The best pay for a sales representative is a progressive percentage with , plus additional bonuses for special tasks. But the company understandably does not want to pay a sales representative a salary higher than the market average. Therefore, the majority of firms act quite cunningly. When entering the market with a new product, she makes a salary consisting of a small salary, say 10,000 rubles, which includes both gasoline and depreciation and cellular and plus 4% on sales. As a result, a sales representative who starts to develop a territory from scratch receives the first three months, in fact, a net salary and a small percentage of sales. Say, with sales in the first month for 100,000 rubles, he will receive 10,000 + 4,000 \u003d 14,000 - 13% (tax) \u003d 12180 - 4000 (gasoline) - 3500 (depreciation) - 200 (cellular communication) \u003d 4480 rubles.

I took the average figures for gasoline and depreciation per month, which I spent myself, someone gets less, someone more, compare with mine. As a result, we get a salary of 4480 rubles, which is clearly not serious. Further, with the development of the customer base and an increase in sales for the second month to 150,000, you will receive a salary of 6480 rubles. In the third month, with sales of 200,000 rubles, the salary will be 8480 rubles. I think that it is clear that it is unprofitable to work on new products without a base and for a percentage of sales. I will say that I took my data and all these are real sales and salaries, and therefore we lost up to 90% of employees within three months. But if you compare work in a Russian and a foreign company, then it is better to give preference to work in a foreign company. Because the salary is much higher there.

I'll explain why. The logic of the Russian distributor. Sales representatives must bring money to the company. And if they cannot sell some products, then they are worthless sales representatives and new ones need to be recruited.

The logic of a foreign company, the market is quite saturated, this is not the 90s, when there was nothing in stores and everything that appeared was swept off the shelves. Therefore, in order to put on the shelves new products requires some investment. Accordingly, the salary sales representatives should be above the average for the region, since selling new products and developing a customer base is much more difficult than simply collecting applications from a developed customer base. In fact, it is foreign companies pay for such work up to two times more than the Russians. Therefore, if you are not a beginner and you have a choice, then I advise you to get a job in a foreign company.

While working in a firm, you will face several more obstacles in obtaining a salary. One of them is an unrealistic overestimation of sales plans. For example, if sales are expected to increase by an average of 10% next month, then be prepared for the plans to increase percent by 40%. The logic of the company is as follows: anyway, you will sell and will strive to sell more, the company will make a profit in any case, but you will only receive a salary. Thus, the company will save on your salary.

The second way to save on the salaries of sales representatives is to introduce penalties for overdue receivables. Everyone understands that there are stores that pay poorly for goods already delivered, but there are also those that do not pay at all, and there is also a category of stores that close and open in another place, under a different IP, without paying previous debts. It is almost impossible to calculate, when drawing up a contract, who will pay and who will not. And even the security service does not help, all debts are hung on the sales representative.

The way out of the situation is, if possible, to load stores that pay poorly in the last week of the month so that their debt does not hang on the 1st of the month in arrears, and then gradually reduce the debt over the course of the month and collect the money entirely in the last week of the month and make the next download. I must say right away that this does not always work out, but it works quite well. Well, those stores that do not pay at all, willy-nilly, you will have to transfer them to the security service, if, of course, the company has one.

The motivation of sales representatives is understood as his interest in the performance of certain tasks for an appropriate monetary reward from the employer. Competent and worthy motivation encourages the sales representative to do his job with great zeal. As a result, the company remains in the black, develops and grows.

Most often, the income of a sales representative consists of a stable salary and a variable bonus. Motivational activities refer to the bonus part of the salary of a sales representative. Consider the most common motivational activities.

Percentage of export

The amount of the bonus depends on how much the sales representative sells. Worthy motivation, provided that the supplied product sells well. The main thing is not to overdo it with shipments if your company sells perishable products. Otherwise, there is a risk of getting a huge return of expired goods later. Of the minuses of this type of motivation, a decrease in the assortment can be noted (i.e., what sells best, the sales representative ships tons, but about expanding the assortment within the group certain product tends to forget). In addition, this motivation is not profitable if the supplier company sells its product and additionally attracted products. The manufacturer may lose in sales own goods if the "attracted" will leave better and faster.

