The Book of Business Sale!
It’s officially the holiday season in the Settlement Services space. An exciting time of year for all! It’s also a time to evaluate the performance of your team and begin budgeting for 2019. Whether or not your goals this year were achieved, one thing is almost always certain, you would probably like to grow your market share next year!
Therefore, you might ask yourself, “how do I efficiently enhance my top line?” Logically, you might then consider recruiting someone to your sales or leadership team with a “book of business” in tow. This can be a great way to make an impact. Realistically, the challenge of immediately transferring a book of business, though far from impossible, is perhaps more difficult than it once was.
There was a time when the sales or operations rep was the point of contact for many needs in a closing or appraisal transaction. The customer didn’t know or maybe didn’t even need to know who else made the behind the scenes magic happen. The customer only knew that if they called their contact with an issue, said contact would take care of it…and that was the end of it! Technology has changed the game. Tools like email, mobile apps, modern and efficient workflow processes, 24/7/365 connectivity and vendor system integrations have drastically altered many customer relationships. But…someone still needs to develop and foster new customer partnerships. When looking to add or upgrade key revenue generating or leadership talent, focusing only on landing a book of business is easy to do. It can also be a costly mistake.
So, what do you do about this on the recruiting front when shopping for sales or leadership talent this holiday season?
Maybe instead of focusing on how much initial impact a new recruit can have on your organization from a pure revenue generating perspective, you should also think of the long-term impact of the individual’s fit with your organization. The key is to identify and validate sales and leadership aptitude all while confirming a positive culture fit. Verify their industry knowledgebase and market presence. Look for past successes and confirm, to the extent possible, that you will be fine sharing some eggnog together at the company holiday party.
In most cases, if the recruit has a nice, consistent career history, and an established track record of “winning” in previous positions, they have the foundation to continue that momentum. When armed with proper tools, they will likely recreate their prior success in your environment, perhaps even more so. Just don’t count on that book of business to follow right away. What you can count on is that you took strategic steps to welcome an impact player to your operation and achieve your newly set goals.
Happy candidate shopping during this holiday season. Should you have any questions, please feel free to visit our website www.andersonbiro.com and one of our team members will be happy to hear your thoughts.