Is this the highest-paid salesperson in the world?

Published: Wed, 10/26/22

October 26, 2022

TOGETHER WITH

Good morning. On this week in 1901, a 63-year-old schoolteacher named Annie Edson Taylor became the first person to successfully take the plunge over Niagara Falls in a wooden barrel, which is pretty much what working in sales feels like every single day. In this week’s issue of The Quota, we’ll tell you about Philipp Schneider, Google’s top sales rep, share a Sales Fail about TMI, and give some advice to a rep who got passed over for a sales manager role. Let’s do this.

NUMBER OF THE WEEK

72 and 28

72% of outside sales representatives are men and 28% are women.

Source: Zippia

SALES ROUNDUP

Here’s what’s happening in the sales world this week:

While the tech industry conducts layoffs, one luxury watch company is taking its sales hiring to the next level, conducting a world-wide televised competition to find its next star sales rep. Luxury Bazaar is flying in 10 applicants from across the world and turning their hiring process into a reality-show experience. You can read about their unorthodox selection process here.
One of the world’s most successful salesmen, who happened to invent a product used by millions of salespeople, passed away last week. Dietrich Mateschitz, the founder of Red Bull, died last week at age 78. The then toothpaste salesman first discovered the concoction in Hong Kong in 1982, before modifying it to better suit European tastes and making a fortune. You can read more about Dietrich’s life here.

FEATURE

DLD16 Conference Day 3 by Hubert Burda Media is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.

Is Philipp Schindler, Google’s top sales executive, the highest-paid salesperson in the world?

Philipp Schindler is a Star Wars fan. His ringtone is set to John Williams’ eternal film score, and he has a collection of toy lightsabers in his office. His empire? Google.

According to a recent profile in The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Schindler is Google’s chief business officer, heading up sales for Google’s online advertising products and the majority of the company’s other services. His department’s $230-billion-a-year portfolio comprises more than 90% of parent company Alphabet Inc.’s revenues. Many of his colleagues agree that he is an exceptional deal broker, and he might just be the highest-paid salesperson in the world.

“Philipp is one of the few Germans who really made it in Silicon Valley,” Matthias Döpfner, CEO of the German publisher Axel Springer, told The Wall Street Journal. “He deserves it because he is smart and in a very diplomatic way a tough negotiator.” Mr. Schindler has received stock grants worth $93.5 million from Alphabet’s board in the past three years alone. That is more than any executive in the company other than CEO Sundar Pichai.

Mr. Schindler graduated from the European Business School in Germany and then took a position in a talent-development program at Bertelsmann SE. In 2004, Google hired Mr. Schindler to oversee its business in Germany, Switzerland, Austria, and Scandinavia, and in 2012, he was promoted to a role overseeing global sales and operations in the U.S. Three years later, he was chief business officer.

Now, more than 29,000 employees work under Mr. Schindler, more than any other Google department other than cloud computing. Mr. Schindler and Mr. Pichai have worked over the years to unite all of Google’s product areas under one banner, migrating all of the business-development and partnership teams to be under Mr. Schindler’s domain.

Now, nearly every business decision concerning customer services and outside companies runs through Mr. Schindler and his team. For example, in March of this year, Mr. Schindler helped broker an agreement that lets Spotify offer alternative methods of payment to customers, thereby avoiding the 30% fee that Google usually collects when people purchase the app in their Play Store. Google is extending this option to other developers as well. Spotify Technology SA previously led the charge when it came to criticizing these practices, a fee structure that Apple Inc. also employs.

Some of Mr. Schindler’s controversial deals with other empires have pricked up the ears of antitrust authorities seeking to break Google’s hold on the online advertising market. (This is the very subject of the Justice Department’s second antitrust lawsuit against Google in three years, which the DOJ is expected to file in the coming weeks.) In 2018, Mr. Schindler signed an agreement with Meta Platforms Inc.’s Facebook known as Jedi Blue in which Facebook was allegedly given priority over other companies in Google’s online mobile-advertising slot auctions. Attorneys general in more than a dozen states called it illegal price-fixing. Google and Facebook insisted the attorneys general had misrepresented the agreement.

Schindler is known as a tough negotiator, and according to the Wall Street Journal article, “Some people who have sat across from Mr. Schindler in negotiations said he employed a conciliatory approach while offering few tangible concessions, leaving business partners frustrated.”