Implementation of the sales plan separately for own products and separately for attracted

In this situation, the sales representative has to control both the shipments of his own products and the "attracted". This type of motivation, in my opinion, is most beneficial for companies that not only produce, but also sell their own products on their own (through their staff of sales representatives). Usually this point of motivation is the main one in the bonus part and is about 40-60%.

Accounts receivable control

Not all companies pay their sales representatives money for the control of receivables, when payment for the shipment is made in accordance with the contract - no later than the specified dates. In my opinion, this is an oversight. Everything is simple. What does the Law of Trade say? Commodity-money-commodity. And the more often this cycle turns around, the better for the company. She is growing. Therefore, it is desirable to allocate about 20-25% of the bonus part to maintain the "receivables" in the norm. If the sales representative at the end of the reporting period has no overdue receivables or it is minimal, it is a sin not to give him a bonus for good work.

Opening of new outlets

One of the most useful motivations on the part of the employer. The logic is simple: the larger part of the market a company covers, the more significant player it becomes in the eyes of potential suppliers of new attracted products. Respectively, large companies can dictate their terms to suppliers and beat out for themselves Better conditions and prices.

Motivate sales representatives to open new outlets in various ways. Someone pays a certain amount for each new point. But this is not entirely correct in relation to different sales representatives. After all, one trader has an active customer base (ACB) of 50 outlets, and the other has 100. Employment is slightly different, you see. Therefore, it is more expedient to allocate the same 20-25% of the bonus part for the development of the client base and set an individual plan for opening new outlets for each sales representative.

Sales Representative Efficiency (COP)

In this case, the efficiency is calculated in a different way - the number of orders divided by the number of visits, but otherwise.

Consider a situation where a company sells "its own" and borrowed products. In each of these categories there can be several groups of goods, and for "attraction" - also several suppliers. The company is interested in every point of sale was the entire range of products supplied by it. 100% efficiency will be when all points are “loaded” within a month by all groups of goods from all suppliers.

For a number of reasons, such a situation is practically impossible if the merchant works with at least 50 outlets. But there is no limit to perfection.

The motivation of sales representatives in relation to KPI can be as follows. The ideal (100%) is the best efficiency indicator for the entire company for the previous month (for example, 70% of the maximum possible). Based on the results of the current month, it is announced who receives the bonus. You can set a minimum threshold, for example, the bonus is paid when it reaches 80-90% best result last month or more.

This is actually a very effective motivation. Tested many times in my own experience.

Motivation from the manufacturer and from the attracted products

A competent leader always negotiates with his suppliers for promotions and motivations aimed at both outlets and sales representatives ( individual plans each for a specific manufacturer or group of goods).

It is useful to alternate motivational programs from time to time. Although this does not apply to the implementation of the shipment plan, which is usually increased from month to month.

Motivation of sales representatives is one of the most important tasks of the management of a company that wants to develop. After all, motivational programs provide an opportunity to earn money, and good trading rarely miss the opportunity to receive a bonus for completing additional tasks.

And how do you motivate your trading?

The original article is posted on the Torgovy.ru website

Want to know why your trading works for you? Pass.

Our company is engaged in the sale of strong TM, 80% of our volume. We are a representative office of the plant in our city and are actually monopolists in this product. We also have in our portfolio two packages of goods from other manufacturers (TM1 and TM2). In addition to us, there are two more distributors in our city for these products.

To date, we have transferred one TP to the “distribution tomorrow” work scheme and faced a problem, if the TP removes the balance and forms the optimal order, then it cannot guarantee that before it there were no deliveries of TM1 and TM2 products to this outlet from other companies.

All other TPs work according to standard scheme, and we pay them to meet the Sales Volume target. Is it possible to pay a salary to a TP in two parts, for example, for an exclusive TM we pay for distribution, for the removal of balances and the formation of an optimal order, and for the other two brands we leave the “Sales Volume” indicator?

If you briefly answer your question “is it possible to pay TP a salary in two parts for different tasks?”, Then the answer is unequivocal: “No!”.

If I understand correctly, your company's product portfolio contains products that require completely different sales strategies. The sales strategy of one product ("strong" TM) is focused on quality sales, the other two - on quantitative sales (sales volume).

