Mastering the Art of Vetting Commission-Only Sales Reps
Jayce Grayye • February 13, 2024
Commission-only sales is a much-maligned field in business. While the lack of a base salary creates an element of risk, most commission-only salespeople have uncapped earning potential. It’s a sales sector that’s often reserved for specialists and high-performers.
It can be tricky to hire commission-only sales reps. There are certain criteria recruitment departments must look out for to ensure they find the right people. To help you find and secure the best commission-only sales reps for your business, we’ve put together a guide for mastering the art of vetting in the recruitment process.
The Importance of Vetting in Commission-Only Sales Roles
Hiring commission-only sales reps is one of the important aspects of running a successful sales company. Commission-based sales can be fickle at the best of times. In fact, over 40% of salespeople claim they would leave their job for the opportunity to make 10% more elsewhere.
In addition to appetizing commission structures, vetting is also essential to secure the right personalities and avoid high turnover rates. Businesses must look beyond the numbers and statistics to secure the top candidates. Personality plays an important role.
The 6 Key Traits of Successful Commission-Only Sales Reps
When vetting commission-only sales reps during the hiring process, we recommend looking out for six key traits. Not all candidates will excel in every area but high-performers should stand out when you focus on these characteristics.
1. Self-Discipline
Self-discipline is one of the most common traits shared among successful people, regardless of the industry. The best-in-class commission-only sales reps are willing to do what others aren’t through discipline and drive.
When prospecting or following leads, self-discipline is needed to avoid scaring away a client. During the nurturing stage, you’ll also need to be patient to build rapport with the customer. The same goes when following up and negotiating.
What Questions Should You Ask?
Here are a few questions to ask a candidate to assess their level of self-discipline.
- Does self-discipline play a role in your sales process?
- Provides insights into the candidate's sales process
- Shows you how much or little self-disciple is important to them
- How do you nurture clients and follow up on potential sales?
- Allows candidate to show their self-discipline in critical areas of the sales process
- How do you use self-discipline to improve long-term sales performance?
- Shows you whether or not candidates reflect and learn from experiences
- Demonstrates if they have a growth mindset
2. Emotional Intelligence (EQ)
Emotional intelligence (EQ) is one of the most misunderstood yet crucial traits of a top salesperson. Many people mistake EQ for weakness. However, high EQ sales reps stand out in five key emotion-based categories:
- Self-awareness
- Self-regulation
- Social skills
- Empathy
- Motivation
High EQ salespeople are good at building trust with clients, developing relationships, and using their wit to close a sale. EQ is extremely valuable for honing long-term clients.
What Questions Should You Ask?
To gauge a candidate’s EQ levels, here are some interview questions worth asking.
- What’s your proudest achievement and why?
- Highlights self-awareness regarding achievements
- Shows candidate’s ability to reflect, evaluate, and report
- Demonstrates candidate’s ability to show their worth without coming across as arrogant
- Have you ever had to adjust your behavior or approach with a customer?
- Exhibits candidate’s level of empathy in a sales situation
- Displays social awareness and skills to navigate difficult situations
3. Confidence
Confidence is a charismatic trait that virtually all top salespeople have. A confident rep puts a client at ease and instills trust, increasing the likelihood of getting a deal over the line. While confidence is something that can be worked on, you want to hire commission-only sales reps with a good baseline.
What Questions Should You Ask?
Confidence is a characteristic that you can generally spot pretty quickly. However, you’ll want to determine whether a candidate’s confidence is useful or unwarranted. Here are some questions to help you do that.
- How has personal and professional development improved your sales career?
- Exhibits where the candidate derives self-belief
- Are you confident in your sales abilities?
- Direct question opens the floor for the candidate to appear confident and tell you more about themselves
- What personal traits make you a confident sales rep?
- Demonstrates candidate's understanding of important confidence markers
- Allows candidates to talk about their strengths and how they leverage them
4. Patience
There’s a fine balance between patience and assertiveness among the top-performing salespeople. You want to avoid encroaching on a client’s decision-making process while also being there to help them solve problems. Essentially, you need sales reps who can assertively yet patiently guide a customer to a sale.
Some sales tactics help you drive a deal over the line quickly but a patient approach builds trust and often leads to longer relationships. Regular customers are typically more valuable in the long term. In fact, repeat customers spend 67% more than new ones.
What Questions Should You Ask?
To assess a candidate’s patience, pose behavioral or situational questions. These can be real or hypothetical. We recommend the STAR method for formulating these scenarios: Situation, Task, Action, and Result.
- What role does patience play in your sales process?
- Determines candidate’s self-assessment of the role of patience
- Allows you to get a better idea of how patient the candidate is
- Give us an example of a time when your patience helped solve a customer’s problem
- Shows you if a customer has successfully implemented patience in a sale and how
- How would you de-escalate a situation with an angry customer?
- Provides insights into the candidate’s process for handling intense situations
5. Stress Management
It’s somewhat naive to think that everyone can navigate a commission-only sales job without any stress. However, the ability to control and manage stress is key.
Stress has a negative impact on every aspect of the sales process. If all your reps have elevated stress levels, you’re likely to be losing out on money.
What Questions Should You Ask?
You don’t want to try to gauge a candidate’s stress levels. Rather, you want to analyze how they deal with stress and manage high-pressure engagements. Here are some questions to propose in an interview.
