February 24, 2022
When you’re running an international company, it can be challenging to manage a remote sales team in the US. Here are some tips for how to make having a remote US sales team work for your company.
You want to stay up-to-date on how your salespeople are spending their time. One way to do that is to have your salespeople tell you at the beginning of each day what they’re going to do, and then at the end of each day tell you what they did. That way, you can chime in if there’s something else you’d like for them to spend their time on, and you know what they’re working on.
Make sure your sales employees feel comfortable approaching you when there’s something they want to discuss. Build trust, maintain open communication with your employees, and provide a supportive working environment. Lack of communication can be a key pitfall of remote work.
Be sure to set clear expectations for what is required of your salespeople, including their duties, priorities, and deadlines.
It’s better to err on the side of over-communicating than under-communicating when you’re in a remote work environment, to ensure that there is a clear understanding between you and your remote sales employees.
Make sure to have weekly 1:1’s with your sales employees. During your weekly 1:1’s, you can stay up-to-date on what your sales team is working on and help troubleshoot any issues. There may be some issues that your employees don’t want to bring up during a meeting or by email, so a 1:1 is a great time to address those issues. A 1:1 is also a great time to provide feedback. This time to directly interact with your remote US sales employees will help them feel more engaged.
Have regular meetings to discuss topics that are important to the company. Having everyone on the same Zoom call will help them feel more connected to the team.
As a manager, you want to make sure you’re not putting too much pressure on your sales employees. Selling is stressful enough. Make sure to manage the workload that you’re giving to your employees.
Make sure to give kudos to your salespeople when they close a deal or are far down the sales pipeline with a prospect. You want them to feel appreciated.
Salespeople want to have autonomy in their work, and that autonomy is especially important when working from home. It’s good to keep tabs on what your salespeople are doing, but make sure not to micromanage. Micromanaging backfires in a remote work environment.
At Alariss Global, we match top remote US sales and business development talent with global tech companies and act as the Employer of Record (EOR) to take care of payroll and legal compliance. If you’re ready to work with us, book a call with us today.