Different sales strategies define different tasks for your employees, and accordingly, they must take different actions to solve them. It is the implementation of these actions is enshrined in the wage system.

The variant of the salary system proposed by you for a sales representative assumes that you, in fact, will require him to perform various tasks (often contradicting each other), to perform various actions. So what do you want from him, on the implementation, what tasks should he concentrate his actions on? In the case when the tasks contradict each other (when distributing today, the sales representative forms the “optimal, correct order” at the outlet, and when distributing “today” - the maximum), the sales representative will concentrate on fulfilling those that he can fulfill as efficiently as possible ( either in terms of its personal effectiveness, or in terms of ease of implementation). Ultimately, none of the tasks will be 100% completed.

Which exit? Separate these two processes not only at the level of sales representatives, but also at the level of process managers. Create two teams - one working on an exclusive product, focusing on sales quality, and the second - on sales volume. It is possible that it is a properly built system of quality sales for the products of one manufacturer that will encourage your other suppliers to provide you with exclusive rights to their product. Provided that these producers need such a service as "well-built distribution".

So, a good wage system should:

1. Motivate sellers. The wage system should perform the function of stimulating sales personnel. It should encourage salespeople to meet or exceed targets.

2. Control the activities of sales representatives. Efficient system wages should act as an invisible controller of sales representatives, allowing management to better manage the activities of sales personnel. The pay system should provide incentives that are flexible enough to compensate for the effort put into tasks as varied as full-time, "missionary" salespeople.

3. Motivate for the correct treatment of customers. Today, companies are beginning to compete more and more precisely in the field of service provision. Good system remuneration is one of the factors motivating sellers to work correctly with customers, thereby ensuring their greater satisfaction. In other words, if only volumes are taken into account in determining wages, there will inevitably be a loss in service quality.

4. Be good enough to attract and retain competent employees. An effective payroll system is one of the surest tools used to build a highly skilled sales force. Because it allows not only to keep the best shots but also to attract new employees with valuable qualities and knowledge to the company.

5. Provide the employee with the opportunity to know in advance how much the amount of salary depends on his efforts and how much he can earn. The employee must be aware of all the requirements for his work, and of all the rules that determine his remuneration. That is, how much and for what he receives. Otherwise, he will work in accordance with his own subjective ideas about the goals of his work and the decency of his leadership in assessing his work. And this, in turn, leads at least to a mismatch between the goals of the employee and the enterprise. It is precisely the clear informing of employees about the criteria for remuneration of their work that makes it possible to avoid such problems.

6. On time to meet the expectations of the employee. It is necessary to reduce the time between the receipt of the result and the payment of the bonus as much as possible. For example, performance bonuses that are achieved during the month should, as far as possible, be paid at the end of that month. That is, he did his job - get the money you earned. Nice spoon for dinner. But the performance of some workers can only be determined after a long period of time. It is also important to encourage such actions, but then it will most likely be a bonus at the end of the year. In any case, this must be done with a clear mention of the reason for the promotion.

7. To the extent possible adequately correlate with the efforts of employees. In most cases, the indispensable condition for receiving remuneration is only the achievement of certain results. This situation can be very contradictory and even conflicting. An employee can work very hard, make a lot of efforts, but at the same time achieve modest results and, accordingly, receive a low remuneration. It is imperative to take into account how the effectiveness of his work actually depends on factors that are subject to and not subject to him. For example, we considered the possible difference between different territories served by sales representatives. In one area, you can strain less, but the result is much greater than in another with more intense work.

8. Produce natural selection» the most hardworking and capable. That is, it must systematically encourage these qualities, their manifestations, and punish for others, so that there is a constant repulsion of the incapable and lazy.

9. Be both economical and competitive at the same time. That is, companies should pay employees as much as they earn. If companies pay more than employees earn, nothing good will come of it. The wage system must be economically justified. A company whose payroll costs are disproportionate to its revenues will either start to increase the price of its products or face a shrinking profit margin. Most companies, however, try to keep hospitality costs competitive. It is not always easy to strike a balance between economy and competitiveness.

