Closer Test™

How to tell the closers from the posers
 

I. Introduction

What makes the “20” in the famous 80/20 rule* different from the others? From the mediocre reps? The losers and posers?

Is it nature (genetic), nurture (training), or both?

Who knows?

What matters is that you can now test to be able to identify the winners. The closers. The wolves among the sheep. The Top Guns.

You can hire them before someone else does. You can even recognize future closers – those that may never have sold before, but with the proper training could be superstars.

And just as important, you can recognize yesterday’s closers. Individuals that look great on paper. That have experience and a track record. But that won’t be a closer again for reasons that are not obvious or well known. These hires are the biggest disappointments and source of frustration sales managers have to suffer through in their careers.

Lastly, you will be able to turn away the posers. The non-hackers you may have been tempted to hire if you feel pressured to fill a position now to get it over with. Don’t do it. Better to wait and live with another month of lower than desired sales volume than to do double damage ending up with the same lower volume and also increased expense and wasted time.

The Closer Test™ is your secret weapon. With it you will screen out the posers before you waste your time and money. You will be able to recognize a closer when others looking at the same candidate can’t. It will allow you to build a better sales team faster than any of your competitors. You will vanquish them in the marketplace, the battleground of the economy.
 

II. Interpretation

The value of the Closer Test™ is subtle and may not be obvious. The 20 factors shown are foundationally important. The questions relevant for each factor were carefully psychologically engineered to elicit valid responses from reps. Reps know how to answer objections. If they see patterns they will adjust to take advantage. I know that game well and can counter their counters.

The test is fundamentally different from HR assessment surveys or tests which are designed for salary W2 employees. These tests re fundamentally flawed since created by academics with little or no field experience with sales teams. The MBAs and PhDs are embarrassingly useless with salary sales reps and laughable when dealing with commission reps.

The only similarity between the reps is that their titles include sales. For all their posturing and statistics the esteemed academics are blind to the realities of sales.They collect their fees leaving you with reps selected on no valid basis. No better than random guesswork.

The assessment tests must comply with countless laws and regulations. They and are scrutinized by employment lawyers who gleefully seek out any minor noncompliance as the basis for claims and lawsuits. Their demands are extortion like and settlements are agreed to because the system is rigged against employers. Smart employers stay clear of assessment tests altogether.

The Closer Test™ was created by a Top 1% closer who then created an agency building 145 sales teams with over 20,000 commission-only reps since 1987. The test is designed specifically and only for independent contractor commission-only sales reps. Note that employment law does not apply. Only business contract law.

It is critical to understand that the questions are not all of the same value in the analysis to separate closers from posers. Thus the questions are weighted in scoring to refine the analysis. This is more art than science so takes a strong intuitive sense to accomplish.

Questions are changed and rotated randomly with corresponding weighting. The last critical factor is that scoring is validated during the personal interviews. This necessitates many years of recruiting commission-only reps to make the final call on the rep’s qualifying.
 

