Great! You have done your homework, consulted the powers that be and you have determined that outsourcing your sales force is the way forward. Congratulations on this first big step. You might be wondering, now what? Here are a few steps to ensure that your outsourced sales campaign gets off the ground running…
1) Find the right partner: Assuming you haven’t found an outsourced sales company yet, you need to start doing your due diligence. Start by researching companies, setting meetings, viewing pitches and proposals and be very selective. Ask for referrals and meet the existing sales force. Remember, this company will not only be working for you, but with you. Choose wisely!
2) Get your ducks in a row: just because you’ve hired an outsourced sales company does not mean they’ll do all the work for you – remember, this is a partnership, and for companies like ours to succeed, we need you to have some skin in the game. Designate a point person who will be the liaison between your outsourced sales company and your business, develop realistic goals you’d like to see set, and get us all the marketing and training materials you have.
3) Make sure your product/service is market ready: we have fallen into this trap before where a company hired us to sell a product that wasn’t market-ready. While this might seem like a good way to get ahead of the game, it is not. If you are outsourcing your sales team – you must have a product to sell. Market research is another monster all together – we’d be happy to do it for you, but make sure you know what you are getting into and be prepared.
4) Tell us everything you have learned: We’ll ask you – but it’s best for you to prepare us with the ups and downs of your business, what has worked, what has not. That way, we as the outsourced sales professionals don’t waste time repeating your past mistakes.
5) Be flexible: Outsourced sales is not a magic solution, it’s a learning curve. We might try one tactic and realize it’s not working and then try another. Maybe we’ll tweak the cold call script, maybe we’ll re-vamp the offering – either way, you can be guaranteed that the outsourced sales process will evolve. This is good – this means progress. Be flexible and understand that we have been here before, and we know what we’re doing.
Making the decision to hire and outsourced sales company is not always easy – but on-boarding that outsourced sales company can be a breeze if you are a willing partner who does their due-diligence and works with us along the way. Remember, we’re not just your outsourced sales company, we’re your strategic partner.
Happy Selling!
