How To Have A Remote Sales Team (You Don’t Need To Babysit)
When I was on a call today, a question about our sales team came up. “How did you build your company using a remote sales team and do remote sales teams work?”.
“How did you build your company using a remote sales team and do remote sales teams work?”.
The question about a remote sales team helped me realize that most businesses do not operate like ours, and we are likely ahead of the curve. I love having a remote sales team and building a performance-based sales team is vital.
Having a performance-based sales team has been crucial for us, and we only recruit talented people who are interested in earning multiple six-figure incomes based on their effort and skillset. 100% of our team members have a big reason “why” they want to do this. The ‘why’ is the fuel behind their self-discipline. Getting to know your team and talking with them will help you understand them and their “why,” It will be WHY your remote team works.
Top 3 Performance-Based Sales Team Member Requirements:
- A desire and drive to make a substantial income based on their effort
- Discipline and the work ethic to earn based on their effort
- A big “why” story
On our team, we do not micromanage or babysit. We don’t even care which hours our team members work (half days are great! Pick which 12 hours you want to work! Haha -If you’re on our team and reading this, that’s a joke!)
We give our team the space they need to be themselves and operate in the best way.
Our whole attitude is to allow the team to use their instinct as salespeople. They know what they have to do and what is needed to get the job done. The team members know how to make it happen. Making “it happen” usually is easy to do, but also easy not to do, such as waking up early, going to bed later, or getting dressed correctly in the morning to feel productive. (PJs are cozy, but showering and getting dressed set a better working mood.) The little ‘tricks of the trade’ work. The point is to trust your team and trust them to control their destiny. Yes, we are a team, but we all have a unique MO. We all know what works best for us. We give our team the space they need to be themselves and operate in the best way.
Sounds so simple right? Find performance-based team members who are talented, goal-driven, and who will crush their goals. Finding these salesperson-unicorns might be a challenge if you’re only searching for a team member based on a small radius from the office. But there’s one huge reason I love having remote sales force: we have a much larger pool of people we can choose from because it doesn’t matter where they’re located. As long as the person has access to the internet and phone- we’re good to go!
Having a remote team is fantastic because it allows them to be comfortable to work from wherever they want and have that work-life balance at the same time. For us, as a business, it also allows us to have people working in multiple time zones. We have people from the East Coast to the West Coast. It seems like our business is running ALL THE TIME (I love this!), and the team appears driven to reach their goals and connect with our clients throughout the United States. So I would say it’s an excellent way to be able to build a team! No confinements. No walls. No restrictions! No limits!
I know the big question that comes next. “How do you keep your team motivated?” As I said, we find self-disciplined people. But of course, we do things to boost morale and mood, keep things fun, and keep our remote team connected.
“How do you keep your team motivated?”
First and foremost, a weekly team call check-in is mandatory. Salespeople can work freely during the week, but Thursday nights from 9–10, we get on Zoom together and get on the same page as a TEAM. We talk about all the things that come up during the week, and we try to tie up any loose ends, questions, concerns, etc. We don’t let things get out of hand. If there are issues, we address them. We give the team room to make suggestions, offer ideas, and use their voice. Notice I keep saying “team”? The salespeople are on their own but also part of something bigger. Being part of a team means we can do fun things together! From time to time, we have incentive trips (much easier before COVID-19 hit), daily and weekly cash bonuses, prizes, etc.
Most importantly, we do things as a family. We refer to ourselves as a family more than a team or company, and that’s because we care about everyone! We care about the salespeople’s struggles, family and personal life, and their emotional state.
The team communicates with each other using a chat app (currently using Telegram) where they can group text and ask questions, send encouragement, and even be silly from time to time. As business owners, we use this app also and participate with our team. We can see what comes up, what they talk about, ask about, etc. And we can praise the wins too (our secret sauce.) Every time a sale comes in, we call out the sales member and give them a virtual high five. The chat always blows up with high fives and encouragement from us and each other. It is brilliant.
Keeping A Remote Team Motivated:
- Weekly Check-Ins (face to face on Zoom)
- Give the team a voice
- Care about the group (novel concept to many business owners!)
- Incentivize (Bonuses, prizes, trips, etc.)
- Give the team an easy way to connect daily with each other
- Praise the little wins. It becomes part of the big picture.
Funny. Come to think of it; we ARE ahead of the curve! With COVID-19, I believe many companies will be making a switch to remote sales teams. I hope this blog post helps! One last thing, we always say, “it has to be ESPF.” Easy, simple, painless, and fun. If it’s not those things, it’s not worth doing. So go out there and get your remote sales team!
Thanks for reading my blog post this week. I hope it inspires you to either start a remote sales team in your company or become part of a team!
Success is a choice!
Originally published at https://aaronbouren.com on June 16, 2020.