Are you waiting for the right time to scale your sales headcount? But what is the “right time”? This is among the most strategic decisions one has to make during the early stages of a business. While there are no obvious quantitative nor qualitative signs, here are a couple of symptoms that indicate it is a good time to scale your team and initiate sales development rep hiring:
Your Product is Doing Well
If customers are enthusiastic about buying the product ahead of industry-standard features or key features, your business must be doing well in the market. This kind of pull, regardless of the product’s maturity, indicates that you have become successful in building a product that is invaluable for customers.
Enough Leads
We suggest you take measures to scale your sales development team when the pipeline to quota ratio exceeds to 6 times. This ensures you have enough leads to fulfil the quote requirement for one sales rep. The pipeline to quota ratio represents the amount of business available to close within a certain time frame, be it a quarter or a month. As a general rule of thumb, the account executive requires 5x – 6x the number of leads as total quota if the sales rep closes 15% to 18% of leads. However, this ratio may not be applicable for smaller companies that have a sales cycle of less than 30 days.
It is also imperative you apply metrics to your sales development team, which can be used to enhance your overall sales. This will not be possible if you neglect using key performance indicators and data analytics.
Short Sales Cycle
Is your company observing a shortening sales cycle? A fast sales cycle translates to execution sales, where the account executive does not have to educate the market and is only responsible for finalizing the contracts.
These are only a few signs that indicate it is time to scale your sales development team. However, when your company has decided to invest in a growing sales team and sales development rep hiring, there are typically three investment goals you need to keep your eyes on. Start by identifying the successful account executives at the company. Next, establish quotas, ramp time, and hiring costs for salespeople so the company knows how to model its growth costs. Third, compile all of your sales motion into a playbook that includes objection handling, competitive advantages, and pitch.
Once the company begins sr hiring, it is important to remember that sales development representatives alone cannot help the company grow. If you want your company to truly grow, you must hire new salespeople, customer success representatives, and marketing support. Each of these components is known as the fundamental unit of growth, which is why you should keep a bird’s eye on the costs incurred to help you succeed in the short and long term.
Keep these indicators in mind the next time you start your sr hiring process and decide to scale your sales development team.