Activate the Prey Drive in Your Reps
I'm just going to graze the top of this. It's going to be very superficial. There are still going to be nuggets, some good content for you. But I want you to know that if we were to step to the side, there's much more depth to these things than I'm going to cover here.
LOW HANGING FRUIT
1. Headhunt
I said low hanging fruit, right? Head hunting is a low hanging fruit. Snipe the best talent away from your competition. Who has never headhunted before? Just be honest. It's OK. The majority of people haven't. Think about this for a second. Have you been able to grow a sales leader who can guide your team and just throw huge numbers on the board consistently? This is like one of the most critical elements to a successful door-to-door program. You have to have a consistent person who is swinging from the doors. If you have not been able to identify or create this person organically, you need to find this person elsewhere. You need to have the killer mindset, right? Because, if you get a guy from another company who's really talented and you bring him over. Automatically, your revenue jumps. You start throwing up big numbers. But, what did you just tell all your other sales reps who are in your company? “I believe in us so much and I am so confident in what we offer as a company that I know I can go get some of the best talent out there.” As a sales rep on your team, if you've heard of, like, a local legend that works for another company. He comes over to your team. How do you now feel about your company? You're like, "dang! If it makes sense for so and so to come over here, I must be in a really good spot." Your reps get even more excited, more committed, and more loyal to your brand and your company. Does that make sense? Some people are too short sighted. They think, “I'm just going to get this guy. He does about 2 million a year. He's a beast. I'm going to bring him over and go from 8 million to 10 million. But the real value is how you move the needle on the majority of your sales reps. Right? 'Cause he's just one guy and you already know where his ceiling is. So if you can get all of your sales reps to do just a little bit more. That revenue boost is way greater than any individual rep. Bringing in a rockstar will galvanize your reps behind a positive sales culture overall. They'll be thinking, “it's awesome here. Look at these people who are coming over to us. I don't need to look anywhere. I don't need to wander with my eyes and, you know, entertain another offer or something like that." Does that make sense? So, retention is boosted greatly simply by bringing over top talent. If nothing else, to help protect yourself from that kind of a situation, you should proactively snipe and get talent from other companies.
2. Sales Tracking
This one's very simple. invest in sales tracking. And that could be canvassing software or a CRM. This is like the most common sense and you know, there are plenty of fantastic options out there like SalesRabbit, Spotio, JobNimbus, JobProgress, and Acculynx. But, what I hear sometimes when I am consulting is “well, yeah, I know about that bell and I know about that whistle. But, we kind of do it this way. And we're doing OK. Like, I don't see a huge need. I don't feel backed against the wall or in a corner to have to invest in this next thing or whatever it is. Like, we're doing OK.” That is not a growth mindset, not a growth mentality, whatsoever. And, I would be very sorry if one of your sales reps ever heard you say something like that. Right? As a business owner, I get that you want to be careful with costs, margins, and how you're spending money. I totally understand. Trust me. But, imagine if your sales reps overhear that. How excited do you think you just made them to work at your organization? They think, “so, everyone else gets the bells and whistles. Everyone else gets the state-of-the-art software and technology.” That doesn't get your reps pumped up at all, right?
PREY DRIVE
You're going to notice a theme with most of these suggestions today. It is, “how do I move the needle on my sales reps with how they feel about my organization?” Because, you need to activate their prey drive. Have you ever heard of Coach Burt? Check him out later. He's awesome. Coach Burt. He talks about initiating a prey drive within your reps. Where essentially, you wake up knowing that you have to provide for you, yourself, your family, and everyone depends on you showing up and showing out on the doors or in the sales context that you're in. So, everything that I'm going to talk about will help you activate the prey drive in your reps.
Who has a rep where you're like, “dude, you told me about your life. You're like one bounced check away from being on the street. Why aren't you knocking? Here's the path. Here's even some leads sprinkled in. Why, for your own freaking sake will you not go work and make the money that's out there for you?” Never happened or has this happened? There are these reps that for whatever reason, won't do what is in their best interest. You can't want it for them. right? So, how do you activate a rep like that and ignite their prey drive? Well, it’s a culmination of all these things. It's not one single thing. It's the 5 + 5 + 5 rule, where you are able to actually add little things over time that culminate and boom. Suddenly, you tip the scale for those reps. They become activated and actually start working hard.
WATCH THE VIDEO PRESENTATION
This article is an excerpt, Part 3 from the live presentation with Jake Bennington at Win the Storm 2021. Watch the full presentation by clicking on the button below.
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