“How can I sell more this year?” A question that most sales reps ask themselves at the beginning of every year. According to the Salesforce.com’s, ‘State of Sales’ report, 57% of sales reps expect to miss their quota this year. It is becoming more important than ever to optimize the sales process and stay on top of deals. In this post, we go over 5 New Year’s resolutions that any sales rep can implement to stay ahead of the game and close more deals.

Improve time management

I know, I know. This seems really obvious but, in truth, there are few that make a concerted effort to manage their time as efficiently as possible. Any time you’re spending not closing deals, is time you’re also not earning your commission. One of the best ways to improve time management is to take a few minutes at the start of every day to plan out your strategy for the day.

Create a methodology for how you want to close your deals. Use a data-driven approach to prioritize the leads you think have the highest likelihood of closing a deal with. According to ‘State of Sales’, only 33% of salespeople actually prioritize leads based on their likelihood to buy. Lead prioritization is instead often based on factors like intuition or geography. By prioritizing the deals that are more likely to close, the chances of hitting your quota increase drastically as you now have more time to focus on the harder to close deals.

Emphasize personalization

Buyer standards for what they expect out of sales reps are higher than ever. It’s not enough to just offer lower prices or a good product. Customers are starting to expect a new level of personalization with products they are getting pitched.

As such, qualifying your lead is more important than ever. Make sure that you are actually listening to what the customer is saying. Nothing is more counter-productive than a sales rep that is just ranting about their product without allowing the customer to talk about what they need from you. You can use the information the customer gives you to tailor your sales pitch as a blend of the value your product adds to them along with some personalization. This will lead to a higher success rate on deals closed.

Focus on the customer journey

Elevating the customer experience throughout the entire customer journey is one of the most effective ways to close more deals. In fact, ‘State of Sales’ claims that customer satisfaction is the number one measure of sales success. For this reason, the sales process shouldn’t be complete after closing a deal. The sales rep should also be working with the customer after the deal gets closed to make sure the customer is getting the value they need.

Understand how you are contributing value to your customer

We mentioned in a previous blog post, that a sales rep drastically increases their chances of closing more deals when they have a great understanding of their product. This is due to the fact that the rep needs to be able to display to the customer how they are contributing value. The customer needs to be able to understand exactly how they are going to benefit from your product. The needs of every customer are going to be different so the same exact same pitch is not going to work on everyone. Once you understand the needs of the customer, molding the pitch to fit the customer’s needs allows for a higher success rate.

Utilize new technology

With the advent of new technologies in the sales field, reps have the opportunity to be more productive than ever. A lot of tasks that previously took up a lot of time are now able to be automated effectively. It’s often the case that the highest performing sales reps tend to make use of any technological advantage they can get. In fact, ‘State of Sales’ found that high performing sales reps are 1.6x more likely to use compensation management tools than underperforming reps. QuotaPath is a great way to ditch the manual data entry of spreadsheets and improve your overall efficiency.

If you’re not currently using a compensation management tool or you’re not happy with your current solution, QuotaPath is free and easy to use. Sign up for free here.

Even though it’s possible to change or improve your habits at any time, having a new year seems like a perfect time to do so. It’s a brand new calendar, you’re typically coming off a vacation, and everyone around you will be talking about resolutions. So here are a few ideas for New Year’s resolutions if you manage salespeople.

Coach more, close less

If you manage a sales team, you probably have a background in exceeding your own personal quotas. You’re likely a great salesperson, so when a deal gets stuck for someone on your team it’s second nature to jump in and get it closed. Starting this new year, when your rep is struggling, step back and explain the best way to get it closed. It will help them learn the process and save you time in the long run.

Prioritize your weekly one-on-ones

Don’t let your one-on-one meeting time fall to the wayside. This is a very important block of time for the people on your team, as it’s their time to give feedback and share their voice. Don’t control the flow of the one-on-one, instead focus on what they want to talk about, how they feel they could improve, and what they want to change. If there’s time after they have said everything they want to say, you can jump in and give feedback or tell them what’s on your mind.

Recognize and invest in your teams’ strengths

Say you need to run training on negotiating to kick off 2020, but everyone on the team is tired of your old Powerpoint. This is a perfect opportunity to grab your top negotiator and ask them to run the training. Not only does it make them feel good about being recognized for their skills, but it also allows your team a wider base of knowledge.

