AJ said. 

As for another sound piece of advice, put a formal and transparent framework in place to level inequity equality. 

“Wherever you are in the process, or your stage in the company, start something formal,” AJ said. 

For additional resources around startup compensation equity, check out the following:

• Here’s How Startup Founders Should Offer Employee Equity (Gong)
• Startup equity: how much to give employees (SeedLegals)
• The Complete Guide to Employee Equity (acelr8)
• Startup employee equity: What founders should know (Carta)

Sales Compensation

Thanks, AJ, for sharing your thoughts on equity as compensation. 

For more information on QuotaPath, a sales compensation management platform and commission tracking software, chat with our team today. 

Creating an ideal customer profile (ICP) is essential to sales and marketing success. It enables marketing, sales, service, and leadership to focus on accounts with the greatest potential value to their organization.

According to Gartner, companies that invest in a well-defined ICP achieve compelling business results, including:

• Faster sales cycles
• Higher conversion rates
• Greater average annual contract values (ACV) and lifetime values (LTV)

The goal of developing an ICP is to identify the accounts with the greatest probability of becoming high-value customers.

Not sure how to develop your own ICP? No problem. We just went through this exercise ourselves and got you covered.

What is an ideal customer profile?

An ICP is a detailed description of a customer that can most benefit from your solution. It includes pertinent characteristics for focus accounts such as:

• Industry
•  Annual revenue
•  Geography
•  Employee headcount – in specific departments or company-wide
•  Software in tech-stack

Since it is common to include the presence of a key stakeholder at an account as an identifying characteristic of an ICP, ICPs, and buyer personas are sometimes confused.

To differentiate between the two, remember that ICPs focus on the account level, while buyer personas describe the decision makers, or buyers, at said account.  

Why is it beneficial to establish an ICP and how does it impact RevOps strategies?

ICPs provide a deeper understanding of your most successful customer implementations.

In turn, this information can inform where your GTM team should focus prospecting efforts by targetting organizations with the highest potential return on investment. Creating and aligning around ICPs help you streamline your efforts and improve sales efficiency.

Some of the benefits organizations typically see from developing ICPs include: 

• Saving time and money: Understanding the unique characteristics of your ideal customers allows you to focus your marketing campaigns and budget on prospects most likely to convert
• Improved content and campaign quality: Allows you to create more targeted, relevant, and personalized advertising and messaging
• Lead prioritization: ICPs make it easier to identify, rank, and prioritize quality leads to hand off to sales or to nurture
• Faster sales cycles: Improved content and campaign quality and lead prioritization helps reduce the length of sales cycles
• Reduced churn: As you sell to similar company profiles that have historically had the most successful implementations, you’ll notice churn decreases.  

Now that you see the benefits, let’s review how to create your ICP.

How to create an ideal customer profile

There is no shortcut to creating an ICP for your business. But, it’s worth the time and effort to create your business’ unique ICP.

Here’s how:

1. Create a list of your best customers.

Finding your ICP requires a greater understanding of which of your accounts is experiencing the most long-term success with your product. These aren’t necessarily the accounts that have purchased the most from you. Rather, it’s the accounts that receive the most value from your solution.

Build a list of these customers and look for key characteristics shared by these accounts.

2. Identify common characteristics.

Now, dig deeper into your data to learn more about these shared attributes and to reveal more commonalities. This will give you a clearer picture of what your ICP looks like.

Data points to start with include industry, vertical, the technology used, business model, and size. Additional data to investigate include purchase volume, long-term contract value, account growth and expansion, renewal rates, company age, and geography.

Then, review your findings from the data and select a handful of metrics to use in your actual ICP, such as customer lifetime value, cost per acquisition, and monthly revenue. What you choose will depend on your specific business.

3. Define challenges and use cases.

Identify the challenges each ICP faces and how your product solves these issues. This determines common use cases amongst the accounts.

Now you can shape your messaging to ICP prospects based on these shared challenges and wins. 

4. Create an ICP document.

Time to document your findings for easy reference.

Your documentation must clearly define each ICP and list all their defining characteristics.

A visual document in PowerPoint slides or a PDF is most effective. But, don’t use a spreadsheet as it can be too cumbersome.

Once you have that laid out, share it with your entire organization and especially your GTM team.  Use your ICP to build quality prospect lists, identify and prioritize quality leads, and finetune things like advertising, messaging, and onboarding processes.