III. What a Top 1% Rep Looks Like

• Prefer Commission. Reps often lie saying they prefer a commission job but quit if a salary is offered. They ghost or at best happily tell you that they got a real job.
• Need Money. Reps that have a family to support and struggle with debt have only one option. These reps have the best odds for success.
• Sales Career. There are many times more interlopers in sales than committed long-term reps.
• Family. If a parent owns a business or was in sales the rep knows the game and will likely succeed. Often the rep is told that they take after the parent.
• Embrace Conflict. The rep will stand his ground and not be intimated. People fallow leaders and respect the strong.
• Won’t Quit. Most reps quit when the going gets tough. Successful reps know they can prevail if they stay with it.
Prima Donna. The best performers have ultra-high self confidence and self esteem. They hold themselves in high regard. This tends to make them look down (way down) on lesser mortals. They epitomize the prima donna label. Their arrogance borders on the megalomaniacal. They bask in praise and adoration. They need this like a junkie needs the next fix. They will do anything to get it. Give it to them – but only after they do what you want them to do – which is to sell sell sell! Capitalist. Socialism is great for posers that know they can’ compete. They don’t want to be paid what they are worth. They want something for nothing. Closers are happy to be paid for what they deliver. Embrace Risk. They are entrepreneurial. Double or nothing is second nature. They often exhibit risky behavior with alcohol, drugs, sex, gambling, driving, and most everything else they do. Your best rep may call you from time to time to bail him out of jail.
• Honesty. Reps that lie may get a sale but when found out can destroy your company. The rep will be long gone leaving the cleanup to you.
• Sense of Urgency. Get out of the way or get run over. It’s in their DNA. They are impatient and will not tolerate people that waste their time. They live fast, drive fast, and act fast. They are often fidgety and compulsive. Many are bipolar and ADHD as are many of the top entrepreneurs, actors, and other accomplished professionals we all admire.
• Success Habit. Winners win and losers lose. Look for compulsive habitual winners – sports, college, jobs, life. That can’t stand to lose at anything and will do anything to win. That get upset and angry about every lost sale.
• Comfort Zone. Enough is never enough, they always want more. When a goal is met, they immediately set another higher goal. They will quit at the drop of a hat for a better offer. Sensible “normal” people don’t act like this. Normal people don’t get “abnormally” superior results. Closers do.
• Ambitious. They have boundless drive and dream big. They are always scheming and creating new ideas and techniques. Launching new companies. If you don’t challenge them and keep them interested they will soon be gone.
• Intelligent. Winners are inevitably smarter than losers. They will figure out ways to close deals that the wannabes can’t fathom. Sometimes they are too smart for their own good and outsmart a prospect out of a sale and themselves out of a job.
• Creative. Wild imagination that at times can become obsessive. Better ideas for everything, with some that could just pay off. Put them in a maze and they will climb the wall or tunnel out.
• Self-Reliant. They are not looking for charity or a handout. Self-starters with initiative. They probably worked to pay for college. They don’t abide bums and layabouts.
• Work Ethic. Seemingly a contradiction but not when you look deeper. The greatest inventions were ideas to save labor, to make life easier. Top Guns don’t mind hard work, they just want to get the most out of their time and energy investment. They work hard and smart. Lesser achievers do neither.
• Sales Skills. Reps that try to make every presentation better than the last end up on top. They are trainable the effective. They know how to set up the close.
• Charisma. Reps are charismatic or not. The danger is that they skate through life on the looks and charm so see no need to learn sales skills. Keep them if they bring in the deals. Axe them when they slack.

IV. The ‘X’ Factor

It’s not what they know how to do . . .

It’s not what they did before . . .

It’s what they ABSOLUTELY NEED TO DO NOW!!!

Do they need the money? This is a 90% predictor for future success. A great rep whose wife (or husband) has a good job, or who lives at home with mom, or who has all the money needed for retirement (may just have inherited a million dollars), does not need to do anything. And probably won’t. When it gets tough, he or she will bail for something easier. Like watching TV all day or going fishing.
 

V. Experienced Pros?

• This Is No Place For Kids. Hire pros whenever possible. May cost you more but not in proportion to the revenue generated.
• Don’t Be First. Never, ever be the first to hire someone to sell. 90% won’t make it, let some other fool pay that bill.
• One Year Minimum. Insist on at least one year “successful” sales experience. Preferably in a similar situation – inside or outside, high tech or low, tangible or intangible.
• Check Them Out. Verify experience and success – percent to quota? rank on team? Call references and past employers. Ask if they would hire them again – that’s all that matters. If they won’t say, then assume it is no.

VI. Or Future Closers?

• Intuition Says Yes. Suppose you run across a new college grad or someone with no sales experience that somehow catches your eye. There’s something about her cover letter and experiences that make you pause. Your intuition says that she can be a winner. You may be right!
• Has To Be A First Time. Every Top Gun was given a shot at that first sales job. This could be it.
• Find Evidence. Look for related activities – acting, musician, volunteer, college elected office. Or jobs like fund raising or others involving persuading people.
• Test. If they meet the ‘X’ Factor criteria (above) then give them the Top Gun Test. If they pass, and you get a 100% commitment that they will do what it takes, and everything you say, you should give them a shot. Especially if the job is commission-only (or primarily commission).
• Buy or Make? It can be easier to make a Top Gun given the right ingredients than to find one looking through the job posts or to poach one that is happily employed. And cheaper too!
• Closer Factory. Once you master this method, you can mass produce Top Guns out of thin air. You can overwhelm your competition and make your company an immensely profitable market leader.

