So, you decided you want to hire a dedicated phone sales rep for your winery. What are your next steps? Here is a “Punch List” of what you need to get the right candidates in the door:
Establish the skill sets
Look for candidates with previous customer service/ sales experience. Someone who uses professional telephone communication techniques is obviously a must. A familiarity with standard sales concepts, practices, and procedures and someone who will understand the telesales environment, goals. and performance metrics. They should have a minimum of 2 years experience in outbound telemarketing; strong record keeping skills, computer skills, and experience with a CRM.
Establish pay structure
You should look to pay them an hourly rate 0f $15 an hour minimum plus a commission (percentage of sales) and bonus (based on team performance).
Run the ads
I like to run ads in WineJobs.com ($150 per month) and Craigslist ($75 per month). If you go into either of these websites and look at what others are posting that should give you a good idea of where to start.
Review the resumes you have received
Looking for people that have done telemarketing, are passionate about wine, and match the skill set
Schedule a test call
When scheduling the test call you should send them a test script prior to the call. The test script should be simple and will give you an idea of their voice quality, salesmanship and customer service abilities.
Schedule a phone interview and a face to face interview
It’s good to have a list of questions ready when doing the interview. Here is a list of 20 questions you can ask at any time during either of these interviews:
– What are you doing now?
– Tell me about your resume (idea is to get them to talk about it vs you just reading it).
– Which jobs did you like? Why?
– Which ones didn’t you like? Why?
– How do you like to be managed? (This will give you an idea of if they can manage themselves)
– Have you done telemarketing before?
– What about it did you like?
– What didn’t you like?
– Talk to me about the telemarketing you have done. B2B (business to business) vs or B2C (business to consumer)?
– Which one did you like more? Why?
– Do you like wine?
– Do you drink wine?
– Tell me about your experience with wine?
– Tell me a story. (Selling wine on the phone is about connecting with the customer and telling stories is a skill)
– Have you used a CRM (Customer Relationship Manager) before and do you remember the name of it?
– How many calls did you make an hour/ calls per day?
– On a 1 to 10 scale where to you rank as a sales person?
– Tell me about a memorable call
– What do you do if someone is not nice to you when you call them?
– Can you tell me about a time when you made a customer save (turned an upset customer into a happy customer).
This is a good start and should help your hunt for the right candidate. Good luck and let us know how it goes on Twitter @TeleWineGroup
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