A- A- A+ Always hire a great sales candidate when you have the opportunity. You do not know when you will see another. For reasons still unknown to hiring managers, you never exactly know which candidates will succeed for you in your particular business and which will fail. It is safer to hire more than …
A- A- A+ Do not wait; terminate lousy salespeople within a short time period. If you know they are not going to succeed, do not waste the money; let them go so you can focus on the successful ones and start looking for replacements. This is another reason you should always hire more sales reps …
A- A- A+ To ensure you get what you ordered, have the receiving personnel independently identify and count all of the items on a delivery on their own blank receiving report. Hand that report to someone in the shipping department who will compare it to the trucker’s bill of lading. The two lists should be …
A- A- A+ Have your employees grade long or extended meetings, financial reviews, quarterly financial meetings, etc. Ask what they did not understand, what was missed, what was not clear, what was too long, who should not be involved or excluded or included, what do they need to discuss that was not, what, which speaker …
A- A- A+ Allow your vendors and local businesses to advertise to your employees through advertisements included in their weekly payroll checks or on a large bulletin board in their break or lunch room. Encourage local businesses to offer special discounts for all company employees and family members at no cost to your company. Have …
A- A- A+ Hire the great sales candidate who is revered by his clients. When you run across an extraordinary candidate, do not hesitate to hire him. Do not miss the opportunity to increase the overall level of your sales staff. There will always be good, mediocre and lousy sales personnel as measured by their …
IDEA: Always hire great salesmen regardless of the organization chart. Read More »
A- A- A+ When you have the opportunity to hire a tremendous asset for your company, go ahead and hire the great experienced manager candidate. You will immediately increase the overall level of management even if you find you must terminate others as a resulting consequence. Your firm will grow with great people on board. …
IDEA: Always hire great manager candidates regardless of the organization chart. Read More »
A- A- A+ To boost incentives for your sales staff, try increasing the payout when a sales representative increases his overall profit margin percentage. Add an added bonus to the payout pot for the profit margin improvement which yields a higher rate of return for your firm. This improved performance enhances your company’s return on …
A- A- A+ Regularly (monthly, quarterly) analyze all of your customers’ net profit dollars and percentages, line them up high to low by percentages and then look to address your problem ‘dogs’ at the bottom of the list. Analyze your customers running negative profit margins. If the numbers are correct and you have no other …
A- A- A+ Keep and teach your subordinates an overall positive attitude. Talk about not only price increases needed, bad and late shipments, bad product issues or lost customers. Also talk about the new contract with a large customer just signed today. Discuss briefly the development of a new product made by the smart guys …
IDEA: Tell employees good news too, on a regular basis. Read More »
A- A- A+ Have your receiving people prepare a ‘blind’ receiving report which is then compared to the bill of lading to ensure all items on the incoming bill of lading were indeed received by your firm. (Note: A ‘blind’ report is the report prepared by your receiving personnel who count everything delivered and write …
A- A- A+ All companies need to ensure that their shipping personnel ship good products, the correct products, products with no known defects or problems and ship on time or early to meet the customers’ demands. All of these employees need training and reassurrance that the company does not want any bad product shipped even …
IDEA: Ensure your shipping personnel are trained well: test them. Read More »
A- A- A+ Take the time and question your production people as to what makes them stop doing their job and thus making less or no money for the company? Here are a few questions to consider asking all of your production/office personnel every day: What makes you stop doing your job? (What deadline are …
A- A- A+ Visitors (customers and vendors) who come to your firm and wait in your company’s lobby will greatly appreciate an occasional update from your receptionist while sitting there. All the receptionist needs to do is politely let them know the status of their scheduled meeting or appointment with one of your employees. She …
A- A- A+ Instruct your receptionists to ask new unknown callers for their names, companies’ names and reason for the call prior to transferring them to an employee. Use this as a standard rule answering the company telephone in order to minimize unwanted ‘sales’ calls. This will help to leave more time for incoming ‘sales …
A- A- A+ Your firm has trucks constantly coming to your shipping department. Some will be third party freight haulers. Some will be truckdrivers who work directly for your customers. Half the time your receiving personnel will not know the difference. Make sure they are trained to offer access to restrooms and drinking water (if …
A- A- A+ Teach all of your employees they are never to make payments or agree to wire transfers based upon verbal demands or conversations. No matter which vendor is demanding payment, make sure to provide your employees the following instructions. What to request when a vendor calls and demands payment: Clarify to the caller …
IDEA: Do not make payments on verbal commands for anybody, except the boss. Read More »
A- A- A+ Many companies carry some type of inventory and most find it necessary to count that stock on a regular ongoing basis. Those firms do this either to find out what to buy next, determine what types of goods are not selling, catch the errors in their inventory system or do it to …
A- A- A+ When you bid jobs or products, you may have a profit percentage, gross profit dollar margin or a specific net profitability estimate in mind. Initially you probably know what you need in order to make an acceptable return. Because you spend so much time estimating your bids for your customers, that effort …
A- A- A+ Write a list of questions and comments that your sales personnel should ask when they go see new potential customers. Do this so the management clearly understands why customers like or dislike your company. You will not get it unless you prepare a list of questions for your representatives to get answered. …
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