VII. Sell Me, Sell You

• Be Bold. Write bold job posts that speak unflinchingly and directly to your intended audience, the Top Guns. Don’t try to placate or pander to the others. You get what you ask for.
• Takes One To Know One. It takes a closer to understand and identify a closer. Never let HR. an admin, or a bureaucrat screen candidates. Do it yourself. If you’re not a closer, admit it and pay your best rep do it.
• Alpha-Male. Establish Your Credibility. Do this up-front. Relate your experience and successes, proving that you are a Top Gun, or at least a successful business owner that has many closers on the team. In the animal kingdom they call this dominance posturing. Works in our kingdom too.
• Sell What They Want To Buy. Find out what they want and then sell it to them! Is it money, prestige, challenge, flexible hours, in-bound leads? And what’s the best way to find out? Ask!
• Make It Real. Talk about how product is actually sold and how much the top reps earn. Promise them what you can and if not good enough, make it good enough.
• Don’t Oversell. It is a sign of weakness. You may come off as desperate. Blood in the shark-infested waters. A closer will wonder “if the job is so great, why is he selling so hard?”
• Secret Weapon. Arrange for candidates to talk directly with a top rep. Coach that rep to be realistic and believable without scaring them off. This sells the dream as attainable. Doing this will net you two to five times many closers.
• Make Them Sell You. Challenge them to convince you that they are players and will be winners if you hire them. That they not only can, and have, but need to and will. This further establishes your credibility. The takeaway makes them want the job even more.

VIII. The Bait

• Salaries Are For Chumps. Salaries will attract many more applicants. But not the Top Guns. You will be swamped with posers. Winners love commission-only plans.
• Bottom Line. Closers only care about realistic annual earnings. If they made $100K before, then they want at least that much now. Preferably double.
• The Odds. How you get to the desired amount is not as important as odds in getting there. Like all gamblers, they prefer a sure thing.
• Greedy Bastards. Appeals to their “greed” never fail! Show them the money and they will join your team. If they join and don’t see the money, they are gone.

IX. Managing the Unmanageable

• Ego. Top Guns are almost always egomaniacs and prima donnas. If you don’t like these kind of people, you are probably not a Top Gun and won’t attract and keep them. When persuading them know that appeals to their ego will never fail.
• Mercenary. Recognize closers for what they are. Hired guns. Don’t expect “loyalty” and you won’t be disappointed. They are loyal to the only person they should be loyal to – themselves. Just like you. They go where the money is. Do you have money to offer?
• Set the Bar High. Set high standards and hold them accountable. Give them a bonus for hitting targets.
• Prestige is a Drug. Set up a results board so that sales reps know where they stand and so they can compete against each other. The top reps get prestige when they beat out the others. They like this. They like it a lot. Even more than they like money. Money can’t buy prestige. Award public honors and praise for performance.
• Promotions. Don’t make your best rep a manager. You will likely gain a bad manager and lose your best rep. The skill sets are completely different. Top Guns think only of themselves. This is good for a rep and bad for a manager. Look down the line until you find management potential and good solid sales skills. Promote that person instead. They will be eternally grateful (for a while anyway) that they were selected knowing that they were not the top dog on the team.

X. Golden Handcuffs

• Too Sweet. Make their life so sweet they would never dream of quitting. Or they will.
• One Call Away From Gone. The best reps are getting phone calls all the time. They may or may not let you know. They are one phone call away from a new job – maybe with your competition.
• Make it Easy to Stay. Provide all possible support to make sales easier – especially lead generation. Nobody likes to cold call.
• Minimize Paperwork. Offload the paperwork and support tasks onto administrative or customer service staff so they can focus on sales and making more money.
• Make Them Rich. Do anything possible to ensure they earn what they want to earn. Get them leads and whatever else they need. Or raise the commission rate.
• No Clocks. Be flexible regarding hours and time off. So she took a 2 hour lunch. While she was gone did the other reps sell enough to catch up to her?
• Nice Digs. Provide superior facilities. Nice offices, desks, computers, phones.
• Free Lunch. Take them out to lunch and listen while they talk.
• Flattery. Have the CEO drop by and take the Top Guns to lunch. Recognition is better than money. Almost.
• Put Up or Shut Up. Counter offers from the competition if necessary. Or pay the price. You may have to hire 5 reps to make up the lost revenue.

XI. Questions When Recruiting

A. Do NOT Ask About the Following:
• Age
• Religion
• Health history
• Disabilities
• Medical treatments or psychiatric care
• Past illegal drug use or treatment
• Race or ethnicity
• National origin
• Sexual orientation and practices
• Marital status
• Number of children or dependents
• Pregnancy status
• Bankruptcies
• Political party membership or voting preferences
• Views on controversial subjects like abortion, gun rights, illegal immigration
• If they will or ever have taken a lie detector test
• Criminal record – dangerous ground here
• Driving records – unless position directly involves driving as primary function

B. It’s OK to Ask These:
• Age 18 or over
• Current illegal drug use
• Legally authorized to work in the US
• Anything about their experience, education, and preferences that is directly related to the available position