{"id":6945,"date":"2021-03-26T07:29:29","date_gmt":"2021-03-26T11:29:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/199.250.223.35\/~craftbrewery\/?p=6945"},"modified":"2024-04-04T16:26:02","modified_gmt":"2024-04-04T20:26:02","slug":"brewery-sales-compensation-best-practices-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/brewery-sales-compensation-best-practices-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Brewery Sales Compensation Best Practices"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One of the keys to a successful comp plan is dedicating enough time to <em>communicate<\/em> the plan details so that your team understands what they need to do to get paid.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here are 3 tips that I&#8217;ve found useful to clearly and completely communicate the compensation plan details:<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Show them. Tell them. Ask them.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Enlist your sales manager and a key sales person<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><b>Show them. Tell them. Ask them.<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">People learn and absorb new information in different ways. Some folks are visual learners, some learn by doing, others learn by listening.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One tactic I&#8217;ve found useful is the &#8220;Show Them, Tell Them, Ask Them&#8221; approach.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It works like this:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Create a written summary of the key bullet points of the comp plan<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sketch out examples of the comp structure &#8211; use real numbers, real bonus scenarios<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Meet individually with each sales rep. Show them the written summary and examples. Tell them how the plan will work.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ask the sales rep to explain how they will get paid, and make more money.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Enlist your Sales Manager<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I&#8217;ve found it helpful to have a sales manager present new comp plan details to the sales rep.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This kills two birds with one stone. 1) It ensures the sales manager understands the plan (sometimes they don&#8217;t, but won&#8217;t tell you), and 2) the sales manager generally has a good rapport with the sales rep and can better speak their language.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Another approach is to enlist another sales rep to present the details. Peer to peer communication is often very effective. This is also useful to get insights and feedback from a sales team member who will be subject to the new plan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;Repetition is the mother of learning.&#8221; -Zig Ziglar<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Studies show that adult learners need to hear something at least three times for it to sink in. Use this as a rule of thumb when communicating the details of your sales plan.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Here are 3 ways to communicate the plan:<\/b><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Group sales meeting to present the plan<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One-on-one meetings with each sales person (questions are mandatory &#8211; make sure they understand)<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Provide a written overview of the plan (use bullet points and visuals)<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And if this doesn&#8217;t work, repeat it again.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>Wrap Up + Action Items<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There\u2019s no better way to grow beer sales than to have a properly designed sales compensation plan.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><b>Use the <\/b><b><i>first rule of compensation<\/i><\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: pay a market rate and give them a chance to make more when they go above and beyond.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b>Ask the <\/b><b><i>Key Compensation Plan Questions<\/i><\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> so that you create a clear, complete and actionable plan.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b><i>Communicate the details<\/i><\/b> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">of your sales compensation plan so that your team understands what they need to do in order to get paid.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yours in Sales Comp Plans,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kary<\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong><em>P.S. Learn more about the\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbfassociation.org\/bbfa-breweries\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong><em>Beer Business Finance Association<\/em><\/strong><\/a><strong><em>. We are a network brewery owners and operators focused on improving financial results. Connect with peers, share best practices, join today.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the keys to a successful comp plan is dedicating enough time to communicate the plan details so that your team understands what they need to do to get paid. Here are 3 tips that I&#8217;ve found useful to clearly and completely communicate the compensation plan details: Show them. Tell them. Ask them. Enlist [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6946,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pgc_meta":"","_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[83],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hr-and-personnel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6945"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6945"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6945\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12033,"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6945\/revisions\/12033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craftbreweryfinance.com\/oldversion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}