Improve transparency and align the team

The best way to keep your team accountable is to measure them. While this can easily grow out of control, (I’m imagining a sales floor filled floor to ceiling with Minority Report style screens) a good amount of transparency is always a good thing.

Take time to reflect. This year, did all of your reps know how they stack up against their peers? Did they know how much each deal was earning them? How close the team was to their team goal? Quick plug for QuotaPath, because with QuotaPath you can see all of that automatically… and free!

Never stop learning

If I’m being honest, I’ve never been a very strong reader. I’m the kind of person who would rather get a Cliffsnotes version of The Great Gatsby than force myself to sit down and focus on it. However, when I started managing people I discovered that if I listen to an audiobook version and read along to a physical book I can fly through books and retain nearly all of it. Most of my management knowledge comes from books, listening to podcasts, reading articles, and meetups with my peers.

If you’re looking to kick off the new year with some books, here is the list from my blog post My favorite sales books: Sales Acceleration Formula, The Challenger Sale, Extreme Ownership, and How I Raised Myself From Failure to Success in Selling.

Remember, New Year’s resolutions are all about improvement, not perfection. That’s why we focus on ways to keep improving, not a hard left turn from the way you’re currently managing your sales team. Get better every single day and by the time next year rolls around you’ll be a totally different manager! If you have some resolutions that have worked for you in the past, I’d love to hear them. You can always email me at graham@quotapath.com.

Changing a sales compensation plan can be a stressful and traumatic event for a sales team. With a new incentive plan comes the risk that you’ll be making less money for doing the same work. This is an understandable concern considering it’s rare that a new comp plan pays you a higher commission rate or your quota goes down. However, with this guide, you can minimize the disruption to the organization and keep your sales reps happy.

When to roll out a new sales compensation plan

In an ideal world, you will want to roll out a new incentive plan during a natural break in business at the end of an earnings period. The best time to roll out a new plan is at the beginning of the calendar year — if your fiscal year doesn’t line up with the calendar year, then use the fiscal calendar.

In some emergency situations, you can roll out a new plan mid-year or even in the middle of a month. However, you should ONLY do this if it’s to improve the plan for your sales reps. Maybe your compensation plan isn’t allowing people to earn what they deserve or an industry disruption makes it impossible to hit quota. In that situation, it’s entirely reasonable to increase commission rates or lower quotas in the middle of the month/quarter.

How to roll out the new comp plan:

Carefully! You should have a deliberate plan for rolling out a new compensation plan otherwise you run the risk of losing control of the messaging.

1. Understand the plan yourself: Ensure that you understand all the moving pieces of the plan and how it impacts your sales reps. If you don’t grasp it, you can’t be expected to explain it to anyone else.
2. Do it all at once: Unless the change in the plan only affects 1 person, discuss the new plan with everyone it affects at once. Otherwise, you risk gossip, conjecture, and misunderstandings.
3. Explain the why: If the quota is going up, explain the business reason for it. If the commission rate on a certain product line is decreasing explain that it’s less profitable. If it’s left up to reps to guess why their plan is changing, they will often have false assumptions.
4. Practice explaining it: My dogs must have a great understanding of lots of different compensation plans given the number of times I’ve used them to practice the intricacies of an incentive plan.
5. Prepare for questions: You don’t want to be caught off guard by any questions you’re asked. It makes the plan look more complex than it is.
6. Give your reps a way to track their attainment and commission: QuotaPath offers an incredibly easy, beautiful and free way to calculate commission and quota attainment. You can create the plan for your team and share it out with them so there are no misunderstandings. It’s simple and easy to create an account and start tracking.

The holiday season is approaching which means it’s time to show the important sales reps in your life how much they mean to you. Staying motivated and keeping morale high during this high-pressure time is so important to end the year strong. So what better way to keep morale up than through thoughtful gift-giving? We’ve compiled a list* of affordable and meaningful gifts to give the salesperson in your life this holiday season.

For the salesperson who likes their morning and afternoon coffee

Temperature coffee mug – This sexy temperature-controlled coffee mug keeps those coffee drinks at just the right temperature, all day long. Adjust the temperature up and down as you wish. Even do it from your smartphone.

