RECRUITING AND HIRING CHECKLIST:

This is the second in the series of several articles outlining how to grow your sales in the face of a turbulent economy. 

An uncertain economy provides huge opportunity to Strengthen Sales for the savvy entrepreneur.  Superstar salespeople are never abundant, but as organizations change strategy trying to adapt to external pressures, some forget to take care of their biggest result producers, leaving their Sales Superstars vulnerable and willing to seek stronger companies.  Here is a Top Ten List to Upgrade Sales by attracting the best of the best Salespeople.

• Your patience - you must wait for the right candidate.  Accept only over-achievers. Not hiring is always better than acquiring average, mediocre salespeople.

• The frequency of your reposts - the life of an internet posting is 3 days. You must repost at least weekly.  It is vital to start with a he candidate pool.

• The target cities for your positions - if you’re looking for someone in the Southeast, post it for Tampa this week, Atlanta next week, Miami the following week, etc.

• The headline for your ad - It must have ’sales’ in the title but beyond that, change it each time you repost it so that it doesn’t look like candidates are seeing the same opportunity each week.

• The industry classification for your opportunity - select “sales” one week and your actual industry the next.

• Utilize additional job sites. If you are using Monster (and using it effectively), try SalesLadder, Careerbuilder, Craigslist, LinkedIn, and a well-used local job site.

• Get referrals from your salespeople, vendors, customers and friends - but make sure these candidates go through the same process as those who apply online.

• Consider a recruiter to locate candidates - but make them go through the same process, too.

• Make sure your ad describes the candidate’s necessary experiences and not the job, opportunity and company.

• Make sure there is nothing in your ad that can disinterest a candidate.

More to come…

© Copyright 2009 Joe Zente