Building Seller Onboarding Programs That Drive Results

Lucas X Taylor Corr

Lucas Price: [: 00:00:00

I don't know exactly what that means, but maybe Taylor will tell us. He's been in sales leadership for the last seven years. And his lead, his current channel for the past five years, Taylor, what else should our audience know about you?

Taylor Corr: Yeah first off DSP is a demand side platform, very specific to the marketing world, but we help marketers and agencies better, better place their ads, learn about their audiences. But yeah, like you said, I've been in sales leadership for the last seven years. I've been building and growing teams during that time and really with a strong focus on rep development and growth and frontline manager leadership development and growth.

It's been a really fun ride and I'm excited to chat today.

rding programs, how to build [: 00:01:00

Taylor Corr: I guess over time with Quantcast, I've had the chance to onboard dozens and dozens. It's not, hundreds of reps into an SMB program where, you know for a lot of SMB mid market programs reps who are either just coming from an SDR org maybe they're coming from out of industry and you want to get them ramped up quickly as possible.

And so there were a lot of learnings for us, especially those first few years and how to do that effectively. I think the biggest and most important thing to call out initially is creating a really specific concrete onboarding program that is simple for reps to follow. Early on. Reps are going to have a lot of questions.

in what is a really chaotic, [: 00:02:00

Make it specific and concrete, have benchmarks for them that they can really easily follow. And that just helps them get to where they need to be most quickly.

Lucas Price: In terms of how you build those benchmarks and, what the right benchmarks are, is there something in your background or your experience to, that led you to realize the importance of that?

Taylor Corr: If I think back five, seven years ago and some of the early stages of when I was leading this team we aired too much on the side of allowing for. Individual rep styles and creativity and manager subjectivity in the process. Two different reps that were being onboarded by two different managers might have, much different numbers of the curse first month, three months, but each manager might consider that rep to be ramped or say, Hey this person's ready.

wn the line when you want to [: 00:03:00

There were two reasons that structure became really important. One was to understand. Hey, who is doing really well those first few months and who needs some extra coaching? Who needs some increased guidance? And the more you can standardize that across teams, there's a common report card to say, Hey here's how we're doing.

And so we noticed that we'd get to the end of that three months or that six months. And the more structure we had, that was common across the teams. Then we could say, Hey, this person is officially ramped. It really helped add some rigor for us. The other piece is reps were asking us for more structure as well.

Hey, what does good look like? Because in most sales organizations, and it depends on your sales cycle, but for us, if it's eight to 10 weeks, for that first deal. You're not going to see revenue for a while. So what is that marker for success? And even, first month, you're learning the outbound motion and maybe not going to be booking that many pitches.

doing the right stuff? Am I [: 00:04:00

So more and more it was rep driven and saying, Hey, we really want to understand what good looks like so that we know we're on track to close these deals and, make a paycheck in those following quarters.

Lucas Price: I think a lot of times onboarding is especially initially too focused on the product and not enough focused on the ICP and the persona that you're targeting.

What do you think?

Taylor Corr: I think it's both too focused on the product and too focused on sales tools themselves. A good example, like a sales engagement platform, like an outreach or a sales loft those are secondary to, what you're saying and learning, Hey, we sell to this persona.

drock understanding of those [: 00:05:00

They can, press add with some of these calls. That's going to be the foundational understanding that, that everyone needs. But it is. Sometimes distracting or tempting to just focus on these sales tools and all the bells and whistles and Hey, here's all the templates we built out.

If you teach a rep templates and sequences and outreach great. They they know how to now add prospects and they can organize their day, but they're really not sure why they're telling this persona, Hey, we're going to solve this challenge. And if they're missing that they're playing catch up from that point.

Lucas Price: So after kind of HR onboarding and, getting the computer set up and stuff like that would you put, ideal customer profile, use cases, personas. Do you put that at the beginning of the onboarding? How do you think about putting the program together to, to emphasize the importance of those?

ng of, Hey, here's how we go [: 00:06:00

This falls into the category of when you leave too much subjectivity manager to manager, or, I've been part of other onboarding programs where there's so much emphasis on. Work ramp trainings and, listening to pitches and doing mock pitches and learning, learning, learning.