For the salesperson who is a great organizer

Blackwing journal – 160 pages of acid-free, ivory paper that comes in dot-grid, blank, or lined. And you can feel good about this purchase because part of Blackwing’s proceeds helps fund art and music education for children and teens.

For the salesperson that appreciates beauty sleep

Silk sleep mask – Wearing this face mask is like sleeping in a dark cave, plus it’s silky smooth and nice on your skin. Pair it with some earplugs and you’ll get the best sleep of your life!

For the salesperson who takes calls on the go

Apple AirPods pro – If they don’t have them yet, they should. These Pro pods have a newly designed for a customizable fit and have noise cancellation and transparency mode.

For the salesperson who loves to stay hydrated

Hydro Flask Wide Mouth Water Bottle – No skimping when it comes to a good water bottle. The Hydroflask keeps cold drinks cold and hot drinks hot for an impressive amount of time. Choose the size and color that you think they’ll like most.

For the salesperson who always brings their pup to work

Casper memory foam dog bed – This memory foam dog bed provides a pressure-relieving and comfortable place for pups to sleep. It comes in three sizes and is easily machine washable. Because our four-legged friends deserve only the best.

For the salesperson who appreciates good desk decor

Hay 120-minute time hourglass – This gorgeous hourglass is the perfect accessory for any desk. It can even be used to time task completion!

For the salesperson with a creative eye

Fujifilm instant wide camera– Who doesn’t enjoy a nostalic instant-film experience?

For the salesperson who is always looking dapper

Woolzies wool drier balls – These eco-friendly drier balls will keep clothes soft, smelling nice, and static-free. They are safe for your clothes and your household. No more toxic drier-sheets, please.

For the salesperson who complains about dry skin in the winter

Desk humidifier – How neat is this USB cactus desk humidifier? It’s portable and easy to carry with you from home to office. Perfect to keep your skin from drying out, for sleeping, and to prevent coughs and sniffles.

*QuotaPath is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by these products. We just think they are great gifts to show some love over the holidays!

Short answer: Almost always, no.

Long answer: Capped commission is a very sensitive and complex subject within sales incentives. Let me first define what I mean by ‘capped commission’.

Capped commission means there is a ceiling of what you can earn when you generate revenue over a certain point. Example: You earn 10% of any revenue you generate up to $1MM in sales per year. Any revenue over $1MM you generate you earn 0% on.

Capped commission is NOT the same thing as a milestone bonus you can only earn once. Example: you earn a $1,000 bonus if you hit your quarterly quota. You don’t earn anything if you’re less than 100% of your quota and you can’t earn more than $1,000 by hitting more than your quota.

Why organizations often cap commission:

1. They’re afraid of overpaying their sales reps. Ever had a rep close a monster deal? Like one that can pay their mortgage for 6 months with the commission check? It’s a great situation to be in! Your rep is happy they made so much money and your company just got a huge influx of revenue. However, some organizations decide that it’s too much to pay someone so they cap their commission.
   
   Why this doesn’t work: Nothing is more demoralizing than closing the company’s record-setting largest deal only to have your boss tell you that you’re making half your expected commission on it.
   
2. They want consistency from quarter to quarter. The thought here is that if you cap commissions, sales reps will spread their deals out evenly throughout the year vs. having one blowout quarter/month. If you aren’t going to earn anything on a deal, you’re more likely to close it the following month. This provides more consistency and predictability throughout the year.
   
   Why this doesn’t work: If you work in an industry where there are literally 0 competitors and you control exactly when your prospects buy, this would help you with consistency and predictability in sales revenue. If you’re like 99.9999% of the rest of us, you run the risk of a competitor taking the deal, the prospect changing their mind, your buyer quitting, or any of 100 other reasons the deal falls through. There’s a reason ‘sandbagging’ is a 4 letter word in sales. Encouraging it with your sales incentive plan is just counterproductive.

I honestly can’t think of a single reason to cap a sales rep’s commission. If you have a good example, I’m all ears. Send me an email at graham@quotapath.com!

According to several sources, Q4 is when more SaaS deals are closed than any other quarter. However, it’s also one of the toughest times to close deals due to Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, New Years and all the associated time off and travel.

