Are salespeople worth the money they get paid?
This is a question that is often asked when I speak to managers looking to recruit. It is often uttered by operational staff and managing directors who resent paying salespeople their relatively high market rates. Sales directors sometimes even say it!
But firstly, ARE salespeople paid highly? Well a recent survey by the Chartered Institute of Marketing and publishing group Croner, entitled Sales Rewards, suggested that the average basic salary for a middle manager in sales is just over £38,000 – 5.6% higher than the national average for this level. Not a massive difference, but significant.
Interestingly, there are regional variations with sales reps in the North East and North West receiving 10% LESS than people at the equivalent level in other roles.
As a salesperson you are in the almost unique position in the business that you are constantly under the return-on-investment spotlight. Would an HR manager be constantly monitored to see that he was worth each year? Or the health and safety manager? Highly unlikely, even in these recessionary times.
However, the value of a salesperson appears to be easy to measure: if you don’t bring enough new sales to cover a certain multiple of your salary, you are toast!
On a strategic level, this way of thinking is incredibly inefficient and unfair. We are a sales training company after all so I not only have an axe to grind but can show it is not the most profitable rout. But let us put this to one side and deal with the issue head on.
Put simply, you need to show your managers the value you bring to the business. If you are regularly exceeding target all the time, then there is no issue. But, if you are like most salespeople, you have good months and bad months.
So be your own harshest critic: think carefully why you may have come up short. Don’t think of excuses; work out the reasons why. And take corrective action, before your manager needs to.
Sometimes the reasons for missing targets are genuine ones and unavoidable. If it is out of your control, see the storm brewing. Understand that the business demands (fairly or unfairly) that you return adequate return on investment. Start the dialogue with our manager early. Don’t let the threat of the axe come as a surprise.
Like it or loathe it, we need to constantly justify our value to our employers unlike other departments. But we do get better rewarded according to the research!