That's fine, but I set really strong activity standards early on. I want to push reps out of their comfort zone and get them involved in the sales cycle early. The best learnings you're going to have are live with a client or handling an objection on an email or getting in that cold call environment.

I want to teach the sales cycle and how we go to market early on as well alongside those ICP elements so that someone can get going really quickly and get to those really valuable learnings really early.

k about putting a program in [: 00:07:00

Taylor Corr: It's a very data driven process. Part of it is, Hey what is your deal cycle and what is your close rate? And trying to work backwards. So for us, for instance first three months, there is a, an activity and a new business meeting expectation that second quarter, you're going to have a smaller goal as you ramp towards a full goal after that six months.

I want to reverse engineer that. I want to understand, hey, if our close rate is X and it roughly takes this many touch points or this much unique activity to get those new business meetings, reverse engineer that all the way back to the beginning, right? And that's something we did early on. And we really built it from, okay, for our reps and not all of our reps, right?

ng like? And that's going to [: 00:08:00

How many new business meetings do they have to have on the board? Then you can build in that expectation early on. And for us, yes, there's calls and emails that are an important piece of that. We want people to ramp to that level quickly. But we look at other stuff like how many Unique accounts, people are reaching out to how many contacts and different accounts are adding to sequences and in outreach, for instance, what's the reply rate looking on like early on.

And of course there's qualitative elements. There's always going to be a heavy emphasis early on the coaching, but the things that are more easily controllable and more easily. I guess targetable for a rep, the more concrete benchmarks you can give them again, built from data built from what's going to set them up for success.

Understanding your sales cycle is really important early on.

going to affect their plan, [: 00:09:00

Taylor Corr: That's exactly it. Let's say you could be a monthly quota, be quarterly, you have an annual quota, but yeah, for any salesperson, the earlier you were getting on the board is going to be, helpful and I tell reps, if you book a pitch day one, that's great, you're not going to take that deal cycle on your own, obviously, we'll get to that point, but that's a good problem to have.

If you are having a bias to activity and you start getting into. Uncertain waters really quickly. You've got an advantage on everyone else who didn't book their first pitch for a month or six weeks or didn't get into that deal cycle for a couple months. So there's always that bias to speed and action.

't wait for somebody to have [: 00:10:00

Even ramped reps are still tweaking with that and getting to that point. So absolutely a bias really is going to help the reps. It's going to help the manager as well. And you're going to be in a learning environment. That's, real pitch versus a mock pitch. That's just going to be so much more valuable.

Lucas Price: Is there anything that we haven't covered yet that you'd really think about, like a common mistake when building a an onboarding program, that you'd advise people to try to avoid

Taylor Corr: I think there's some common stuff. Like we, we try and set up a mentorship early on and expose people to different voices. I'd say the biggest thing I have noticed is people having a bias to learning over action, wanting to do mock pitch after mock pitch, listen to more calls, sit in on more trainings.

ve really concrete onboarding[: 00:11:00

If you're providing the right coaching and the right support, if after Three months, four or five months at, it might feel really soon, but generally you do know early on when someone's not going to be a fit. So part of a really effective and concrete onboarding program, it's a scorecard as well.

And you just know early on and the tendency is Oh, we got to give them more time, more coaching. And yes, you should provide as much support and coaching as you can as a frontline manager. But, sometimes it's just not a fit. It's not necessarily their competency or, them as a person, it's maybe just not the right sales environment for them, whether it's based on sales cycle or industry or something to that degree.

But I wouldn't be afraid to early on make that decision. Again, that's part of the benefit of having an onboarding program. It's going to act as a scorecard for you.

Lucas Price: I would imagine that it has some quantitative items on it that are data driven as you spoke about before. Then there also qualitative items on that and what are the flavor of the qualitative items that might also be on the scorecard?

