Kinder Reese Blog

The 6 Stages of Recruiting & Hiring Your First Inside Sales Agent

Written by NAEA | Jun 19, 2015 12:28:00 AM
Summary: Hiring Your First ISA with Brian Moses

Stage #1: Determine the Need: How do you know you need an  ISA?

You are doing somewhere between 80 and 160 transactions. You're generating leads on a consistent basis, your biggest problem is reaching those people. You want to make sure that you have core capital in place ($25, 000-$50, 000.) Ask yourself the right questions. What are your expectations? What ROI do you need with this position? We have found that you can get many, many multiples of an ROI after your ISA has settled into their role. It DOES take several months for you to start experiencing the fruits of those labors.

Stage #2: Making The Right Hire: Identifying the correct fit

One of our favorite sayings is "Hire slow, fire fast."Hiring the wrong person could be catastrophic. Using your DISC Profile: D's and I's are typically rockstars when it comes to phone sales. They don't take rejections personally. C's could be good at tracking and reporting. Someone who has a high C personality probably isn't the right person that you want. Ideally you would be looking for someone who has prior phone sales experience. Always be on the look out for quality people! There may be people who are licensed agents who aren't strong with people, but are amazing over the phone.

Stage #3: Recruiting: How do you attract that person to your team?

The exact ad that we are using to recruit our ISA is below:

Stage #4: Getting to The Interview: What to ask

If done properly, you always want to be recruiting. You always want to be looking for quality talent. You are building a list of competent individuals that could be on your team. Sample Interview Questions:
  • Are you coachable and looking to improve?
  • Tell me about time where you got screwed...
  • How did you deal with that?
  • Tell me about a time where your feelings were hurt...
  • Tell me about the last educational book that you've read...
  • When was the last time that you failed, and how did you handle that?
  • When you have issues with your manager, how do you go about resolving that?
There are three criteria when we are hiring someone... 1. Can they do the job? 2. Will they do the job? 3. Are they a good team fit?

Stage #5: The Hiring Process: How to make the best offer

Once you have identified the person that you want, make an offer to the candidate! The best compensation structure that we have found for the Inside Sales Agent is salary plus. You can pay them in a number of ways:
  • Salary plus commission for appointments
  • Salary plus commission for listings
  • Salary plus commission for closings
Salary plus commission for appointments gives your ISA an incentive to scheduling an appointment, and then you can arrange a bonus structure for closings (to incentivize qualified appointments.) If you are cheap, you will get what you pay for.

Stage #6: On-boarding Your ISA: The Real Estate Best Practices

In terms of skills, your Inside Sales Agent will get more out of training with you. Make sure you DO NOT outsource the training role to an admin. When you are training them, you want to give your ISA script and role play with them so they can get the "marbles" out of their mouth. The more time that you're able to spend with your Inside Sales Agent, the more successful they will be.