Can a Sales Aptitude Test Help You Grow Sales Through Better Hiring?

Organizations strive to hire top sales talent because they know having a top sales team is the key to meeting revenue and growth goals. This is why U.S. companies spend $800 billion yearly to pay sales salaries and commissions and invest $15 billion in sales training. 

The best way to grow sales is to build a strong sales team and ensure top performers stay with your company, which means recruiting the right people to reduce turnover. To hire the right people, organizations often implement a testing solution like the industry-leading eSkill Talent Assessment Platform^TM and use sales aptitude tests in recruiting.

Why Sales Aptitude Tests Are Important

Sales aptitude tests are indispensable because they help organizations recruit top-quality applicants. This is especially true because of the unprecedented talent shortage.

Employers worldwide struggle to find candidates with the skills to fill critical job vacancies, including sales representatives. This problem could be attributed to the Great Resignation, which occurred when 47.4 million workers quit their jobs in 2021, but it is also due to a skills gap that has been growing for the past 10 years.

Many organizations’ hiring needs have changed because they have adopted new technology and implemented digital transformation initiatives. Many applicants’ skills have not kept up with these changes, and job-seekers now lack the in-demand skills employers need. This has caused a knowledge gap so severe that 71% of CEOs say a talent shortage will be their biggest business challenge during the next decade.

Moreover, the information on job candidates’ resumes is not always credible. According to Entrepreneur, 55% of applicants lie on their resumes and during job interviews, and a HireRight study estimates the number is closer to 85%. This means an applicant with a superb resume who presents themselves well during an interview could be a hiring mistake.

Another battle companies constantly fight is minimizing turnover. The cost of turnover is high, but the cost of sales rep turnover is especially high because losing good sales talent can directly impact the bottom line. As a result, sales managers hate hearing that a top sales performer is resigning. They know they will lose the team member’s product knowledge and client relationships, which could negatively impact existing and future business.

How Sales Aptitude Tests Help Companies Improve Hiring

Using a sales aptitude test instead of spending hours manually reviewing resumes makes screening candidates quick and efficient. The ones who are best qualified and the best cultural fit for the organization can be selected to build a top-functioning sales team that develops business and closes sales.

Consider how sales aptitude tests help organizations hire the best sales talent:

• Streamlining Candidate Screening: Companies often receive hundreds of responses when they post a sales representative position, making it challenging to determine which candidates have the required qualifications. With sales aptitude tests, HR teams can screen applicants quickly, identify and focus on top candidates, and weed out those who lack the necessary skills and experience.

• Customizing Sales Aptitude Tests: HR leaders can use pre-prepared skills assessments or build a sales aptitude test by selecting questions from the many job- and subject-based skills tests in the eSkill Assessment Library.
  
  For example, if you need to hire a sales representative for a financial services company and want to ensure candidates are familiar with common industry terms and regulations, you can create a sales aptitude test using assessment questions that test sales ability and add questions from skills tests such as Financial Statements, Debt Collection, and Money Handling.

• Simulations and Video Response Questions: Written sales aptitude tests help HR professionals confirm candidates have the right skills but may not show whether they can apply the knowledge. So, many HR teams and hiring managers include simulations and video response questions in sales aptitude tests.

Simulations present candidates with scenarios they will likely encounter on the job, allowing the hiring team to evaluate their performance. For example, you can present applicants with scenarios where they must work with difficult customers, overcome objections, or sell against one or more competitors to win or win back business.

Including video response questions in sales aptitude tests enables hiring managers to evaluate abilities that cannot be measured on paper, such as verbal communication skills. Sales representatives must sound pleasant and professional in person, on the phone, and in video meetings. So, you can use video response questions to verify that candidates are articulate, and you can also evaluate other skills, such as foreign language abilities.

Get Started with Sales Aptitude Tests

Sales aptitude tests help organizations build a sales team that works like a well-oiled machine. They also improve hiring outcomes while reducing HR costs and decreasing time-to-hire. Many eSkill clients have decreased recruiting costs by up to 70% and reduced time-to-hire by around 60%.

Are you ready to learn how sales aptitude tests can help you build a top-notch sales team? Contact us to request a demo.