Ideal customer profile example

To help see this in practice, here is an ICP example for a B2B service desk software:

• B2B SaaS company
• Located in the U.S. or Canada
• Customer service team of at least 15 people
• Annual recurring revenue (ARR) of at least $30M

Their customer base consists of small and medium-sized businesses that require significant hand-holding and ongoing training.”

This example shows you that an ideal customer profile doesn’t list every single characteristic we discussed above. You and your team must determine which factors that are most relevant to include in your ICP.

Inform your go-to-market strategy with your ICP

Your ICP is an essential element in preparing or revising your go-to-market strategy. Without an ICP you risk wasting valuable time and money by chasing the wrong prospects.

Invest the effort to create your ICP so you can easily identify, understand, and communicate with your best customers. This enables you to achieve stronger results by accelerating sales cycles, increasing conversion rates, and boosting ACVs and LTVs.

This is not a one-and-done process. Since ICPs are based on data you should reiterate this process yearly, quarterly, or after any major changes to your product or service to keep your profiles current.

We hope you find this ICP guide helpful. Stop back for additional free RevOps resources, and don’t forget to check out our library of tools including:

• Calculate Quota:OTE Ratio
• Compensation Hub
• Build a Sales Funnel
• Sales Compensation Calculator

To learn more about QuotaPath’s automated commission tracking and sales compensation management software, chat with our team today.

A new year often brings new sales compensation plans. 

And, the perfect time to share compensation changes is often during your sales kickoff (SKO). 

Sales kickoffs happen annually and provide organizations with an opportunity to communicate their business strategy and motivate their sales team. Most leaders also use this time to share the new year’s comp plan design and explain the changes and drivers behind it. 

By sharing the “why” behind what’s new and how it will help them and the organization make more money, you build rep buy-in, excitement, and understanding. Looking at it another way, a sales compensation plan is like a blueprint for building a sales pipeline. It shows budding salespeople exactly how they’ll make money.

Reversely, when communicated poorly, you risk confusing and frustrating reps — some of whom may actually quit. 

“Rolling out the sales comp plan is a big moment,” said Mark Roberge, Managing Director of Stage 2 Capital. “I’ve been on the recipient side of a mass exodus, where 10 amazing salespeople from a particular company came to me with job applications.”

The above can happen when companies fail to provide the math behind compensation design. 

Instead of educating reps and giving them space to ask questions, leaders announce the changes and immediately ask for rep signatures on their new commission agreements.

Below, we dive into commission agreements, why getting that rep signature is imperative, and how to do it more effectively and seamlessly. 

What are commission agreements? 

Sales commission agreements act as a contract between an employer and an employee for work paid on commission. They also define the details — or rules — of how and when reps earn commissions and payout periods. 

Download our free commission agreement template here.

One of the most important parts of communicating the new commission agreement requires a rep’s signature. This step solidifies that all parties are on the same page. (Also, in California and New York, this step is required by law.) 

But before you send a mass email with your commission agreement PDF attached for signature, you should first make sure your reps have a clear understanding of their comp plan.

Here are some best practices from an example compensation communication plan: 

1. Educate management 

Before rolling out a new plan to the sales team, start by introducing the plan to all of management. Explain the changes, how they will help the company and how they will affect the sales team. Be thorough. Also share any documents, calculations, and FAQs that help demonstrate and support these changes. 

2. Review the plan and begin the rollout process 

The VP of Sales or the senior sales manager should introduce the comp plan to the sales team as a high-level review. Use this time to energize and engage the sales team. After the meeting, send a follow-up email recapping the session with additional documents, calculations, and FAQs, that will help the team visualize the upcoming changes. 

3. Review the plan…again

After the VP of Sales or the senior sales manager sets the tone for this new plan, now it’s time for each manager to review the plan with their individual teams. Explain to the team how this new plan will impact them. And once again, send out documents. But this time, break down the calculations so that the team can see how they would perform under the current plan based on their current performance. 

4. Schedule one-on-ones with each rep

After sales managers meet with their individual teams, they should meet with each person on their team. This gives the reps a chance to ask questions or raise concerns in private. It also provides an opportunity for the manager to build transparency and trust in their relationship. Once the meeting is over, you can follow up or recap the conversations via email, phone, or private chat. 

