34 Finding Sales Talent in All the Right Places 1. Look Around You are interacting with dozens, hundreds, even thousands of people daily. When you are eating at your favorite restaurant, have you ever consid- ered the waiters or bartenders who are outgoing or super positive? When you are buying a new car, furniture, or home, are you looking for tal- ented salespeople? You should be. These are op- portunities to find pure sales talent that you can train the way that you want without all of those bad habits. 2. Pass Out Your Card Not your business card, but rather a card with a link to your talent assessment. If you are a client of CSS, then you have a bulk link to your OSTI as- sessment. You have unlimited use of it...use it! I have several clients who have created shortened URL's using bit.ly for their bulk link, so it's easy to print on a card. That way, anytime you run into someone who interests you, you can ask them if they have ever considered a career in B2B sales. Hand them your card, and who knows? Maybe you just found your next superstar seller. 3. It's a Numbers Game Whether you've thought about it or not, recruit- ing is just like sales. It's a numbers game. To find superstar salespeople, you are going to need to be constantly looking for the proverbial "needle in a haystack." For every 100 people that you speak with, you might find five superstars. Your talent bank should be filled to the brim with po- tential candidates. So, if you are going to need to hire five salespeople this year, you will need to add two people per week, every week, to find five superstars. Stop searching for sales talent the same ways over and over again, only to turn up with lacklus- ter results. Start looking for superstar sales talent in all the "wrong" places, which might actually prove to be all of the BEST places to find the su- perstar you never thought you'd find. Trey Morris Senior Consultant The Center for Sales Strategy