Pay Your Sales Reps WELL and the Orders Will POUR IN!

When I was fresh out of college I had my first sales interview. My interviewer asked me what motivated me. I thought carefully about how my college counselor would have coached me to answer.

“I want to help people and contribute to a team.”

The interviewer looked me straight in the eyes. “You’re not motivated by money?” he asked.

I almost gasped. This isn’t what was supposed to happen. This isn’t what polite adults do. They don’t demand to know if you’re motivated by money. I sputtered out some lame answer about how money is great but it isn’t my motivating factor.

“That’s too bad,” he said. “This is a sales job. Every good sales rep should be motivated by money. The harder you work, the more you make. So I hope you’ll be motivated to work hard.”

I immediately saw the wisdom in this and I never forgot it. That’s why sales is the best job ever. If you work hard, you’ll get paid well. That’s the way it should be, and through my many years of working, researching and speaking, I have found this to be insanely true. The companies who pay their reps well and have good culture are successful. The ones who don't struggle and find artificial ways to motivate reps.

Sales people are motivated by money. If you want to have good salespeople working for you, pay them, and pay them well.

If you don’t pay them well, they’ll find someone who will.

What has your experience been like? Let me know in the LinkedIn comments!

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