Hiring the wrong salesperson costs a typical business around $2 million in the first year. That loss includes hiring costs, first-year salary and lost revenue.
But what about the cost of hiring the right salesperson but not onboarding them properly—or at all?
As it turns out, by simply handing your new reps a product catalog and turning them loose, your manufacturing business could be losing revenue, brand reputation … and even the reps themselves.
Do You Need a Formal Onboarding Process?
Most industrial manufacturers don’t have a formal onboarding or training process for new salespeople. They might have them shadow for a couple of days or give them some product presentations, but in general, the philosophy is, “You know how to sell, so go start doing it.”
Here are a few quick facts to highlight why their business (and yours) can benefit from a better onboarding process:
- Companies that have effective onboarding programs see an increase of 6.7% in quota attainment according to CSO Insights.
- Businesses that standardize their onboarding see a 50% increase in productivity.
- Employees who had a great onboarding experience are 69% more likely to stay with the company for three years.
The annual sales rep turnover for B2B sales is 13.9%. If your turnover rate is higher than that and you want to know why, it may help to examine your onboarding process. Ask your reps – current and former – if their onboarding set them up for success or if there were elements that should have been different. Use that intelligence to improve your onboarding program.
Great onboarding is a formal and comprehensive process that includes setting expectations for the role, product training, and getting them set up with the right technology.
So, where do you start?
Your Sales Rep Onboarding Checklist
If you want your new sales reps to succeed from day one, or close to it, you need a plan. You should base this plan on your unique market, selling environment, product portfolio, types of accounts and so on. Here are some things to keep in mind to make your plan as effective as possible.
Step 1: Answer their questions – all of them
One of the primary reasons for early failure of sales reps is miscommunication, or lack of communication.
Salespeople are self-starters. They are eager to get out of the office to start prospecting and meeting with customers. If they don’t have what they need to do their job, plenty of them just make do with what they have … or make it up. If they have questions, they find answers as they go.
The way to set your new reps up for success is to meet with them regularly during their first few weeks and have an open-ended discussion about any questions they have. Regular training sessions plus weekly one-on-ones with their manager should all be implemented during the new hire’s first week on the job. This is a time to bring up technology, protocols, product messaging, prospecting methods, expense tracking, sales goals and anything else on their mind. If they don’t ask about it, but other reps have in the past, bring it up anyway.
Step 2: Set expectations
Ready, Fire, Aim. That’s what plenty of salespeople do in their first few weeks on the job without any onboarding. They wing it – which can lead to underperforming at best and furious customers (translated: lost accounts) at worst.
Keep your reps from missing the mark by setting expectations from the start and following a documented sales process.
If you have expectations for prospecting activity, sales meetings held, proposals delivered and so on, communicate these expectations before any new rep dials any customer. Ensure your new hires understand what you expect from them – even if they’re experienced, they still need to know where to devote their time and energy. Set expectations early and your new hires will meet them sooner.
Step 3: Start with the essentials
You don’t hire salespeople to sit in a classroom, or an office, doing paperwork.
That means you need to prioritize. Determine what information is vital for your reps to know as they first start out. Consider including these essentials in your new rep onboarding:
- Orientation (HR documentation, benefits, EAP, mental health support)
- Go-to-market strategy
- Target buyer personas
- Competitive analysis
- Product and service training
- Sales process overview
- CRM system training
- Training on current customers and prospects
- Vertical-market-specific training
Make sure to document this information and make it easily accessible so reps can refer to it again when needed (don’t forget to review it regularly to make sure it’s still up to date and relevant.)
Then, make a point of continuing the education in bite-sized chunks during weekly sales meetings and refresher training. This approach not only gets your reps to the phones faster, it helps them retain new training more easily, because they’re not trying to learn every single thing in one sitting.
Step 4: Follow up. Then follow up again.
On average, students forget 70% of what they are taught within 24 hours of a learning experience. If you want your reps to retain and use what they learn during onboarding, follow up.
For somewhere between 30 and 60 days, stay in frequent communication with each new rep. Debrief after trainings to make sure their understanding is accurate. Challenge their knowledge, monitor their activity, measure their success, answer their questions, allay their fears. No follow up = no success.
Selling in the New Era: Onboarding Remote/Hybrid Employees
Onboarding new sellers is tougher when they never come into the office.
If they work remotely, or work from home, you’ll have to be a tad more creative, since you don’t have the opportunity to share knowledge in person in the office.
Create a more formal plan that you run through with your new hires over video calls. Consider using an app like Fellow. It helps sales leaders run productive 1-on-1s with new reps, conduct pipeline reviews, discuss important deals, and keep new hires in the loop, engaged, motivated—and productive.
Otherwise, consider investing in a sales enablement platform that hosts all sales content, syncs meeting notes to your CRM, and keeps all reps on the same page.
Onboarding Outsourced Sales Reps
If you sell with a direct sales team and through an industrial manufacturers’ representative (IMR), you need to create a mini version of your onboarding process for your IMRs.
Why mini? Because IMRs typically require less onboarding — they already understand your markets, end users, and common buyer objections. Plus, you don’t need to go through a whole orientation of your company’s HR policies, or train them on your CRM.
But you will need a formal onboarding process to ensure you set your IMR partner up for success. Focus on territory management, roles and responsibilities between your direct reps and your outsourced sales reps, expectations and product knowledge.
By the way, if you are actively looking to hire an IMR, read our guide on the Six Things to Look for in Independent Sales Reps.