10. Be flexible and stable at the same time. It should make it possible to receive both a variable income, depending on the results of labor for a certain period of time, and stable income. In other words - a fixed salary plus interest. The wage system should be flexible enough to meet the needs of specific salespeople as much as possible. Some companies use individual pay systems, where the sales representative can choose what percentage of his salary will be fixed and what percentage will be based on his performance. Flexibility is also needed to accommodate product differences. Some items are in constant demand and can be ordered with frequent re-delivery. Other products are sold in a single copy and therefore require additional efforts, a creative approach to the sale, which is worthy of a separate encouragement. At the same time, the basis of the wage system must be stable. Only then can one expect from the employee at least some kind of attachment to the company, necessary for the successful achievement of common goals.

11. Provide the opportunity to receive a stable and rewarding income at the same time. Every wage system should provide employees with at least a minimum level. The principle of this provision is that the seller should not worry about how he can earn a living. If it's a bad month, or the company is experiencing a seasonal lull in the market, or the sales rep is unwell and unable to work for a while, then he should be making some kind of income. However, this permanent income should not be too high, so that there is no decrease in interest in incentive payments.

12. When used for the purpose of additional incentives, the salary should change by more than 10-15%. Otherwise, it will not be able to have a noticeable effect in terms of stimulation. This is how practice shows.

13. Do not include too many components in the variable part. If there are more than six components, then they lose their motivational effect. Sellers lose the connection between their actions and different components of wages, it becomes difficult to navigate them, to choose the most effective course of action.

14. Among the components, include also points of remuneration for collective results. General corporate bonuses contribute to the cohesion of the team, the coherence of the work of employees, and the consideration of the interests of other departments. Ideally, an employee should receive three bonuses:

• for individual results, which stimulates his personal productivity;
• for the results of the work of his division, which contributes to a good climate in the division and an increase in labor productivity;
• for the results of the work of the enterprise as a whole, which contributes to the acceptance by the employee of the goals of the enterprise.

At the same time, it is necessary to convey to employees a simple truth: in the absence of collective results, the enterprise will not have money to reward high individual labor results.

15. Easy to understand. Simplicity is the hallmark of a good wage system. Sometimes simplicity and flexibility become conflicting goals, and indeed they are: a simple system may not be flexible enough, and a system may achieve adequate flexibility at the expense of simplicity. However, the wage system must be simple enough for employees to easily understand: they must quickly calculate their income. The task of the leader in this case is to find a middle ground, given the importance of both conflicting goals.

16. Be fair. A good pay system should ensure that all sales representatives are fairly evaluated. Nothing can so quickly destroy the positive attitude of an employee as the feeling that their pay is unfair. One way to ensure objectivity in valuation is to strive to use, as far as possible, measurable valuation criteria that can be controlled by vendors. But here, too, it is impossible to go beyond the reasonable, so as not to cause confusion.

17. To be effective in the period of time in which its components meet the requirements of the situation. The point is that no wage system can be effective in every situation. Each company should have a system designed for its specific purposes, relevant for a limited period of time. There may be considerable similarity in the general features of the systems used by different companies, but the details should reflect the characteristics of each company, as well as the specific situations in which they find themselves.

18. Developed by the company's management, taking into account the opinions and suggestions of the sales representatives and sellers themselves. Because sales reps are better, more enthusiastic about the pay system that management consulted with them in developing.

If you carefully go through all of the above points, you can pay attention to the fact that some of them take into account the interests of employees to a greater extent, while others take into account the interests of the company.

The main types of wage systems

1. The fixed salary is a fixed element depending on the amount of time the sales representative works.
2. Direct commissions are a variable element that depends on the results obtained when performing a certain amount of work.
3. Combined wage systems.

1. Simple salary system ( hourly form or salary). The amount of payment depends on the unit of time, and not on the amount of work performed. Salary is a fixed element of the wage system. In each time period, the same amount of money is paid to the sales representative regardless of his sales volumes.