Corr: We really lean on the [: 00:12:00

They're going to, Hey, they're missing on the ICP over here. And this messaging is not quite right. Or this discovery session didn't go too well. Everyone's running into something in some area. We just want to know, Hey, early on. And again, this is tough to measure, but our reps taking some of the coaching actioning on that, making a, good faith effort to build on some of the feedback that you're giving them.

That's one thing we look for. And then we also look for improvement in those client. Communications generally in that first pitch or in a demo or a discovery call we want to be able to measure, okay, are they getting more comfortable talking with clients? And again, you want a good data sample there, but are they getting more comfortable?

he note card for the for the [: 00:13:00

So we do look for more comfortability and more effectiveness in one of the, those first calls. And again, that's going to be measured over. A period of months. But those are two things that are factored in on the qualitative side. And, then there's a lot of coaching on the margins, right?

When I have one on ones with my frontline managers and we talk through how reps are developing, we might look at, Hey, let's look at all the contacts that they're adding to their outbound sequences. Are, do they fit with the personas we typically sell to?

Okay. Let's see if the messaging lines up. Are they matching there? Are the accounts they're looking at? Are they in our ICP? Is this a good fit? So we are constantly looking for coaching opportunities on the qualitative side. But having a really nice quantitative scorecard does give you areas maybe to look for coaching and it provides just an easier snapshot of that development.

ng the progress of new hires [: 00:14:00

Is thinking about what are the things that we're hiring for they may build a scorecard The best practice is definitely to build a scorecard against those things that you're using during the interview process And then you hire someone and that scorecard disappears, right and you thought oh we're hiring for coachability We're hiring for resourcefulness.

We're hiring to be able Create your own pipeline, we're hiring to be able to hit quota. And then you move over to the performance review system that has some overlap, but for the most part is totally different items. If those are what mattered during the interview process, then they should also matter during the onboarding process and during the post hire process as well.

It's really consistent with what we try to help enable. Transitioning here to the next topic holding sellers to high standards, accountability, tell me about the importance that plays for you and for your team.

with, they were the ones that[: 00:15:00

So this is partly a personal thing for me, but I also believe that reps really want to be challenged. They really want to excel and, your jobs and managers. Not necessarily to be their friend. You, there might be elements of friendship there. But I think what happens sometimes when you err too much in terms of trying to build a friendship is you soften those standards and say, okay I'm going to be nicer to them or friendlier to them.

But when you don't hold them to that standard, you're not doing me. Either of you a favor, right? Your team's not going to excel. And the reps can sense it, right? So I think reps want to be a part of a really high performing environment. It's fun when you are challenged by people around you, when you're challenged by your managers.

s really humming. And it's a [: 00:16:00

I think that's where a lot of. Frontline managers do struggle and I've definitely struggled with this. And sometimes I'm better at it than other times. But I think that's a really key element reps want to be a part of that environment and when it's a healthy amount of competition, when it's not this, cutthroat environment and everyone feels supported.

You get that buy in to, to seek those higher performance standards.

Lucas Price: That tension between being supportive and building relationships on the one hand and having high performance standards and accountability and sense of urgency. On the other hand I tend to find that most managers are naturally better at one than the other. And that they really have to focus on the one that they're not as good at, and at getting good at that.

Is that your experience as well?

rontline manager role. I had [: 00:17:00

That's the common story. It's you knew how to do it. So just teach them how you did it. And I had a An early manager feedback survey that was really instrumental for me. But one of my reps told me that I was mechanically compassionate, but I just said what people wanted to hear, but I don't really mean it.

And another rep told me that it was my way or the highway and that was just how my management style was. And they were both true. I was still really struggling to find my footing and, my. Approach is basically, Hey here's what we need to do. Go do it.

Here's how you go do it. And not a lot of flexibility there. So I've had to do a lot of work to figure out, okay, how do I be more supportive? Not just practically supportive. Because yeah, I can go help my reps prospect. I can hop in on calls with them. I can help them uncover a challenge, in a deal progress.

