How many deals did your team lose last quarter that it should have won?
In this episode of Business Builder's Playbook, host David Bush welcomes John Asher of Asher Strategies, a sales leader who helped build an engineering company to $165 million in annual revenue and has spent decades on sales performance. John kicks off a monthly webinar series with the hiring process he has refined over 25 years, and he says he hasn't hired a bad salesperson in the last 20.
John walks through how personality data and emotional intelligence decide who belongs in which sales seat. David weighs in with his own plan for a real company case study and asks whether a team benefits from variety.
Here's what you'll learn by watching or listening to this full episode:
* How to screen sales candidates with three checks before an offer: a short IQ test, a personality assessment, and an honesty and integrity assessment.
* How to check references with a phone call, interview for the right behaviors, and define your culture by asking your executives what it takes to get ahead.
* Why about 1 million of the roughly 25 million salespeople in the U.S. bring in 80% of new logos, according to the Harvard research John cites.
* Why natural talent can account for anywhere from a third to two-thirds of a sale, depending on how relationship-driven your buyers are.
* Why your best salesperson often makes a poor sales manager, and how John learned that firsthand.
* Why only about 21% of U.S. employees are fully engaged, and why John sees 40% as the point where a company improves exponentially.
* How to match personality traits to a hunter sales role, including why drive and independence run high and the need to analyze runs low.
* How one engineering services firm moved five salespeople into better-fit seats and went from stalled growth to rapid growth.
* How to sell to buyers who research on their own, including why to offer two or three options and where AI tools fit.
* How to listen so buyers ask about your product, why an inside coach comes first, and why John swaps "always be closing" for "always be curious."
Find all the show notes and links here: https://www.BusinessBuildersPlaybook.com/John-Asher