5. Verify the plan

Now, you’re ready for rep signature. This step, a mandatory step in some states, confirms alignment and understanding between the rep and the organization. Even if your state doesn’t require it by law, you should introduce this practice. It protects the business and the rep should a discrepancy arise.

You can run this process manually, or you can use QuotaPath’s in-app feature, Plan Verification. 

Automated plan distribution

Check out how this Finance leader saved 2-3 hours by automating rep signature of comp plans using QuotaPath.

Read the full story

Automate sales comp plan rep signature

In QuotaPath’s Plan Verification tool, managers or admins can upload comp plan documents and distribute them to the reps via email.

As reps go into the platform, review and sign off on the new commission agreements, admins will see the verification completion statuses directly from the plans page view. 

Then, you can store and access all of the plans in QuotaPath for future reference. 

See below.

Making sure that you and the rep are on the same page and ultimately getting them to sign the new plan quickly is easier with QuotaPath. Our Plan Verification shows reps how to earn commissions and creates transparency across the comp planning process. 

See this feature, along with our full commission tracking software and integrations, in a custom demo with a member of our team. 

If you’re not ready yet to automate your sales commission reporting and payouts, no worries! You’re not the only one calculating commissions in Excel.

Despite rapidly rising numbers in business intelligence and analytics, it seems people still prefer spreadsheets. Specifically, 63 percent of businesses do. A recent International Data Corporation survey found that nearly two-thirds of companies run various payment processes, like commissions, via Excel.

For small businesses with simple commission structures, bulk spreadsheets can deliver exactly what you need. In this article, we will walk you through the steps and formulas to create a sales commission spreadsheet.

We love and respect a spreadsheet, but the disadvantages to running manual commission calculations can be an error-filled time suck. Any change to a compensation plan requires manual updates. Every new deal must be added, along with any bonuses or spiffs that impact commission payouts. These can take as little as a few minutes to make or two business days depending on their complexities. 

At QuotaPath, we’re big on transparency. It’s a theme woven throughout our team, our platform, and our relationships with our customers. Unfortunately, spreadsheets often fail in fostering transparency. Permission-based spreadsheets block sales reps and leaders from real-time insights into their earnings and forecasts. Anytime a commission question pops up on a specific deal or paycheck, a gatekeeper to the spreadsheet awaits. 

Beyond an Excel commission calculator

If your business is planning on scaling its sales organization this year or adding new compensation plans, please consider automating this process. Better yet, fancy a chat with QuotaPath as your sales performance management system. We can track, calculate, forecast, and prepare earnings payouts for all of your sales teams on variable compensation plans. 

By our estimates, QuotaPath can save your teams that are calculating commissions in Excel 17 hours a month. Some customers have even reported four business days of work freed up since implementing QuotaPath.

Depending upon how complex your compensation plans are, your spreadsheets should take you between two to eight hours to build. Then, for monthly upkeep, approvals, and finalizations for payroll, plan to spend between one to four days a month preparing and addressing discrepancies. 

Note: Bulk spreadsheets do not carry over month-per-month. Any exceptions or modifications to a rep’s commissions will have to be re-added each month.

Additional note: Individual rep commission statements will need to be manually created, with other rep info fully deleted from the spreadsheet. 

Now that we got that out of the way, we’re ready to begin calculating commissions in a spreadsheet! To help you get started, we’ve outlined the steps and definitions below. 

Free Sales Commission Calculator Template

A free spreadsheet to simplify the commission tracking process. Track what you or your team have earned in 4 inputs.

Download Now

Follow these steps to start calculating commissions in Excel

How to create a commission calculator in Excel: First, identify what you want to include in your spreadsheet. 

We recommend, if applicable:

• Date Closed
• Customer
• Order #
• Revenue 
• Sales Rep
• Commission Rate
• Commission Amount
• Bonus 
• Deductions
• Payout
• Date Paid

Next, will your bulk spreadsheet track multiple months? If so, you can either duplicate the spreadsheets for every month or, extend columns out to the right. Beware, the more columns you add, the trickier it’ll be to scroll through and find what you’re looking for later. 

Once you’ve built these fields out, review your commission structure and compensation plan. 

Ask yourself, what kind of compensation plan do I have?

If it’s a single-rate sales commission model, good news, this spreadsheet will work well. A single rate, or flat rate, pays a set percentage from the deals you close. 

