Why Great Entrepreneurs Start Out in Sales

In an age of entrepreneurism, it’s becoming a common theme that some of the best startup founders come from sales. It’s an idea that seems to prove itself true repeatedly, and it’s one that you can see in the numbers even here in Idaho, where Adaptive Business Services is based.

Though Idaho is not necessarily the first state that comes to mind when one thinks of startup culture, and successful founders don’t often advertise that they come from sales, some of the patterns we see in the state back up the idea. Idaho, for one thing, is a fairly busy state when it comes to sales jobs in the first place. A typical sales salary can go a lot further in a state like this with a relatively low cost of living; busy technology, tourism, and manufacturing. Not to mention that tech industries make up much of the state’s economy, and require sales work; and sales also ranks among some of the jobs that can be done at home, meaning that these jobs should be secure even in the bizarre working climate of 2020, and may expand moving forward.

On top of all of this, Idaho also happens to be significantly more startup-oriented than you might guess! Some recent research ranked Idaho among the most entrepreneurial states in the country — at number two overall, in fact. Now, this does not necessarily mean that droves of sales professionals are moving directly into starting their own businesses throughout the state. But the expansive market for sales professionals coupled with surging entrepreneurism does suggest some correlation that supports the same theory: that successful entrepreneurs often come from sales.

But even if we accept the idea as true, it’s interesting to wonder why so many great entrepreneurs seem to come from sales. And to that point, we have a few ideas that appear to factor in.

Sales Teach Competition

Different sales jobs can be structured in different ways, but by and large they make for competitive environments. To some extent, it’s typically true that the harder you work, the earlier you start in a day, and the more dogged you are in pursuit of a deal, the more you’ll succeed in sales. And few would argue that the same is true of being an entrepreneur. In this sense, working in sales can serve as training for some of the more intangible aspects of succeeding in the startup world.

Sales Pros Have an Eye for Detail

It’s easy to think of entrepreneurs as ideal people, and in a way they are. But the successful ones also maintain an eye for detail, and know their businesses inside out. As an example, consider the very process of starting a business. Forming a new LLC in Idaho isn’t too complicated, but it does involve filing Articles of Operation and forming a business Operating Agreement. The latter can essentially function as a business plan of sorts, and it’s the sort of thing someone with a practiced eye for detail will excel at, whereas a raw “idea person” might struggle. That’s not to say it can’t be figured out by anyone willing to do the work. But someone with a sales background, who is trained to understand products, services, and processes inside and out, will often be better suited to these early tasks — and thus set up a stronger foundation for a business.

Sales Means Tackling Difficult Tasks First

Another article exploring entrepreneurs who got their start in sales described this idea as “eating the frog first.” It’s an odd phrase, but one that refers to getting the biggest challenge or hardest job out of the way early on — and doing it with a smile on your face. Sales professionals learn to do this because of the importance of securing larger deals or more important clients. They grit their teeth, take deep breaths, and make their bigger calls as energetically and positively as they can, and then they go from there. This is a great skill or tendency to learn for any line of work, but entrepreneurs certainly benefit from being able to “eat the frog first.”

Success in Sales Means Successful Networking

When this site posted about the idea of being responsive but not busy in sales, the point was made that businesses in position to be buyers are used to salespeople not returning communications efficiently. But those salespeople who do communicate promptly tend to get a leg up, because they are demonstrating that they want the buyer’s business. This is a simple matter of prudent networking. It’s something successful salespeople learn, and something that unquestionably suits them well if and when they become entrepreneurs.

Given all of these factors, it’s perhaps no surprise that some of the best entrepreneurs start out in sales — from Idaho, to Silicon Valley, to industries all over the world.

Exclusively written for adaptive-business.com by JBowie