- How do you destress after a tough day of work?
- Shows the individual’s ability to separate work life from personal life
- Gives insights into the person’s capacity for handling stress and what tools they use to manage it
- Describe how you dealt with a stressful situation in the past
- Gives you direct insight into the candidate’s process for navigating stressful scenarios
6. Coachability
The majority of employees who receive coaching experience improvements in their performance, according to the Institute of Coaching. Coachable salespeople not only perform better, but they’re also more open to feedback and show a willingness to grow and develop.
What Questions Should You Ask?
Consider the following line of questioning to assess a candidate’s coachability.
- What’s the best feedback you’ve ever received and why?
- Shows if a candidate is comfortable being vulnerable and whether they have a growth mindset
- Tells you if the candidate is open to feedback
- Tell us about a time you made a mistake at work and how you dealt with it
- Displays candidate’s accountability levels
- Showcases problem-solving skills
- Exhibits honesty
If a candidate begins to criticize others or lacks accountability, this is generally a red flag,
Ready to Hire?
It’s not always about hiring the best people. More often than not, the secret to success is to hire the right people. While track records and sales numbers are important, you’ve got to analyze personality traits when hiring commission-only sales reps.
Though these 6 traits provide a great way to identify outstanding commission-only sales reps, you don’t need to do this alone. Our team at Jayce Grayye Consulting & Recruiting is always here to help. Contact us if you’d like us to find some of the best commission-only sales reps in the globe.
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The term emotional intelligence (EQ) is grossly misunderstood in business contexts. Some falsely believe that an emotionally intelligent salesperson is a pushover or someone who can’t drive home a sale. However, being an emotional person and an emotionally intelligent person are two different things. If you hire commission-only sales reps, it’s important to know that EQ plays a critical role in business, especially when it comes to sales. Essentially, EQ boils down to five core components: Self-awareness Self-regulation Social skills Empathy Motivation Performing well in each of these areas demonstrates that you can recognize, understand, and apply the power of emotion in sales contexts. Emotionally intelligent individuals tend to build stronger relationships and establish trust with others. In this article we take a close look at emotional intelligence and how it applies to the professional work of commission-only sales reps.
In modern business, cutting-edge data has enormous influence over decision-making and analysis. Managerial experience and intuition are important. However, they’re no longer the most prominent factors in determining sales performance. Data analytics provide sales teams with critical insights that improve team performance and add value to the entire organization. It’s particularly important when building a commission-only sales team . If you hire commission-only sales reps, it’s key to use data to audit sales performances and make executive decisions to drive overall sales, instill confidence in sales staff, and ultimately, help the company achieve its targets. The Role of Data Analytics in Sales In recent years, the role of data analytics in sales has become essential for virtually every aspect of business, regardless of the industry. When it comes to commission-only sales reps, the numbers tell you everything you need to know about performance and profits. Analytics may also be used to identify patterns and create predictive data. This can then be leveraged for target creation or incentivization plans for salespeople. Analysis allows businesses to predict future success and make better plans by adapting, adjusting, or even, redesigning their sales strategies. When it comes to commission-only sales, in particular, analysis is essential for developing incentive plans. By looking at different sales metrics , you can create customized incentive plans for all salespeople. These help them reach their potential and maximize revenue. Strategies for Implementing Analytics in Commission-Only Sales Sales analytics can enable businesses to streamline sales processes, incentivize staff, and increase overall revenues. So, let’s take a look at strategies for implementing analytics in commission-only sales. Plus, we’ll show you a practical way to level up the data science approach of a business. 1. Determine What You Want to Analyze It may seem obvious, but far too many companies buy all the fancy analytical tools without knowing what their end goal is. With commission-only sales, there’s no need to overcomplicate things. You’ll want to use data to do straightforward, high-value tasks, like identifying top salespeople, spotting weaknesses, and noticing trends, to understand your salespeople’s ROI . 2. Establish Metrics In addition to knowing what you’re looking for, you’ll need to establish what metrics best align with your goals. Consider key metrics such as total revenue, lead generation, conversion rate, percentage of revenue from new or existing customers, year-on-year growth, etc. These metrics will differ depending on the company. 3. Compile Data Using Sales Analytics Software While it’s possible to manually compile data and crunch the numbers, it’s not an efficient approach, especially considering the availability of sophisticated CRMs. These programs use analytical software to analyze the data, display it in an easy-to-understand way, and provide insights that help you achieve your goals. 4. Take action Armed with key insights and data relating to your sales team, the next step is to take action. There’s no point sitting on data and insights because their value diminishes with time. Decide how often you want to publish reports and be sure to take action based on your findings. For example, certain locations may require more salespeople to meet demand, while other zones may not be worth the effort. Or, a particular product may no longer be hitting targets, meaning you need to reconsider the sales strategy. Regardless of how many insights you have, you won’t see change until you take action. 5. Monitor findings over time You won’t always find valuable insights from each report. However, over longer periods, like six months or a year, you might see patterns emerging. Pay attention to data and findings over time, and take relevant action.
Hire an experienced recruitment agency for professional support in the recruitment process. Get the right talent on your team, and you'll be able to find the sweet spot between risks and rewards for long-term business success.