Whatever your single rate is, you’ll apply this percentage to every revenue amount earned by you or your reps in your spreadsheet. 

Within your spreadsheet, single-rate commissions might look like this:

You’ll input this formula in the third column to calculate the commissions earned:

To apply to the fields below, grab the corner of the cell with the formula in it, and drag it through the applicable cells. This action will modify the same formula for the corresponding rows.

Pat yourself on the back; you’re doing great. Just remember that although all often understand single raters, they fall short in rewarding overperformance.

If you need help with compensation plan strategy, we’ve got free consultations available with our Chief of Staff Graham Collins. 

Need a Google Sheet Commission Template? Download Yours Below.

How to track multiple-rate commissions in Excel

Your spreadsheet grows more complex when you venture outside of simple-rate compensation plans.

Unlike single-rate, multiple-rate commissions factor in different percentage earnings on deals. The rate earned could vary based on quota attainment, deal size, or how much a rep sold already that month or quarter. 

You may have also heard multiple-rate commission plans referred to as accelerators, escalators, tiered commission, or multipliers. They all mean the same thing and act as a great way to motivate reps and reward performance. 

If your plan classifies as such, should you be calculating commissions in a spreadsheet? Not on our watch! 

We can make this process so much easier for you through our automated commission tracking software.

But can you? Absolutely. 

To account for the various rates, you will need to create a rate table. This can be built out on the same page of the spreadsheet.

A commission rate table in Excel might look like this:

Note: There are no formulas within this rate table.

After defining your rate ranges, build out the table within the spreadsheet. Then select all of the cells within the rate table, scroll up to the top left corner where the cell numbers usually appear, and name it “RateTable.” 

How to get my commissions spreadsheet to acknowledge my rate table

Now that your rate table is ready, it’s time to get your spreadsheet to recognize it and apply it to your commissions. 

Cue: Excel’s “LOOKUP” function!

To get your spreadsheet to recognize what rate a closed deal should be paid out on, you will add the LOOKUP command to your Commission Rate column.

In this example, the formula is citing cell D2, which is where the revenue amount for this deal lives. Then, it’s pulling in the appropriate rate based on the range we set previously. For $3,500, reps earn 4 percent commission.

Deep breath, you’re doing amazing, sweetie!

Add in your deals

From here, you’re now ready to add the won deals for your reps that fall within this compensation plan. For reps outside of this compensation model, such as a sales development rep or a sales leader, you’ll need to create a different spreadsheet. (Psst, in Quotapath, we can build and distribute your different plans for you.)

Congratulations, you just built a model for calculating sales commissions in a spreadsheet!

Additional variables to consider

As you thrive in your new spreadsheet utopia, here are a few more items to consider. Along with rate plans, make note of any single-rate bonuses, multiple-rate bonuses, and/or milestone bonuses. 

Bonuses represent something entirely different from rate plans. Commissions calculate from the revenue earned on a deal closing. Meanwhile, reps get bonuses, or set amounts of money, for completing a specific task. A single-rate bonus, for example, could be earning an extra $500 for hitting a monthly quota. 

You can add bonuses manually at the time a rep hits the conditions within your spreadsheet. Or, you can have individual spreadsheets for each rep and add a formula that inputs bonuses based on your conditions.

This might look like a bonus of $1,000 upon hitting $50,000 in total revenue. That bonus is in addition to the rep’s commission rate. When that rep closes a deal that pushes them to $75,000 in total revenue, they might earn another bonus of $2,000. That’s a multi-rate bonus.

To account for this, you’d have a cell in your spreadsheet dedicated to total revenue for the year, month, or quarter, depending on your bonus parameters. The formula, assuming your revenue totals are in the “A” column, looks like this:

Commissions spreadsheet checklist

Lastly, to ensure your spreadsheet remains accurate and secure, run through this checklist monthly.

• Use naming conventions that include time periods and rep names.
• Check that all formulas and multipliers are correct before sending and upon receiving.
• Password-protect each spreadsheet.
• Make a backup of each spreadsheet.
• Only send the spreadsheets to the designated recipients, and triple check the email address before sending. 
• If sending to reps, only include that rep’s commission information by deleting the cells related to other reps. 
• Always look for hidden rows upon receiving commission spreadsheets (tips)

Until next time

Thank you for making it this far! 

