Claire GrosekIn every organization, the sales department plays a pivotal role in the company’s success. It doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, what part of the market you’re targeting, or whether your company is built on selling products or services — sales leads the way.
While marketing and advertising attract customers, it’s salespeople who ultimately convert them. Salespeople bridge the gap between your customers’ needs and how your product or service can help them. Sales provide extra information to these “warmed up” prospects and connect the dots necessary to move from “interested” to “buyer.”
Because salespeople interact directly with customers, they can glean personal knowledge and build credibility and trust; and with trust comes long term customer relationships, which lead to repeat sales, referrals, and increased brand awareness through word-of-mouth.
So sales is hugely important — often, they provide a face to your company. That means you need great sales professionals, which means recruiting these great men and women is extremely important. In an increasingly competitive culture, more companies are turning toward hiring recruiters that can attract these kinds of salespeople. That brings us to why sales recruiting is one of the hottest, most in-demand jobs around right now.
11 Reasons sales recruiting is the hottest demand right now
1. Sales isn’t going anywhere
For obvious reasons outlined above, sales is not going anywhere. High growth companies will always seek out great recruiters who know about modern sales and can attract top talent to them.
2. It’s a candidate-driven market
The research — and any employed recruiters — will tell you that the current market is being run by candidates, not employers. At the end of 2017, there were 6 million open jobs, and 6.6 million unemployed people — that’s an employer-driven market. However, at the end of 2018, there were 6.9 million open jobs and 6.3 million unemployed people.
In other words, there are more jobs available than there are people to fill them. That means that employers don’t pick talent, talent picks employers. Employers need sales recruiters that can convince those talented sales pros to choose them.
3. Companies are moving toward longer-term sales hiring
The coming years will see a major battle for sales talent among companies, and there are two primary factors as to why: an aging U.S. population, plus a falling birth rate. Between them, the growth of the U.S. labor force has dropped from 2.6% annually in the 1970s to a projected 0.4% in 2020. The disparity between open jobs and available workers will only widen, too, if the projections by the Bureau of Labor Statistics come true.
That just makes it an even more candidate-driven market, and we already covered why that means good sales recruiters will continue to be in demand.
4. High turnover rate = open jobs
Although sources conflict with each other, most agree that between 41 and 45% of recruiters leave the industry after just 9 months — that’s a huge turnover rate! Although you can quickly become competent at the job, many choose to leave for a variety of reasons. So there’s no shortage of recruiting jobs available, either — especially if you’re going to stick with it for the long run.
5. Recruiters save (and make) companies money
A good sales recruiter does this in a few ways:
- They avoid bad hires, who return poorly on the company’s investment;
- They ensure that the best talent isn’t lost to other companies, which entails a painful opportunity cost;
- By assembling teams that go on to work well with each other, creating a culture of achievement and profitability.
6. Recruiters get companies higher-quality hires
Connected to the previous reason, sales recruiters put together teams of the best people for the job. They can spot the diamond in the rough, and make an appealing case for them to join the company. Over time, effective prospecting has a cumulative effect, yielding a robust, cohesive team of people that attracts talent by its own virtues and track record.
7. Pay and entry are great
Starting a career in recruiting isn’t hard — there are no heavy entrance requirements. You don’t need a strict degree or certification, just skills in sales and soft skills. And for such low entry requirements, sales recruiting pays well (with an average starting salary of at least $50,000/year), plus plenty of opportunity for advancement.
8. Companies with great marketing need great sales
Current business trends have been moving toward an ever-greater emphasis on marketing for years now — particularly online. But it’s not enough to simply attract leads — strong closers are needed to coalesce a strong return. Sales should be every bit as robust as marketing, if not more so.
9. Sales recruiting is less known
Engineering recruiting has been around for years — it’s well established. Sales recruiting? Less so. That means it’s easier right now to build expertise in sales recruiting and become in-demand and invaluable to companies who are willing to pay top dollar for your services.
10. Recruiting = Sales
Recruiting is sales, and sales is recruiting. It’s a popular phrase because it’s true. Recruiting involves selling candidates on a company. People who are working in sales can naturally transfer to recruiting other salespeople. Plus, as sales professionals first, they also have a Rolodex to start with.
11. Cloud software + tech need sales pros
The 2018 Randstad report showed sales reps as the most in-demand job in Canada — and that country isn’t alone. Worldwide, sales talent is one of the top three hardest skills to find. Cloud software, SaaS, and tech companies are being particularly hard-hit: for such new industries, there aren’t enough skill sales reps yet. A survey found that 7 out of 10 high-growth tech companies struggle to obtain executive-level sales talent.
Wrapping up
Still don’t think sales recruiting is a hot, in-demand job? Give that list of reasons another read. Sales will always be a necessary part of business, so companies will always need to attract talented sales professionals. And in the fast-paced rate of growth that many industries — cloud software, SaaS, and tech, in particular — there’s a major shortage of skilled professionals.
The power is in the hands of those few candidates, so companies that want to succeed need to be able to attract them. That means sales recruiting is exploding onto the scene.
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