That's that practical support, but there's also this empathetic support and this other element where you need to be a really strong, connected leader with your team. That's a really hard element that I had to focus on a lot because yeah, naturally, Hey I'll go help you do the work.

ce reps. If all you're doing [: 00:18:00

Lucas Price: I'm one of those rare leaders who needed to get a lot better on both sides. I'll talk about the other side for a minute. There's a lot of. Highly empathetic people get, get promoted into leadership. The reason that they got promoted into leadership is they held themselves to really high standards, but they have trouble holding other people to those same standards, the same standards that they hold themselves to.

At times I've been one of those people who, would hold myself to a really high standard and thought for some reason that it was like too much to ask someone else to stay, to be at the standard that I hold myself to. And you're doing a disservice when you don't let people know, this is what it takes to get to the level that you want to get to.

y know. It's Hey, here's the [: 00:19:00

And then, you end up in these situations where the tough feedback only comes once a year in an annual review. Which also doesn't help anybody, it's Hey, you observed this in April, but for the last six months, even seeing this, you just told me in January you get situations like that when people withhold that feedback.

It doesn't help anybody.

Lucas Price: You have a management team that reports to you,. HOw do you think about enabling them to be good at both of these items,?

Taylor Corr: It's a great question. A couple things. I I share my. development journey and my focus areas with my whole team. And they're very aware of the stuff that I've focused on and where I've tried to grow and how my strengths and weaknesses have changed as a manager over time to allow them the freedom and space to explore that development journey as well and understand that it's going to, take time for everyone to get there.

ship with their reps as well.[: 00:20:00

But we do talk a lot about, okay rep a rep B, how are they developing? What have you tried from a coaching perspective? How can we work together on this coaching? Because sometimes it does. Take a couple people. Maybe it's a good cop, bad cop routine. Maybe it's, talking through that conversation.

Maybe it's helping them uncover coaching blind spots. So there's a lot of work that goes into helping them develop that, that coaching muscle. And then, I've got the same conversations that I have with them and share the good and the bad. I'm going to show them a really high degree of support in their roles and demonstrate that.

Really consistently. But yeah, it does take on a different flavor when I'm not directly having those conversations with the rep. It's more about, okay, let's talk through how you're going to approach this coaching. What kind of questions do you have? What have you tried and really try and help them develop that skill over time?

the coach. Going into those [: 00:21:00

Taylor Corr: You talk about coach, the coach and the coaches, there's just not a lot of frontline manager training out there. I know for myself as a frontline manager, it was a lot of trial and error which had its painful moments and an uneven development curve.

It's something I focused a lot on with my managers, but yeah, most enablement programs. I'd argue across tech sales are really focused on how do we, we talked about onboarding earlier. Hey, how do we get that frontline or that rep onboarded? How do we constantly tweak their discovery call, introduce new products for them?

There's really not as much and sometimes there's some basic level programs at different companies, but it doesn't scratch the service and all the challenges. That say a sales leader is going to go through. So I really do focus a lot of time there because it is really important. Has a huge impact on the rep experience.

You talk about building a successful team. Retention is a huge part of building a successful team. And that frontline manager effectiveness plays a key role there.

more about what you mean by [: 00:22:00

Taylor Corr: There's a revenue scorecard at the end of the day, right? That everyone's going to know where they fell on the revenue piece. And again, this, comes from reps just wanting to know. How they are doing, if revenue is not going to show up and if, results lag effort by 10, 12 weeks, what are they doing right now?

And are they doing the right things? They're going to get them to revenue. So it is both a, Hey, where are we where are we right now? How am I doing? And it's also a way for us to uncover coaching items for the rep. So when I think about coaching for, reps for the whole sales team.

It is a very data driven process for me. There's a, as a frontline manager, it's gotten really difficult because there's so much data out there. What I try and work with my managers on is sifting through that data and identifying, Hey, where are the yellow areas, the orange areas, the red areas, or the really bright green areas that we can use to form the foundation of our coaching.

o having those really strong [: 00:23:00

And instead of just saying, Hey, you need to get this number from here to here. It's identifying. Okay. What is maybe the coaching? That we can apply that will help get them there. Maybe it is, maybe it is a sales tool thing and they're, they're trying to get enough, unique touch points out there, but they need help leveraging the sales tool effectively.

