Ever heard the phrase “bad dogs aren’t born, they’re made?”

We talk to business owners every single week who say they just need to “find the right salesman” or “motivated salesmen.” Sure, talent plays a small part in sales, but you and I both know that there are complete goons out there doing this job who can barely sign their own name. The great part about this industry is that even if you’re not very good, you can do well at it. But what if you were GREAT at it? Motivated or skilled salesmen aren’t born – they’re made!

Consider this: if you’re hiring salespeople and not training them up to master the fundamentals, they’re going to have a MASSIVE, costly, motivation-slaughtering learning curve with poor results. Every time they hear “no” at the door, their confidence is chipped away. Not to mention it costs around $10,000 in sales. This is terrible for retention! When a salesman is out there just “trying his best” without a solid backbone of skill from good training, “motivation” (and confidence) dissipates pretty quickly. They also start saying anything that might get them in the door, coming across shady or dishonest and representing your company poorly.

Unfortunately, companies lose out on guys with amazing potential every single year, simply because they failed to give that person the best chance to succeed in this industry. It’s like this: imagine you’ve recruited an incredibly athletic person from a foreign country who was skilled and talented at basketball, soccer, and track & field. They are fit, fast, strong, coordinated, and motivated. You’re sure they’re going to kick ass, and are excited to recruit them to play….

…baseball.

Except you never teach them much more than the fact that they would swing a bat to hit a ball that would be thrown to them, and that they were to run to the various bases after hitting the ball.

Worse, their first experience with baseball will be in a real game during a tournament where the team is counting on a win.

Baseball is a pretty complicated game to learn if you’ve never heard of it before. There are a LOT of rules, positions, and numbers to learn. Sticking someone with great athletic potential in the field assuming they’ll dominate at this brand new game of baseball that they are completely unfamiliar with, simply expecting them to “catch on” is not fair to that athlete. They don’t stand a chance! Sure, they’ll probably eventually figure it out, but at what cost? After a lot of embarrassment, easy missed points, countless unnecessary failures due to simple technical errors, and not to mention causing a loss for the team.

Failing over and over when starting something new is pretty de-motivating, especially when there are limited (or no) options to turn to for help. Even the most driven person starts to take it personally and it takes a real mental and emotional toll to keep going back out there to try to figure out a complicated “game” on your own with almost zero formal guidance. More than likely, their ultimate opinion of the game of baseball will be that it’s too hard, they don’t like it, and they are no longer interested in pursuing it.

Your new salesmen who are sent out to “watch Chris knock a few doors” are no different than a foreign athlete being thrown into a high stakes game of baseball. The pressure is high because the points matter. They feel unprepared so their confidence diminishes, and it shows. They’ll lose easy wins due to things as simple as not knowing the answer to a common question from a homeowner, or by forgetting to say one key element in their approach at the door or their negotiations with an insurance adjuster.

It gets pretty hard to continue to go back out into the field and pound the pavement when you’re getting doors slammed in your face, being accused of being a scam artist, and not getting inspections lined up (which your income depends on). So the salesman starts to avoid it: they stop answering their phone, they quit going out into the field, and then they ultimately get labeled by their manager as “unmotivated” or “lazy,” and to boot, get yelled at to just “go knock more doors.” Suddenly, sitting at a desk answering phones for $15 an hour instead starts to not sound so bad.

Without being armed with the knowledge, skills, and answers to the most basic elements of the storm sales game, they’re bound to fail, probably quit, and leave you in the never-ending revolving door of advertising, interviewing, and hiring. Over. And over. And over.

INVEST in your team! Provide them with the most tried and true methods, strategies, scripts, and approaches for lead generation, closing, and adjuster negotiations in this industry so they can go out and do well from the start, because when they do well, they make money. When they make money, they’re happy. When they’re happy, they stick around. And when they stick around, you’ve got a killer sales force that will produce millions for you year in and year out.

If you’re a general manager, sales manager, or company owner and want to sink your teeth into our training program for new hires, don’t wait. You’ve got nothing to lose and literally millions to gain. We’ve got the perfect program to develop responsible, honest closers without the huge, expensive learning curve that until now, this industry has demanded. Let’s stack your team with closers, deal generators, and producers this year. Click here. Let’s talk.