We want you to blow out your quota in Q4 so you can avoid a stressful holiday season, so we asked a few sales experts their take on how to prevent deals from stalling during the holidays. We asked all of these experts the same question:

How do you prevent deals from stalling during the holidays?

Emily Zipp, Enterprise Account Executive at WeWork, believes that planning is key:

Two ways!

1. Create an internal Deal Closing Checklist and include EVERYTHING that needs to happen to get a deal done. Include things like Legal review, IT review, final presentations, and anything that is part of your closing process to bring a deal across the finish line. Don’t skimp, be thorough!
2. Once you’ve created your Deal Closing Checklist, create a customer-facing version that you can present to your client and use it as a Mutual Action Plan (MAP). Hold them accountable for what they need to get done, and use generous timelines so that you add in plenty of buffer room for things to go wrong. An especially helpful thing to do around the holidays is to use the MAP as an opportunity to ask all stakeholders involved in closing a deal what their travel schedules are, and to include those dates in your Mutual Action Plan.

Sebastian Cañizares, Cloud Account Executive at MongoDB, stresses you should ask questions about your opportunities now before it’s too late:

There are 3 must’s to prevent deals from stalling during the holidays that have worked for me:

1. Understand the process for signature once the basics (cost, features, etc.) have been agreed upon. You will run into many instances where everything has been set in stone but you were unaware that the procurement office is the final approval and they are out for half of November and December.
2. Know the Decision Maker/Economic Buyer/Procurement Team’s holiday schedules! Are they going to be out of town visiting their families? Are they finally taking that month-long trip to the Bahamas? Will they be in the office for some days or working from home? I’ve worked deals on New Year’s day where we knew that the final signer had a holiday party that would take her out of the office early that day. Without knowing that, we may have not gotten the contract over in time to reach her before she left midday… Start figuring this out now (before the Holidays), not later!
3. Build your internal champion and stay top of mind with light-hearted holiday material. Stay top of mind during the holidays, send them a personal note/card wishing them Happy Holidays. Send them your company’s holiday marketing material. Think of creative ways to get them to open up your email/outreach. Stand out, especially as they get bogged down with Consumer Marketing holiday emails. Make sure that if you are in an active deal cycle, every time they open up their email you are at the top of it and your email subject line is catchy.

Brittney Stinner, Account Executive at Rapid7, also thinks that planning and mutual accountability is important to getting deals done:

One of my most consistent practices in keeping deals from stalling is to collaborate with my prospects on a Joint Project Plan. This document is a mutually agreed-upon plan with key steps that must be met to successfully implement your product or service. This will help quickly identify what obstacles lie ahead and keep the prospect accountable to the timeline they originally agreed to. Plus, if you have tied the close-date to one of their initiatives, then you can easily reference how potential delays put their own initiative at risk. The key is making sure both parties are contributing to what that path to implementation looks like!

Also, be sure you ask early on whether your point of contact or any decision-makers (and contract signers!) will be traveling… and be mindful of those dates.

AJ Bruno, CEO at QuotaPath, thinks that it’s all about bringing a positive attitude into the month:

I love telling salespeople on my team that “people LOVE doing deals on Friday. Everyone is in a happy mood and it is closer to the weekend. Things just get done.” Now imagine that you have a whole month of Fridays! That is why the end of the year (specifically December) is the best. If you go into the month with the right attitude, deals just DON’T stall in December. This has held true for me going into every single Q4. We would always look at our pipeline and just say “This is going to get done by Dec 12th because our contact surely doesn’t want to be in the office on December 29th at 4 pm getting contracts signed so their budget doesn’t go away”. Understand that is your reality and go into the month with a positive attitude and the rest will take care of itself.

Don’t let your deals stall this holiday season. Finish the year strong with QuotaPath. Sign up for free today!

Now that we’ve set the quota for SDRs, it’s time to talk about how to set their bonus and commission rates.

Before we dive in, let’s define some terms:

Commission: a percentage of some other number (usually revenue) that you earn. Do you receive some percentage of every deal you bring in? If so, that’s a commission.

Bonus: a flat value you earn for doing something. Do you earn some set amount of money for hitting your quota, hitting revenue milestones, or for every meeting you set? If so, that’s a bonus.

