When to outsource sales and build a team

As a growing company, it can be hard to know when to outsource your sales and grow your team.

As you step into the role of the CEO that is working ON the business instead of IN it, you end up delegating tasks to your team. One of these teams will be your sales team.

As your company grows, so does each “department,” as in all positions, you replace yourself, and soon enough, it will be someone else's role to manage sales. (Unless of course, that is the designated role you have decided to have in your business.)

When do you need to create a sales team?

Before I get into this, I recommend working with your business coach (that could be me!) to create a plan that works well for your business.

The general rule, is that I recommend creating a sales team when running sales all on your own is preventing you from growing. This may be because sales isn’t your strength, or it may be because selling is taking up too much of your time.

If you’re current way of selling is preventing you from expanding, then it’s time to develop a sales team strategy.

Now, I understand that this may be intimidating for some of you. I hear it all the time in my business coaching calls, “I’ve been doing everything on my own and I’m nervous about growing my team.”

I recognize that growth can be intimidating. But you need to grow your team to grow your business.

How to set up your sales team.

There are two ways that I recommend.

You can create a partial sales team, or a full sales team.

A partial team strategy is when business development agencies use their connection to broker meetings that are then schedules on your diary. When your team does this, they’re creating the appointments, and you’re handing the sales.

The focus with a partial team strategy is more on lead generation through outreach by the outsourced party.

In other words, your team members aren’t going to actually be doing the sales, instead they’ll be focusing on generating the leads and then you’ll be making the sales.

The other method is to have a full sales team. This is an in-house teams that handles the complete sales process for you.

As you grow, so will your agency.

Now, here’s the caveat. I’m of the school of thought that you have to know how to do everything in your business.

This includes sales.

Now, your employees aren’t going to hold you random and demand that you prove to them that you’re killer at a sales call. You don’t need to be an expert. But you do need to have a basic understanding and be capable of doing the minimum of every role.

This is going to help you lead your team well.

So, whether you choose a partial sales team or a full sales team, as a business coach, I always recommend that you become familiar with the process of selling.

Learn more.

What stage of business are you in? How far along are you for getting your sales team in place? If you’re in a position where you’re not sure how to move forward with your business, I recommend working with a business coach.

As your business coach, I can help you strategically develop a plan for how to grow your business in a way that is going to work for you.

Learn more about my coaching services.

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