The advantages of this method. A permanent income guarantees an employee absolute confidence, stability and reliability. Accordingly, his loyalty and reliability, commitment to the company, satisfaction with cooperation with the company increase. The result is low staff turnover. This form of remuneration allows you to require sellers to perform various functions that are quite important for the company, but not directly related to the sale. For example, sales staff can spend more time on the interests of the client. That is, it can spend more time on each client, provide him with better service. As a positive touch, one can also single out ease of understanding. Such a payment system is the simplest and most understandable, which minimizes the likelihood of various disputes and misunderstandings.

The disadvantages of this method. A fixed salary is not a direct incentive for an employee. Although it is possible to compensate for this disadvantage by changing the size of the bet, which may well become an incentive. With this form of payment, it is difficult to evaluate the performance of an employee. It is difficult to link the amount of salary with different criteria that evaluate the performance of an employee. For the company, such a salary is a constant expense that does not depend on the profit received, on whether the sales volume decreases or increases. That is, they sold a lot - they paid, they sold a little - they still paid.

When is the best time to use this method? First of all, when management can effectively control and stimulate sales representatives. The following specific situations are examples:

• sales reps are still in the learning phase or still too inexperienced to earn enough on a commission basis;
• the company wants to enter a territorially new market or sell a new range of products, that is, when forecasting sales volumes is problematic;

2. Payment system based on direct commission payments. What is a commission? This is a regular payment for the performance of a certain amount of work. Sales representatives usually receive commissions in accordance with the results achieved on those parameters that are under their control, depend on them.

The choice of commission percentage may depend on:

• the target income level of sales personnel determined by the head;
• profitability of this particular product;
• the difficulty of marketing specific products;
• the type of customers attracted or served by the sales representative.

A higher percentage should be paid for the sale of more profitable products to stimulate their sale. The percentage of the commission can be constant for any volume of sales, or it can be sliding, increasing or decreasing as sales volumes grow.

The advantages of this method. It has a huge stimulating effect on sellers. Provides unlimited opportunities in terms of revenue growth if there is no upper limit on commissions. It is a strong factor in motivating employees, encouraging them to work harder. It is easier to reject underperforming sales reps. It is a variable expense item for the company. Sold a lot - paid a lot. Sold little - paid little.

The disadvantages of this method. It is difficult to control and manage the activities of sales representatives in other areas not directly related to the sale. The dominant desire of sellers is the desire to sell as many goods as possible without taking into account the interests of the company or the client. Sellers focus only on goods that are easy to sell, and neglect the sale of difficult-to-sell products. Customers may be sold more than they need, including items that are not in the range they need or are interested in. Sellers are not interested in providing buyers with a high level of service. Since the firm does not provide a guaranteed income, salespeople tend to feel that they do not owe it anything. That is, loyalty and commitment to the company at a minimum level.

When is the best time to use this method:

• When a company is in a vulnerable financial position and therefore, distribution costs should be related directly to the volume of sales.
• When the sales representative starts to lose interest in the job and a strong stimulus is needed to achieve relevant sales figures.
• When there is no need to exhort the product, provide customers with quality service, after-sales service.
• When you do not need to develop long-term relationships with customers.
• When a company uses part-time salespeople or independent contractors such as sales agents for manufacturing firms.

3. Combined wage systems. We considered two extremes: bare salary and bare bonuses. Now consider something in between - combined systems. Their mission is to overcome weaknesses using one method while maintaining its benefits.

1. salary plus commission
2. salary plus bonus (bonus);
3. Salary plus commission and bonus.

As you can see, all three options include the ratio of the constant and variable parts. Which part will be present as an element of encouragement, and which in the form of a fixed salary, should depend on the nature of the sales tasks and marketing goals of the company.

Now let's try to define terms.

A bonus (bonus) is a one-time payment for achieving above-standard indicators. The bonus cannot be used on its own, but must be applied in conjunction with another element, salary or commission. The most commonly used basis for calculating the premium is an assessment of the sales representative's performance against the plan. Fulfilled the plan - get a bonus. A sales plan (quota) is a target assigned to a marketing unit for a specific period of time. A marketing unit can be a sales representative, affiliate, county or region, dealer or distributor.