Maybe their close rate from discovery to demo is not really strong. And they, it's not a. It's more so a coaching thing around, Hey, how do we make that discovery call more effective? It might also be, Hey, we're not talking to the right ICP accounts. So the data helps guide where you might apply that qualitative coaching and it helps uncover maybe stuff that can be a blind spot for both the manager and the rep.

se that to pick a couple and [: 00:24:00

So bring it full circle like that really strong. Operational scorecard is going to help with onboarding, keeps them on the right pace, getting going. But then once they're a tenured ramped rep, it helps to identify coaching areas that pop up all the time. You're going to have reps that are three, four years into your sales team who maybe they start to, they're going to develop blind spots in certain areas.

Maybe they over correct into certain areas. So you're constantly looking for Where to apply that coaching and reps generally because they're so close to their own work. They're not great at servicing their own coaching areas. So a scorecard helps you consistently find those opportunities to apply to coaching.

whether they're hitting the [: 00:25:00

Taylor Corr: It's a similar conversation that I have internally with my managers. So one way to apply that. Yes. Again, start with the numbers, right? If there are other people who have are currently onboarding or have recently onboarded, what did their kind of trajectory look like from an activity perspective or some of the benchmarks that they use? there's a story in there. Maybe there's, a couple of metrics that look great, but oh, they really missed here.

Lucas Price: I'll chime in that, when we're talking about someone's usually closed their first deal in month three, there is some randomness and luck to that.

Taylor Corr: Sure. Absolutely. There totally is. Cause the other, cause yes, I want to look at their inputs are all there. Maybe it is just a matter of time and randomness, but okay. If the numbers are there, great. You can check that first box pretty easily. I mentioned earlier, some of those qualitative areas, one of them being are they taking coaching?

really big one that I ask my [: 00:26:00

Did they actually tweak their account list a little bit? Hey, you told them not to reach these personas, reach out to these more. Are they doing that? Hey, and your mock pitches are, are they switching around how they're making that conversation based on your feedback? I think that coachability progress is a huge element.

If it's not there, that's something that's probably not going to improve as you're going on. So that is, that's a red flag for me. But then beyond that, yes, I would. I'd start with the top line numbers if they're there, then I look at kind of the coachability progress and then it is, okay, let's look at some numbers that maybe we don't track during the onboard onboarding process as a key metric, but maybe our other reps are held to or use the secondary metric and see if there's some coaching opportunities.

there. So those are the few [: 00:27:00

They're reaching out to the right people. They're doing all the activity. Their pitch sounds great. They're improving where you need them to. And for others, eh, they're not really responding to coaching. Their numbers are not quite there. Then it starts to be more of a conversation.

Lucas Price: One thing that I would add to it is for their deals that are in pipeline or even their deals that they lost. What type of visibility did they have into the the opportunity, the stakeholders in the opportunity, what the buying criteria is, what the timelines were, were they doing that discovery and rapport building that got them to the place where they really understood the deal?

hat's a more kind of skilled [: 00:28:00

And they will end up coming around if they're learning that type of information about the stuff that is in their pipeline.

Taylor Corr: Yeah, that's a great call. A lot of good clues in the last stops. Cause on the flip side, you can look at the last stops and they could all be outside the ICP or, you didn't have a lot of visibility. I don't know why I lost it. They just went dark. And those are two different stories.

Lucas Price: I Really appreciate you spending time with us here today. Great information. Before we sign off here, tell us where we can find you online.

Taylor Corr: Yeah. So I'm on LinkedIn almost every day trying to share the good word about sales leadership and, chat with people who are also passionate about the topic. So love to connect with anybody who wants to expand on this topic or others. And LinkedIn is probably the best place to find

Lucas Price: Great. Search for TaylorCore on LinkedIn. Thanks Taylor.