Source
r/sales•
KingPyot

What qualities do you feel make a good sales person?

Discussion

I've been working in IT sales now for close to 4 years and have seen varied types of individuals across various sales teams. In my current role I'm helping out management with scaling a new sales team within our business, this is the first time I've really been involved in the recruitment process. I'm trying to really hone in on what a potential candidate should posses in terms of qualities so that we can really launch this team off on a good basis. I have a general idea as to what I perceive are the qualities a good sales person should have but would love to get your take on this. Especially as I'm sure you all have seen your fair share of gun sales people.

Posted Aug 15, 2018, 9:44 AM UTC

16
BAD1086•

I think what makes a great sales rep is hard to determine through recruiting, which is why I am not envious of what you do.

If I had to list the top traits:

  1. Coachability - the ability to take criticism well and apply it and continue to get better
  2. Grit - You have to keep grinding during times where sales sucks, and you cannot let your foot off the gas when things are going great
  3. Empathy - Hard closing is dying more and more and the best sales professionals are those that genuinely care and are trying to solve their prospects pains
4
IncredibleCO•

Agreed. Not much else to add. Other than Grit is generally underrated, especially by non-sales people.

1
vaetas-video•

Gun to my head?

L&L: Listening and Likeability

3
lonemaverick87•

Consistency

3
salesandtonic•

I’m sure many people will chime in here so I’ll keep this brief:

I would put hard worker at the top of the list.

Having a genuine interest in achieving a positive business outcome for the client is high up there as well.

Being open to coaching is also key.

3
jaspersales•

Can they remember names? Not a huge deal as some good salesmen are bad with names but it’s one thing.

How well do they retain information? Tell them something and bring it back up near the end of the interview to see how much information they have retained. Retaining information is a big thing in sales (personal opinion)

Ask them about there sales process (depending if your hiring someone with experience) proper salesmen actually have a process and understand what they are doing on a call and the steps they need to take to get it closed and done.

In the past have they dealt with inbound or outbound selling? Inbound based salesmen can have a hard time moving to outbound

In the past did they deal with warm leads or straight cold calling? Salesmen moving from warm leads to cold leads can be a struggle for them.

Those are just a couple of things to think about. There are plenty more questions or things to look out for.

2