This may seem a bit overwhelming, and honestly, it is. 

That’s why QuotaPath launched in 2018 to remove this burden from sales, RevOps, and finance teams. If it’s not the right time to chat, and you need additional spreadsheet tips, check out this lengthy list.

For free commission calculators, quota attainment calculators, and commission tools, check out ours here:

• Sales Compensation Calculator
• Sales Quota Planner
• Quota:OTE Ratio vs. Sales:Earnings Ratio Calculator
• Commission calculator Excel template
• Comp Plan Builder

FAQs

Can I calculate different commission rates based on different sales tiers?

Yes, you can calculate different commission rates based on different sales tiers. Here are two methods:

Method 1: Using the IF function

The IF function is a logical function that allows you to test a condition and return a value if the condition is true, or another value if the condition is false.

To calculate different commission rates based on different sales tiers using the IF function, you would need to create a table with the different sales tiers and their corresponding commission rates. Then, you would use the IF function to calculate the commission rate for each sale.

Method 2: Using the VLOOKUP function

The VLOOKUP function is a lookup function that allows you to search for a value in a table and return the corresponding value from another column in the table.

To calculate different commission rates based on different sales tiers using the VLOOKUP function, you would need to create a table with the different sales tiers and their corresponding commission rates. Then, you would use the VLOOKUP function to look up the sales tier for a given sale and return the corresponding commission rate.

Can I automate commission calculations for multiple salespeople?

You can automate commission calculators for multiple salespeople using commission tracking software such as QuotaPath. Build your compensation plans using QuotaPath’s plan builder, assign plans to your reps, then sync your CRM to automatically pull data from your sales pipeline and calculate commissions accordingly.

What if I need to calculate commissions regularly?

If you need to calculate commissions regularly, the easiest and most accurate solution is to invest in a sales compensation management platform like QuotaPath. In doing so you can shave down the time it takes to run commissions from days to minutes. Try it out for yourself in a free 30-day trial.

Hiring sales reps can be a tricky endeavor. After all, they are salespeople selling themselves. You’re looking for successful sales rep hires that will ramp up quickly to qualifying leads, crush their quotas, and build lasting relationships with clients for your company. So how do you make sure you’re getting the right information out of interviews? Ask these interview questions for sales reps when hiring to build a successful, profitable sales team.

Tips to keep in mind when interviewing potential sales hires:

1. Dig at least three levels deeper than the answer they give by asking what, how, tell me more. This will get you to the real, juicy answers.
2. Take note of their communication and enthusiasm every step: over email, on the phone, and in person.
3. Interrupt the candidate at some point, and listen to how they respond.
4. Test how they take feedback. Offer constructive criticism to something they said or did, and see how they respond.
5. One of the most effective activities for hiring sales reps is having them run through role-playing exercises and putting their skills to the test, on the spot.

Interview format for hiring sales reps

Step 1: 30-minute phone screen

Don’t waste your time with unqualified people.

Being a personable communicator over the phone is a basic qualification for a career in sales.

If they shine on the call, you might consider sending a brief testing exercise before scheduling them for in-person interviews with your sales team like drafting a cold outreach email or coming up with a cold call script. This will help gauge their interest and enthusiasm for the role and your company.

Step 2: Onsite interview with sales team members

Have them meet with a peer, senior peer, and potential direct sales manager. If they are interviewing for a role requiring more experience, meeting with a senior executive might also be necessary.

When you meet in person, have them demonstrate their skills through exercises like a mock call or a mock demo.

Best interview questions for sales reps

Ask an entry-level sales hire:

1. Why are you interested in sales?
2. What scares you about being a sales rep?
3. What keeps you going when you’re having a bad day?
4. How do you keep a smile on your face when you’re having a tough day?
5. What motivates you more, money or praise?
6. What do you need to be successful?
7. Tell me about a time you persuaded someone to change their mind.
8. Tell me about a time you were persuaded to change your mind.
9. What’s something you’ve taught yourself recently?
10. Teach me something.
11. Sell me something.
12. Tell me about a person or event that has impacted you.
13. What’s your proudest achievement?
14. Tell me about a time you were disappointed with yourself.
15. What are your career goals?
16. What are you really, really good at?
17. What do you struggle with?
18. What are you not interested in?
19. Tell me about someone who’s had a positive influence on you.
20. Tell me about someone who’s had a negative influence on you.