Commission Types

• Single rate commission: The simplest form of commission is the single rate commission. This means that you earn a set % of your sales, regardless of your quota attainment.
• Multiple rate commission: Multiple rate commissions change depending on some variable. The most traditional multiple rate commission is an accelerator that increases your commission rate when you hit your quota.

Bonus Types

• Single rate bonus: Much like a single rate commission, single rate bonuses are very simple. You get paid a specific amount for completing some action. These are more common for non-revenue producing roles, but examples might be earning a flat $500 for closing any deal or earning a bonus for every new logo you close.
• Multiple rate bonus: Again, similar to a multiple rate commission, a multiple rate bonus means that the amount you earn for completing an action changes depending on some other variable like quota attainment.
• Milestone bonus: Milestone bonuses are bonuses you earn for hitting some achievement. For example, you could earn $500 for making 1,000 dials in a month. If you make 999 dials? No bonus. If you make 2,000 dials, you still earn just the $500.

So how do you actually set a bonus and commission rate? Well, once you have your On-Target Earnings (OTE) and quota figured out, you need to determine the weight of each of their quotas on their variable pay. A good rule of thumb is to not tie more than 25% of SDRs’ variable pay on revenue, so we’ll say 75% of their variable pay is earned through demo setting and 25% is earned through revenue generation. From there, it’s fairly simple to work backward. Continuing the example from this blog post, let’s say we have a 20 demo/month and $36k/month revenue quota, an OTE of $72k broken into $40k base and $32k variable. In that example, 75% of the $32k/year would be $24k/year or $2k/month. If you’re paying a flat rate per demo, that would be $100 per demo.

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However, if you want to incentivize overperformance, you could add an accelerator past 100%. I recommend having your accelerators apply to all demos for the month to add an extra incentive. So maybe you’d want to have your reps earn $100 for every demo up to quota, but once quota has been achieved, they earn $120 for every demo held that month. We’ve seen as many as 100 different earnings tiers, but we recommend sticking with 4 max.

Then if you’re paying 25% of their variable pay on their revenue generated, that would be $12k/year or $1k/month. At a quota of $36k/month, that would be 2.77% of any revenue they generate. I’m a fan of round commission percentages personally, so I’d round it to an even 3%.

At the end of the day, you’ll have to play around with all the numbers and find something that works for your organization.

For additional resources designing SDR comp plans, visit our free tool Compensation Hub. Explore SDR compensation plan examples, customize them to your business, and save and share with your team.

Interviewing for a job at a new company may make you feel like you’re under a magnifying glass. When your experience, skills, and personality are being scrutinized, it’s easy to forget that job interviews are a two-way street. Yes, you want to present yourself in the best light, but that’s not the end of the story; you’re also there to determine whether this company is where you want to invest your time, energy, and talent for the next several years.

With that in mind, what kinds of things should you be looking for to decide whether a company will be a good fit for you and your career goals? Here are a few questions you may want to ask about the company and the role before you accept a sales job:

What does success look like in this company?

This question, on its face, may seem like it has an obvious answer: someone who hits high numbers. But what that looks like in practice may be a completely different story.

Ask your interviewers what comes to mind when they think of their highest-performing sales reps. What kind of person is most suited to the work? What personality and character traits to the most successful sales reps at this company have in common? What habits or skillsets do top performers share? When you know what kind of people have been most successful in this role in the past, you’ll be able to gauge how closely you match that profile.

What does the comp plan look like?

In any sales job, there’s some degree of uncertainty about how much the final take-home pay for the year will be. That’s why it’s so important to know the details of how your pay will be calculated, and how accurate the quoted on-target earnings are.

In addition to finding out the specifics of the company’s compensation plan, ask your interviewer to tell you what percentage of reps have hit their quotas in the past six months. Ideally, about 80% of sales reps can hit their goals within a given period. If 90% of reps at this company only hit 50% of their quota, partial quota attainment may be considered normal in this organization. Knowing whether the company sets reasonable sales quotas will help you get a better idea of what kind of pay you should realistically expect.

What does a typical day look like for sales reps here?

This question may feel like a cliche, but it’s an important one to ask; it will clue you in about what will be expected of you. It’s common for a sales rep to imagine that they’ll spend their days doing demos and closing deals, only to be disappointed when they find that much of their day involves cold calls and other outreach tactics. Sales processes can look vastly different between companies; it’s a good idea to have a realistic picture of what a job entails before accepting it.