The target can be expressed in terms of money, units of production, or sales activities. For example, each sales representative may be assigned a target sales volume for a three-month period, gross margin, or be tasked with meeting a customer's needs. Quotas can also be assigned for each type of product or type of customer. If sellers meet their quotas, they often receive some kind of reward or performance bonus. For example, a sales representative may receive a bonus in the form of cash Money in the amount of "X" for exceeding the quota in terms of sales by 10%.

Salary plus commission. It is used more often than all other methods. The question often arises: what part of wages should be made constant and what part - variable? Usually the variable part is 40% of the total remuneration. But one thing must be remembered. None of the options can always be good.

This type of pay offers the benefits of a fixed salary, as well as the flexibility and incentive effect of commission payments. But we must not forget that the introduction of elements of encouragement to the detriment of the fixed part of the salary may lead to a weakening of managerial control over sales personnel. That is, by increasing the share of commissions, you can increase the activity of sellers and sales volumes, while increasing the share of the constant part allows you to improve manageability and control. So salary plus commission is perfect option when a company wants to keep its employees under control, but at the same time also wants to encourage their activity.

The success of a salary-plus-commissions system, or any other combination system, depends largely on achieving a balance between the elements.

Salary plus bonus. An ideal way to pay sales representatives if a company wants to keep its employees under fairly strict control, while offering them some element of encouragement. The difference here compared to the previous payment method is that the fixed part exceeds the variable part of the remuneration much more than in the "salary plus commission" system. The use of the "salary plus bonus" system is effective in stimulating some kind of action in short term. For example, if a company is interested in attracting new customers, incentivizing repeat orders, or intensifying outreach activities for a particular product.

Some companies use bonuses to help salespeople focus on long-term goals, such as improving customer satisfaction. Many companies use bonuses to reward teams for performance. If the team achieves its goals, then all team members receive a bonus.

Salary plus commission plus bonus. By far the most common system. It combines all three components - salary, commission and bonus. This allows, on the one hand, to ensure the presence of a certain level of control, at the same time to encourage employees and offer a bonus for solving special, specific tasks. Example specific form- base salary, commissions and quarterly bonuses, which are calculated for each salesperson based on customer satisfaction ratings.

4. Connection of method and goals. It is extremely important to link the system of remuneration with the achievement of certain goals.

Consider examples of goals and options for wage systems:

• The goal is to increase revenue by 10%. To achieve this goal, as a rule, some form of encouragement is necessary, for example, a commission or a bonus.
• The goal is to increase sales of specific products by 10%. In this case, it may be useful to pay commissions at higher rates, on high-margin products, or on any other goods in which the company is particularly interested in marketing.
• the goal is to increase sales to existing customers. A bonus may be paid for increasing sales to existing customers by a certain percentage. The bonus can be tied to a repeat order quota. Alternatively, you can pay commissions at higher rates for repeat orders.
• the goal is to increase customer satisfaction. The bonus is The best way execute this task, although a salary increase can be quite effective.
• the goal is to stimulate explanatory activity. Explanatory activities may include training dealer salespeople, holding presentations or preparing exhibitions, expositions, and other activities not directly related to the sales process. Some of these efforts can be individually measured and rewarded for their performance. Effort that cannot be easily measured can be rewarded by increasing the share of salary in the total.
• the goal is to invade new territory. Perhaps all income should be in the form of a salary, at least in the early stages of developing sales in a new territory.

Development of a wage system for sales personnel

There are 6 main stages in the development of a wage system:

• Study of job descriptions.
• Determining the goals of the wage system.
• Establishing the level of wages.
• Development of a method of remuneration.
• Choice of indirect cash payment.
• Putting the system into operation.

Let's consider each separately.

First stage. Study of job descriptions. At this stage, it is necessary to identify the nature, scale and possible difficulties associated with the implementation of each type of work. That is, to put it simply, what the seller must do, to what extent, for what period, so that the company agrees to pay for his work.

