While today’s roller-coaster economy demands top-dollar performance from your sales staff, many employers are still relying on compensation plans that were designed for – and in – the 20th century. They’re based largely on the discredited idea that salespeople are focused solely on money. If you’re using these old-school plans, you’re likely failing to retain your top performers at the level you should. And they’re not delivering the results they could.
Compensating salespeople these days is tricky business. You must balance your organization’s revenue goals and product mix with your sales employees’ abilities to attract new accounts and serve existing customers. You may be facing big decisions about whether to organize your sales force as individuals or teams (and, either way, the best techniques for paying and incentivizing them). It’s difficult to find the “sweet spot” in sales compensation - if you aim too high in your targets, you’ll turn off your sales reps, but you risk leaving sales on the table if you aim too low.
Order this practical 90-minute audio conference recording. Our speaker – an experienced sales compensation strategist – will share proven methods for designing, implementing, and managing compensation plans for your sales staff. She’ll show you how to size up your current programs and benchmark them against the competition. You’ll also learn how to tie pay to sales performance (and measure those results accurately), as well as the latest ideas for finding the best compensation formulas to keep your sales force motivated when the economy goes south.
You and your colleagues will learn:
- The critical factors that can make (or break) your sales compensation plans
- How to set base pay and commission levels, as well as effective caps
- Which techniques work best in benchmarking and measuring sales performance
- The best practices you can follow in using incentives, contests, and recognition programs
- What steps you should implement to link pay to performance - and hold your sales force more accountable
- How to balance individual sales rewards with team-based incentives
- The best ratios of sales compensation to total sales revenue
- How you can target pay and rewards across all levels of your sales force, from top performers to barely-getting-by stragglers
This audio conference was recorded on Monday, October 6, 2008
About Your Speaker:
Dan Kleinman is the principal of Dan Kleinman Consulting, a California-based compensation and human resource consulting firm. For the past 16 years, he has served as an independent consultant for a broad spectrum of regional, national, and international companies. Prior to consulting, he spent 20 years in the financial and telecommunication industries, where he managed compensation and benefits departments for Wells Fargo and for subsidiaries of Pacific Bell (now part of AT&T). His last assignment was serving as vice president and manager of compensation, benefits, human resources information systems, and payroll for Charles Schwab. Kleinman is the author of the book All Star Sales Teams: 8 Steps to Spectacular Success Using Goals, Values, Vision, and Rewards (Career Press, 2008).
Approved for Recertification Credit
This program has been approved for 1.5 recertification credit hours toward PHR, SPHR, and GPHR recertification through the Human Resource Certification Institute (HRCI). For more information about certification or recertification, please visit the HRCI home page at www.hrci.org.