What’s the relationship between sales reps and their managers?

In the best sales organizations, managers are a great resource for their reps, offering ongoing coaching and helping new hires get up to speed on product knowledge. In practice, though, some managers are much more hands-off, only interacting with salespeople when they have numbers to report. Ask what you should expect from your manager so you can make sure you’re ending up in a supportive environment.

What does a career trajectory look like in this company?

The interviewers’ answer to this question should reveal several things to you at once. For one, you’ll be able to learn about how salespeople become eligible for promotions, which will tell you whether or not the company is committed to promoting from within the organization. At early-stage startups, this may not be particularly well-defined, but ideally your interviewers will be able to tell you the company’s general philosophy on whether they hire management externally or from inside the company.

The other important information this question should reveal is the average tenure of an employee in the sales organization. A high turnover rate (meaning employees leave after a short time at the company) could indicate that sales goals aren’t realistic and/or that reps aren’t given the support they need to be successful in the organization.

How is the company performing overall?

Through your research before an interview, you may have been able to find some of this information. But giving your interviewers a chance to answer this question can reveal their level of confidence in the company’s ability to perform in the future. Specifically, you’ll want to know whether the company is growing month over month and quarter over quarter, and how well the company is expanding and innovating in the industry.

Get your career on the right path

There are a lot of variables to consider before deciding to take your skills and experience to a new organization. Whether you’ll be compensated fairly, how well the company is positioned for growth, and what kind of culture you’re getting into are all things to think about seriously when making your decision. By asking these exploratory questions in a job interview, you should be able to get a better idea of whether or not the role and the company will put you on the path to the career you want.

Want an easier way to track your progress and project your earnings? Great news! With QuotaPath’s simplified commission and attainment tracking, you can spend less time juggling spreadsheets and more time closing deals. Sign up for free.

Experts in every profession have their preferred tools to help them work better and faster, and sales is no different. While it’s true that a lot of success in sales comes down to the ability to wield experience and finely-tuned skills to make a compelling case for a purchase, having access to the right tools doesn’t hurt, either.

Whether they’re meant to help you stay organized, provide you with insights about your potential customers, or help you contact people easily, the software tools you use on the job can serve as power-ups to complement your skills.

We reached out to a few sales reps to find out what kinds of software and tools they use to help them do their jobs well. Here are the kinds of tools they told us are essential for them to make the most of their time, stay organized, and close more deals:

General communication and organizational tools

With more sales reps working remotely or communicating with people across the country (or the world!) as part of their jobs every day, dependable communication tools are a must. Many of the salespeople we talked to named communication tools like Slack and Zoom as key to their day-to-day work functions. Using messaging tools like Slack, sales pros are able to collaborate and quickly check in with colleagues. Zoom and other video conferencing tools are useful for giving presentations or demos, regardless of geographical distance.

Nearly every person we talked to also mentioned Google Calendar, Google Docs, or the G-Suite as a whole as essential tools for getting work done. While these tools aren’t sales-specific— almost anyone whose job involves working in front of a computer will use these most days— they are certainly useful in helping salespeople organize their days and maximize their productivity. According to Sebastian, an account exec: “[The G-Suite] is easy to use, and it provides multiple basic tools (sheets, docs, notes, list building, calendar) and cross-functionality (mobile and desktop).”

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools

CRMs are a fact of life for most sales reps, whether they enjoy using them or not. These tools provide a central location for businesses to store prospect and customer data and keep track of all interactions leading up to a sale.

There are hundreds (maybe thousands) of CRMs available for sales teams to use, but the two most commonly mentioned by the sales reps we talked to were Salesforce and HubSpot, which offer integrations with other useful tools, such as sales intelligence and engagement platforms.

Sales intelligence platforms

Many sales operations in the past depended on manual prospecting tasks like cold calling to get a feel for where to focus their efforts. Fortunately, modern sales forces have resources at their disposal that let them work smarter, not harder.

Using sales intelligence platforms like Guru, Clearbit, InsightSquared, LeadIQ, and others, salespeople can quickly access information about prospects, manage pipelines, and make more accurate forecasts— all tasks that would have required significant investments of time a decade ago. Most of these tools are used in conjunction with a CRM to power up contact records with more in-depth information.