Ask an experienced sales hire:

1. What were you hired to do?
2. What accomplishments are you most proud of?
3. What results were achieved in terms of successes and accomplishments?
4. What were some of your mistakes at your previous job?
5. Why did you leave your previous job?
6. What would your former boss say were your biggest strengths and weaknesses?
7. What would your team say were your biggest strengths and weaknesses?
8. Tell me about the team you inherited.
9. Tell me about a time you refused to sell to someone.
10. What traits did your best sales manager have?
11. How have you stacked up to your peers in past performance?
12. What was your most painful sale lost?
13. What was your greatest sales win?
14. What’s the most creative way you’ve closed a deal?
15. Who’s your favorite client?
16. What is your favorite part of the sales process?
17. What is your objection handling philosophy?
18. How does your sales performance this year compare to last year?
19. How did your sales performance compare to your plan?
20. Are you familiar with sales software (i.e., CRMs, sales engagement platforms, etc.)?

To answer that last one, for QuotaPath it’s always happy customers! We’re here to help you and your team crush sales goals. Use QuotaPath to assist in ramping up your sales hires, align your team to their quota, and clarifying goals, and sales compensation plans. It’s a win-win-win situation and it’s free to get started.

Whether you are launching a product or entering a new market, you need a go-to-market (GTM) strategy to help you achieve your goals. 

Without one, you risk wasting valuable time and resources on what eventually becomes a fruitless effort. 

By formulating your approach, you can avoid pursuing the wrong prospects, miscommunicating your message to potential customers, or expanding into a market saturated with too many competitors.

Do you need to prepare a new GTM strategy and aren’t sure where to start? We’ve got you covered.

What is a go-to-market strategy?

A go-to-market strategy details the launch of a new product or entrance into a new market.  

Even if you have an existing (successful) GTM strategy that you used previously for a current product, you should create a new GTM strategy as the marketplace and buyers change. 

Plus, every market has its differences, which requires nuanced GTM plans. 

Below, we go through the basics of what every GTM strategy should include. 

Every GTM strategy features the following key elements:

Product-Market Fit: What problem your product solves and how.

Target audience: Who your ideal customer is, how much they are willing to pay to solve their problem, and what pain points and challenges your product can address.

Market research: Identification of potential competitors in the market and the amount of demand for your product or level of saturation in the market

Marketing plan: Which marketing methods and content types to use to generate demand for your product

Sales strategy: The type of sales plan and related process you are using

Now that you know what a GTM strategy looks like, let’s review the steps you can take to prepare one.

Build a Sales Funnel

Use our free sales funnel resource to see how many meetings your team needs to book to hit quota.

Calculate Now

How to build a go-to-market strategy

To build a new GTM strategy, understand that it will take an investment of time and effort. Although your process may look slightly different, the following 10 steps give you a good starting point.

1. Answer these questions

Before you dive into building a new GTM strategy you should answer some preliminary questions. This information helps you work through the additional steps of creating your new strategy.

According to Jen Lyttle, a go-to-market and sales consultant, some of the best questions to ask when developing a new GTM plan are:

1. Who is our ideal customer profile (ICP) and how are we marketing to them today?
2. How do our sales reps currently receive leads? What is the split between inbound versus outbound?
3. What is our total addressable market (TAM) after identifying the ICP?
4. Where are we currently getting stuck in the sales process?
5. Is it that our sales reps don’t have the tools to move quickly?
6. Is it that our sales reps have the tools to move quickly but they just don’t know how?
7. Does our demo process work?

2. Identify the problem

Next, determine the problem your product or service solves for your ICP. This helps you understand product-market fit and is critical to ensure you launch the correct product to the right audience.

3. Define the target audience

Identify your target market with an ICP and buyer personas. This helps you create a clear picture of your prospects and how to communicate with them.

4. Research competition and demand

Once you know who your prospects are and what solution you offer them, you need to ensure there is sufficient demand in your target market and review the competitive landscape.

5. Decide on key messaging

Create a matrix tying messaging to each buyer persona based on pain points and product value.

6. Map the buyer’s journey

This is often visualized as a funnel or a flywheel.

7. Choose marketing channels

Select which types of content you will use to create demand for your product to move potential customers down the marketing funnel, and thereby drive growth. Some options include social media, paid search ads, blogs, SEO content, and emails based on your target audience and where your potential customers can be found along their buyer’s journey.

