Common Mistakes Business Owners Make With Their Sales Team

Hiring a sales team should make your life easier—but for many business owners, it ends in frustration, wasted payroll, and backsliding into doing everything yourself. At Business Builder Camp, we’ve seen this pattern over and over. The good news? These mistakes are avoidable.

If you’ve hired salespeople (or are about to), here are the biggest pitfalls to watch out for:

1. Expecting Them To Sell Exactly Like You

Just because you built the business doesn’t mean your team can, or should, sound just like you. They don’t have your authority, experience, story, or instincts. Instead of trying to clone yourself, equip them to sell with clarity, confidence, and a process they can own.

2. Skipping Clear Goals and Expectations (Agreements)

If you don’t define success, your salespeople will guess at it. You need to create concrete sales goals, clear KPIs, and behavior-based expectations. What does a “good week” look like? How many calls? How many follow-ups? Get it all on the table.

3. Not Training Them Properly

Most salespeople don’t fail because they’re lazy. They fail because they’re undertrained. Your new hire needs more than a product sheet. They need dedicated training time, clear messaging, role-playing, and regular feedback. Expect to invest 10+ hours per week in training early on.

4. Throwing Them Into Sales Before Equipping Them

“Go sell something!” isn’t a strategy. Without a repeatable sales process, your team will flounder. Don’t expect them to wing it, especially if you’ve been the only one selling until now. Build a structure so they can succeed.

5. Ignoring Marketing Support

Sales can’t thrive without quality marketing support. If you don’t have marketing systems that generate interest and warm leads, your team will spend too much time chasing down cold prospects. Sales and marketing need to work together, not in silos.

6. Hiring Warm Bodies Instead of Sales Professionals

A friendly face isn’t enough. Do not just hire warm bodies. They will demoralize the good sales team members and waste your time. You need to hire intentionally and look for people with curiosity, resilience, strong communication skills, and a coachable mindset. Someone just “looking for a job” isn’t going to carry your sales goals.

7. Micromanaging Your Sales Team

Hovering over every conversation destroys trust. Micromanagement can destroy the best sales team members. Once your team is trained and aligned, give them space to execute. Support them. Guide them. But don’t suffocate them. Micromanagement kills creativity—and confidence.

8. No Incentives or Motivation Structure For Your Sales Team

Compensating your sales team members matters, but so does motivation. Are you creating a culture where sales wins are celebrated? Do your sales reps know what’s in it for them? What plays a major role in sales performance is recognition, commissions, bonuses, and growth paths.

9. Not Communicating With Your Sales Team Members Often Enough

If you only talk sales numbers during review meetings, you’re missing a huge part of what you need to communicate about with your sales team. Schedule 1:1 meetings to coach your sales team members. During this time, debrief on more than sales, know them and their lives. Many sales team members struggle to close deals because of things occurring in their personal lives. Communication is not just focused on correcting mistakes. Take time in your communication to build trust, understanding, and your sales team’s culture.

10. Trying To Train Your Sales Team All Alone

Many business owners struggle with sales leadership because no one ever taught them how to lead sales. That’s where sales coaching and the peer support of a business mastermind group make all the difference. A business sales coach can help you see the blind spots in your sales team. A business mastermind group for sales can help you troubleshoot challenges, swap ideas, and stay accountable.

At Business Builder Camp, we help owners shift from frustrated and stuck to confident and equipped. Contact us to build a sales team that actually performs.