According to sales development rep Eric: “I use these in my day-to-day activities every day of the week. It’s not a ‘nice to have’; they directly impact how I get leads.”

Sales engagement platforms

Time is a limited resource for everyone these days; nobody has time to waste on tasks that don’t move the ball forward meaningfully. That’s why sales engagement tools like Outreach.io, Salesloft, and Yesware came up as useful power-ups for the sales reps we talked to.

These platforms all offer their own unique combination of features, but the unifying idea is the same: they all aim to help salespeople get a better idea of which activities are most effective so they can prioritize them and close more sales. They can also help sales reps quickly personalize and automate written communication with prospects, allowing them to reach more people in less time.

According to account exec Isaac, “These tools are extremely powerful for organizing data in a logical way, with user interfaces that are intuitive and easy-to-use. Whether that data organization involves messages, training/sales collateral, or outbound emails, my favorite tools are ones that let me automate manual processes and focus on strategic problem-solving.”

Sales performance management

Even with all these other tools at your disposal, your efforts can become unfocused if you’re not aware of what’s working and what isn’t. That’s one reason it’s so important to have a good idea of where you stand on the path toward your goals. But juggling an ad hoc system of self-made spreadsheets to keep yourself on track is not just onerous and unappealing, it’s also a huge strain on your already-tight schedule.

That’s where QuotaPath comes in. With our attractive and easy-to-use platform, you can forecast your attainment and compensation in real-time, visualize how your performance changes over time, and stay motivated to reach your sales goals… all without putting together a single spreadsheet. Oh yeah, and it’s free to use, today and forever.

Ready to learn more or try it for yourself? Get started today.

Now that we’ve set the quota for a salesperson, it’s time to talk about how to set commission rates. In the past, our CEO AJ Bruno wrote about his favorite comp plan but that’s far from the only option you have.

Before we dive in, let’s define some terms:

Commission: a percentage of some other number (usually revenue) that you earn. Do you receive some percentage of every deal you bring in? If so, that’s a commission.

Bonus: a flat value you earn for doing something. Do you earn some set amount of money for hitting your quota, hitting revenue milestones, or for every meeting you set? If so, that’s a bonus.

Commission Types

• Single rate commission: The simplest form of commission is the single rate commission. This means that you earn a set % of your sales, regardless of your quota attainment.
• Multiple rate commission: Multiple rate commissions change depending on some variable. The most traditional multiple rate commission is an accelerator that increases your commission rate when you hit your quota.

Bonus Types

• Single rate bonus: Much like a single rate commission, single rate bonuses are very simple. You get paid a specific amount for completing some action. These are more common for non-revenue producing roles, but examples might be earning a flat $500 for closing any deal or earning a bonus for every new logo you close.
• Multiple rate bonus: Again, similar to a multiple rate commission, a multiple rate bonus means that the amount you earn for completing an action changes depending on some other variable like quota attainment.
• Milestone bonus: Milestone bonuses are bonuses you earn for hitting some achievement. For example, you could earn $500 for making 1,000 dials in a month. If you make 999 dials? No bonus. If you make 2,000 dials, you still earn just the $500.

So how do you actually set a commission rate? Well, once you have your On-Target Earnings (OTE) and quota figured out, it’s fairly simple to work backward. Continuing the example from this blog post, let’s say we have a $50k/month quota, an OTE of $120k broken into $60k base and $60k commission. In that example, a flat rate commission would be 10%. That comes from: $60,000 annual commission / 12 months = $5,000 OTE per month and $5,000 OTE per month / $50,000 quota per month = 10% commission.

However, if you want to incentivize overperformance, you could add an accelerator past 100%. I recommend having your accelerators apply to all sales for the month to add an extra incentive. So maybe you’d want to have your reps earn 10% of anything up to quota, but once quota has been achieved, they earn 12% of anything they’ve sold that month. We’ve seen as many as 100 different earnings tiers, but we recommend sticking with 4 max.

Another option would be to add a milestone bonus for hitting your monthly quota, encouraging consistency. An example would be a $1,000 bonus for hitting your monthly quota, which would drop your commission rate to 8% while leaving OTE the exact same.