Second phase. Definition of specific goals. There are examples of general goals that are priorities that any wage system should strive to achieve. This is due to the fact that any company goes through different stages of its development, going through different life cycles. Accordingly, at each stage, the company may face different tasks. For example, the exit stage new market. The next task is to cover this market. We solved the problem and covered the market, another task should be set. For example, increase sales to existing customers. The next task, say, is to expand the range of existing customers. After its solution - improving the quality of customer service, then - expanding relationships with customers, and so on. It is important to remember that there is a direct relationship between the tasks that the company faces and what kind of payment system the company uses. If a company's goal is to improve the quality of customer service, and it pays sellers a percentage of sales, then with the help of such wages this problem will not be solved. Why? Because if the sales representative receives naked interest, then the most important thing for him will be the amount of goods sold. He will sell to the maximum, as much as he can. And the quality of service will be the last thing to think about. After all, it does not affect his income in any way. In the same way, if a company wants to increase sales, but at the same time pays only a salary, then again nothing will work. That is, you need to understand that the system of remuneration that was effective at the previous stage will not necessarily be useful at the new stage. Therefore, there is a rule that says that wage may not be good for every situation, always.

Examples of specific goals:

• increase income by 10%;
• increase sales of certain products by 10%;
• increase sales to existing customers;
• improve customer satisfaction;
• develop sales in the new territory.

It is necessary to base the remuneration of each sales representative on those factors that are more under his control. Otherwise, at least the principle of justice will be violated, which will immediately entail undesirable consequences. Careful consideration needs to be given to the elements that a company can measure:

• quantity, sales volume;
• marketing costs;
• number of visits;
• the number of new customers;
• the number of presentations made;
• gross income.

The more accurate the measurements are, the more effectively it will be possible to use the pay system as a factor influencing the success of the company.

Third stage. Establishing the level of wages. The level of wages means average income sales representative for a certain period of time. The level of pay is in many ways more important than the method.

People are more interested in how much money they made than how they made it. Very often managers ask me how best to pay. I answer them that it is not necessary to start with this. How to pay is not so difficult to figure out. First, the manager needs to find out for himself how much he wants to pay, how much he can pay and how much he will pay. this employee. Only then you need to move on to the allocation of salary components, taking into account various factors and criteria. This is the only way to not be distracted, not to forget that we are talking about a person who has certain expectations and, first of all, will pay attention to the amount of salary, and then to what it can consist of.

Therefore, one of the main factors of efficiency is that the work of sales personnel is paid at a competitive level compared to other companies.

Fourth stage. Development of a method of remuneration. Management has in its arsenal the following elements of creating a remuneration system:

• salary;
• Commission;
• bonuses;
• indirect cash benefits (such as holidays and insurance);
• reimbursement of expenses.

Some of these components are employee incentives, others guarantee stability and reliability of income, others can help the company control sales costs.

Mansurov Ruslan Evgenievich,

PhD in Economics,

Director of Human Resources at OAO Nefis Cosmetics

The issues of increasing the efficiency of personnel activities have always been of particular importance, and the sales staff of distribution companies is no exception in this. On the contrary, in the conditions of the developing financial crisis and tougher competition, the issues of increasing the efficiency of the sales system are becoming decisive in the survival strategies of domestic companies.

This article presents practical experience reforming the remuneration system of a small distribution company LLC Uspekh, in which the author was involved as an independent consultant and led the reform of this system.

So, the company "Success" LLC works in the FMCG sector (consumer goods) and is the official distributor of the largest commodity producer. The company is relatively young, it was founded in 2006, but has already managed to win a significant share in the market of its region. The stage of rapid growth is over, the company is already on its feet, sales are stable and nothing foreshadowed trouble. However, the global financial crisis broke out and, although the company did not have a large amount of credit funds, troubles could not be avoided. Sales growth stopped. And although the reduction in volume has not yet occurred, however, this prompted the owners of the company to the idea that analysis and certain managerial actions are needed in this regard. At this stage, third-party consultants were invited to diagnose the situation, develop and implement a set of anti-crisis measures.

Thus, in the course of the analysis, it was revealed that over the past 6 months the company has not received more than one new regular customer. There were many small ones with very small sales volumes that quickly disappeared.

An analysis of the remuneration system for sales representatives showed that the bonus to employees is calculated depending on two factors:

- % of sales for the past month;

Subject to attracting new customers, a bonus (increasing coefficient) is introduced, equal to 20% of the bonus amount.

At the same time, the assessment in terms of the “Attracting new customers” indicator was made on the fact of the presence of a new attracted client, without taking into account its size and long-term attraction.

