Sales outsourcing is a powerful tool that businesses can use to avoid the onboarding costs of hiring their own staff of full-time sales reps. However, there are some misconceptions about the industry, mainly with two major factors; branding and cost.
In short, do you think your new partner can familiarize themselves with your brand, market, and product/service? Will outsourcing work for your business model (cost)?
Control of Your Brand
At the end of the day, the salesperson represents your brand, whether they’re in-house or outsourced.
Now, you might think that having control over your team means being able to watch their every action. However, it’s safe to say that micromanagement is not a viable option for a B2B sales business. Having you or a manager monitor a rep’s every action isn’t cost-effective. Your reps should be their own self-manageable entities, capable of doing most of the work on their own. This is the only way to sustain and grow your business model.
As such, most sales outsourcing companies make it a point to provide monitoring of minutes, activities performed, and advanced analytics to prove their value to you.
Then there’s the issue of how well you think your outsourced sales company can familiarize themselves with your brand. This industry is not a one-size-fits-all approach to sales. For example, every company we work with has to be carefully researched to ensure we can take their business to new heights. On both ends, performance is painstakingly monitored, analyzed, and coached to create a system that works for both Trelevate and our business partners. It’s a process that’s continually evolving.
For us, it’s simple; if our client doesn’t succeed, we don’t either. We have to make sure the partnership will be beneficial for both parties beforehand.
The most important thing to consider about your brand is how well the company can represent you. Trelevate creates a team that is tailored to fit the needs of one particular client. This way, it’s more like YOUR sales team and not just people that work for multiple clients, trying to juggle various products and services. The focus of our sales consultants is your company. This model has worked very well for us.
Cost and What Outsourcing Saves You
This is probably the number one concern for companies that have never used these kinds of services before. They think it will cost them a fortune and maybe an in-house team will be less expensive.
However, according to most surveys, cost savings is the primary reason for outsourcing in the first place. Using data from companies like Glassdoor and Indeed, they show the base salary of a rep ranges from $48 to $62K.
None of these costs factor in the near 25% of overhead costs associated with that in-house employee, like the allocation of management time, money, and resources.
Since the average experience of a new-hire sales rep is typically around 12-months, you also have to consider the cost of management, training tools, and incentive pay for that in-house employee. With all these costs included, you’re looking at closer to the 6-figure mark for that one employee.
Insourcing comes with many hidden costs, all of which YOU are responsible for. Outsourcing, on the other hand, might appear expensive, but all your costs will be upfront and simple to calculate. You can imagine how much you can save when you don’t have to worry about insurance, training, management, and onboarding costs. There’s also a sense of responsibility for your business partner when their team isn’t performing. With outsourcing, you’re mostly paying for performance, which is what you want.
Conclusion
Outsourcing might not be for everyone. You have to consider the cost and your business model carefully. However, some common misconceptions are simply not true. If you’re considering partnering with an outsourcing company, we recommend a consultation to assess if the option is right for your business.