At the end of the day, you’ll have to play around with all the numbers and find something that works for your organization. It was mentioned at the beginning of this post, but if you’re looking for a simple and effective first plan, you can’t go wrong with this plan from our CEO, AJ Bruno.

As new tools make the world more interconnected, inside sales has gained momentum over traditional outside sales. In fact, today’s busy and hyper-educated buyers want to engage virtually in almost 75% of sales situations. Taking the prospecting process online and using tactics like virtual conferencing help inside sales reps engage leads instantly and achieve higher quotas than they would have been able to a decade ago.

There’s no time like the present to land a great inside sales job. But before you send over a standard resume and email, here are four strategies to help you position yourself for a transition into an inside sales career.

Bring on your energy

Successful inside reps should be able to engage prospects through email and phone as well as outside reps can close deals in person. The secret? Enthusiasm. Inside sales reps have to maintain their positivity and energy to captivate prospects and motivate people, despite any setbacks and rejection they may face.

In an interview for an inside sales job, keep your head held high and show off your energy and enthusiasm about the work. Employers will want to work with someone who’s excited about what they do, and who can rally others to feel the same.

Know the product

The best inside sales reps know their product inside and out. When customers have objections and questions, a deep knowledge of your product will allow you to take control of the conversation and convey confidence about what you’re selling.

Make sure you’re well-versed on how the product is made, how it can be used, and what technology stacks work well together. The ability to knock out demos and follow up with useful product info will help you move more deals down your sales pipeline (and impress your boss)!

Connect with insiders

Sales reps tend to be an outgoing bunch, so there are generally plenty of opportunities to network or meet people in the field. It’s a great idea to expand your network and connect with sales reps at local meetup groups or conferences. Make sure you come prepared with your business card and time for several conversations—you never know who will refer you to their company in the future.

Networking with existing inside sales reps at a company you’re interested in allows you to do reconnaissance. Instead of relying on conversations with recruiters or sales managers, knowing people in the role you’re trying to land can help you get a better idea of how to position yourself. Reach out to sales reps who are on the floor to get a sense of what they need and how you can demonstrate that you’d be a good fit. Face-to-face time talking to inside sales reps about their successes and challenges can be really helpful when the time comes for an interview.

Do your homework

It’s never a good idea to apply for a position or walk into an interview without having done your research. You should be familiar with company and industry leaders, what they’re doing, and what makes them successful. Take a few minutes to visit the LinkedIn profile of your interviewers so you can ask them questions about their work experience. When most employers have access to information online, it’s also a good idea to groom your digital profile; make sure you include quantifiable achievements and results.

Finally, articulate why you want the job and how you can contribute to the company’s success. Decision makers remember those who show them persistence and purpose instead of just telling them what they want to hear.

Pave your journey to success

Landing an inside sales career is a great opportunity for growth and development. Taking steps like the ones mentioned above can help you freshen up your knowledge and skills and prepare you for a career in a dynamic field.

Once you land your dream gig, use these 5 expert-tips from SalesRight to become a master sales executive.

With a powerful all-in-one platform to measure your performance, track critical metrics, manage your pipeline, and motivate you to hit your sales goals, it’s easier to pave your journey to success. Try it for free today.

When you’re just starting a career in sales, the amount of information being thrown your way might make you feel like you’re drinking from a firehose. Between the company-specific product knowledge you need to learn, the advice from well-meaning friends and colleagues, and the ever-growing number of books or seminars that claim to hold the secret to a successful career, it’s easy to burn out before you’ve even gotten started.

So how can you sift through it all and determine which advice will actually help you reach your sales goals? How do you know who to listen to— and who to tune out?

We know there’s a lot of less-than-helpful information out there about how to become better at your job. That’s why we’ve put together a condensed primer with practical advice to help you learn how to develop your sales career. We’ve included lessons some of our own veteran salespeople have learned throughout their careers, as well as some advice from thought leaders we trust.

In this resource, we’ve included answers to some of your most pressing sales questions, with advice on topics such as:

• How to decide whether or not a sales job will be the right fit for you
• How to evaluate a compensation plan before accepting a sales job
• How you can improve your first outreach to set yourself up for success
• What to include in a follow-up email (and what to leave out)
• What resources are worthwhile to help you continue to advance your career

Sound useful? We thought so. Head on over to our resource page to learn more about what skills you’ll need to develop your sales career.