In other words, a sales representative, in order to receive his bonus, attracted a small (someone simpler) client, while he did not care at all about further work with him, did not "hill" him. As a result, such a client left for more favorable conditions. In addition, cases were identified when the same customer (point of retail sales) was considered "new" for different sales representatives with a time gap of 2 months!

Thus, the sales representative received the main part of the bonus component of remuneration at the expense of the old, accumulated client base, an additional bonus by attracting insignificant clients, whom he then abandoned as unnecessary and they left. It's just that the bonus of 20% of the premium turned out to be more than the increase in the amount of the main premium from the increase in sales. At the same time, it should be noted that the level of remuneration was high enough to relax, “get fat” and not fight for every ruble. The remuneration system looked as follows (see Table 1).

The remuneration of a business coach was time-based and did not depend on the volume of sales, but depended on the objective (or subjective) opinion of the management about the effectiveness of the sales representatives trained by him.

Table 1.

The current system of remuneration of employees of LLC "Success" with a sales volume of 15,000 thousand rubles per month

* The bonus is paid on a monthly basis by decision of the management, taking into account the achieved result in the training of sales representatives.

Thus, summing up the results of the analysis, it should be noted that, on the whole, the staff of sales representatives calmed down and lived quietly in the positions already won earlier. The business coach, on the other hand, was in a somewhat demotivating work environment, associated with the uncertainty of his potential punishment or reward.

In order to radically correct the current negative situation, the following change in the wage system was proposed.

It was decided to separate employees working only with new clients and employees working with old clients in the group of sales representatives. The division of personnel was carried out on the basis of the results of psychological, professional testing, taking into account real achievements. Also, various training and development programs have been developed for these groups of sales representatives.

Thus, the former were required to find new customers, while the latter were required to retain and increase sales of old ones. Accordingly, it was decided to make the premium part of the former dependent solely on the number of attracted new customers. At the same time, since the company needed to increase its presence in the regional market, the volume of sales by new customers for these sales representatives was not taken into account. Also, in order to compensate for the greater complexity and, to a certain extent, the uncertainty of the result obtained, it was decided to increase the tariff part of sales representatives engaged exclusively in attracting new customers to 13,000 rubles.

It was also decided to make the remuneration of a business coach dependent on the result actually achieved during the reporting period. Thus, we reduce the fact of subjectivity in determining remuneration for this employee and motivate him to improve the quality of training of sales representatives.

As a result, the following wage system was formed (see Table 2)

Table 2.

The proposed system of remuneration of employees of LLC "Success" with the volume growth sales 150 thousand rubles per month

* the premium was accrued in the amount of 10% of the tariff part for one attracted client. Thus, it turned out that when attracting 10 new clients, the employee received a bonus of 100%, with 0 new clients, the bonus was not paid. If the sales representative attracted more than 10 new clients per month, the bonus increased proportionally, there were no restrictions.

** The premium was accrued depending on the increase in sales volume. At the same time, the increase in sales due to new customers attracted in the current month was not taken into account. Only the increase for old clients was taken. However, when determining the level of growth in the next month, the value with new customers was taken as the base (which needs to be improved). In this case, it was decided to accept a premium of 12% of sales. This was done in order to maintain the wage fund at the current level.

*** The bonus was accrued depending on the fulfillment of the tasks assigned to sales representatives and was divided into two components. The first part is up to 50% of the tariff for attracting new customers by sales representatives. The second part is also up to 50%, depending on the increase in sales for old customers. The first part was paid at the rate of 5% for each new client attracted by the sales representative. The second part as 5% of the increase in sales.

It should be noted that one of the key goals in reforming the wage system was the task of not increasing the wage fund of employees, which was achieved.

Analysis of the results obtained within six months showed an increase in sales by an average of 5-7% per month!

In this case, we have considered a slightly simplified example of the work performed. This was done deliberately so as not to overload the author with secondary, less significant information, but to focus his attention on the main mechanism for achieving the set result.

And yet .. And what about the global financial crisis? Yes, in fact, nothing to do with it, just in the "storm" the company began to react more sensitively to existing problems and solve them more quickly, fighting for competitive advantages.