8. Create a sales plan

Decide how to sell to your target audience and convert them to paying customers. Popular options include self-service, inside sales, field sales, and channel sales.

9. Establish clear goals and ways to measure progress

This is an essential step so you can recognize success and the need to adjust your strategy. Create rules of how often to track goals and course correct so it becomes routine.

10. Create clear processes

Determine how to communicate and execute your strategy with your team. Include rules of engagement (RoE) for your sales team to prevent issues as leads start rolling in. 

Lily Youn, Head of Growth at Gradient Works, offers a toolkit that includes a best practices RoE guide, along with a productivity calculator for metrics to hit targets next year.

QuotaPath supports RevOps professionals

We hope you find this GTM market guide helpful. Stop back for additional RevOps resources, and don’t forget to check out our library of tools including:

For early-stage companies, companies looking to ice out the competition, and those in search of predictable revenue models, sales comp plans that promote multi-year deals can be your biggest asset.

“Multi-year deals tend to be better for the company,” said Andrew de Geofroy, SVP, of Global Revenue Platform for Gtmhub. “With current economic conditions, predictable revenue growth is more important toward profitability.”

But first, what is a multi-year deal compensation plan example?

A multi-year comp plan rewards a higher commission rate, such as an accelerator or bonus, on deals with contracts that exceed 12 months. 

In Compensation Hub, for example, we have two multi-year commission plan templates available to adjust and customize. These include Single Rate Commission with Contract Term Multiplier and the Commission with Multi-Year Accelerators plans. The gist of both is that by offering higher payouts on contracts over a year, your reps will feel more inclined to ask for longer terms versus settling for one year. That translates to improved revenue predictability year-over-year. 

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Why you should implement a multi-year deal sales compensation plan

The benefits of longer contracts far outshine any negatives. 

For starters, multi-year deals mean your competition can’t swoop in as easily until your customer’s contract expires. Plus, the more multi-year deals your team secures, the larger the impact on your targeted market — and the fewer chances your competition has to sign your clients.

Multi-year contracts also signal healthy, quality deals. 

“If somebody is willing to sign a contract and really not be able to get out of it for two, three or four years, they are buying into what that rep is selling and positioning from a value standpoint,” said Insight Partners EVP, Sales & Customer Success Hilary Headlee.

Another argument in favor of multi-year accelerator commission plans ties to customer acquisition cost (CAC). If your customer acquisition costs exceed one year, then multi-year deals can help ensure your business has lifetime value.

CRO Kevin McKeown, for instance, works for Beekeeper, an early-stage workflow and communications system. As such, his team is focused on getting CAC under one year. 

“Until we can get our top-of-funnel more efficient and CAC in line, these multi-years are what makes the unit economics really healthy,” said Kevin. 

Added complexity

With that said, adding in multipliers for longer contracts will add complexity to your comp plan. 

For starters, the plan gains an additional tier in its commission structure. The more tiers you add, the more challenging it becomes to track accurately. 

What’s more, most companies will pay a commission rate on the first year of the deal and the multiplier or accelerated rate for every year after. However, they usually will not retire quota for the full amount and instead only count the first 12 months (annual recurring revenue, or ARR) of the deal toward attainment progress. That’s to encourage reps to close a higher volume of deals instead of trying to reach quota by securing a couple of large, multi-year deals. 

In doing so, this makes it even trickier to keep up with and often requires manual inputs and formulas to keep it accurate and updated.

Fortunately, we can automate that for you.

Automate sales commission tracking in QuotaPath

For teams that measure quota based on one number and pay earnings on another, like multi-year comp plans, QuotaPath built plan-building enhancements to simplify this process in our system.

Now, with our new guided experience, any QuotaPath admin can set up complex plans with more than one quota and earnings variable through a step-by-step wizard. No formula building, just a seamless experience to get up and automated. 

In addition to multi-year deals, other comp plan examples made easier by these updates include: when a company pays on commission rates and other bonuses, such as MBOs and meetings booked; when quotas are based on ARR but earnings apply to monthly recurring revenue; or when quotas follow bookings but commissions tie to what’s on the invoice. 

To see your comp plan automated in QuotaPath, or to learn more about our CRM integrations, commission tracking, and sales compensation best practices, book time with our team today.