“He’s got one of the toughest and biggest jobs in corporate America,” said Joey Levin, CEO of the conglomerate IAC. But if he really is the highest paid salesman in the world, (and there’s a very good chance that he might be), then there’s no reason to feel bad for Mr. Schindler. The Force (or the dark side?) has obviously been with him, and we’re not talking about Salesforce here.

TOGETHER WITH QUOTAPATH

One way to have more confidence in your comp plan is to set the business goals first, then leverage the comp plan to drive those.

Pro tip: Run different scenarios and experiment with a compensation plan template and modeler in QuotaPath’s free and ungated resource, Compensation Hub. If predictable revenue is a goal, consider the Single Rate Commission with Contract Term Multiplier plan or the Commission with Multi-Year Accelerators plan.

With Compensation Hub, find a commission structure that aligns with your business. Use the modeler to strike the right balance between pay and performance by adjusting variables, such as OTE, annualized quota, or ACV, among others.

Explore Compensation Hub to discover the right plans for your business.

MEME OF THE WEEK

Source: Instagram -- Sales Humor

QUIZ

Which of the following companies was acquired by LinkedIn?

A. Brightcove
B. Lynda
C. Indeed
D. Microsoft

SALES FAILS

Each week, we bring you the most cringe-worthy sales moments from across the web. To submit your sales fail story for consideration, click here. (Don't worry, you'll remain completely anonymous).

“Reading these always reminds me of when I was still selling (I am a sales manager now, but don’t hold that against me), and I caught somebody on what ended up being a very bad day.

Back then, we were selling to SMBs, so the type of people you’d get on the phone were kind of all over the place in terms of how they would respond. Some were single-person businesses and others were local or regional chains, things like that.

So I emailed and called this one lead (it was inbound), and never got a response. The next day, I called and sent a second email, and started the email with, “I hope you’re having a great week,” or something very similar.

Well, I got a response back later that day, where the prospect said that “Actually” he wasn’t having a great week at all, and that his ex-wife was taking him for every penny he was making and that he couldn’t even afford to repair the roof on his house.

I responded sympathetically, and said that I was “very sorry to hear about what he was going through,” but then added that if he was interested, our product could potentially help him save some money (ABC).

Well… that didn’t go over so well, and he responded almost immediately and told me that I am not his friend, and I shouldn’t be commenting on his personal life, with a few other choice words thrown in. I responded with an apology, but still asked if he wanted to get on a call to talk about our money-saving solutions. No response. :)”

Anonymous North Carolina

GRAPH OF THE WEEK

Source: LinkedIn Poll -- October 2022

WORTH A PEEK

The current economy is… turbulent? Confusing? Bizarre? Whatever you want to call it, it’s not normal, which means selling isn’t normal. Our good friend Jeb Blount has a perfectly-timed new book out, Selling in a Crisis, which gives you 55 easy-to-consume tips, techniques, and tactics that are proven to help you perform when everything and everyone else is down. You can check out the new book here.

ASK THE QUOTA

Want to submit a question and be featured in our advice column? Click here. (Don't worry, you'll remain completely anonymous).

Dear Quota Team,

This is almost my third year with my company, and probably my tenth year in sales. I have been selling since the week after college. I graduated, got a sales job and never looked back. In that time, I’ve had inside sales and AE roles, and a stint as a sales manager, which I enjoyed, until the company shut down and I decided to go back to an individual contributor role.

About two months ago, a sales manager role became available at my company. I applied, and was almost certain I would get it. Not to badmouth anybody else here, but I take my career much more seriously than the majority of the other reps I work with, and I am consistently near the top of the board, though there are reps who close more deals, but they aren’t interested in management.

Needless to say, I didn’t get the sales manager job. Instead, it went to a guy who has absolutely nothing special to offer. He’s not a top producer, he’s not particularly smart, and from what I can see, he doesn’t have any great leadership skills. What he does have, however, is a good relationship with the Director of Sales. They hang out outside of work and worked together at a previous company.

Since I got passed over, I’ve been absolutely livid. I’m no pollyanna, and I understand how relationships and nepotism still exist, but it drives me absolutely crazy that this talentless guy got a sought-after role just because he is buddies with leadership. I am strongly considering quitting or pulling the director aside and asking why I was passed over, if only to watch him squirm. What’s the right move here? I guess above all, I’m mostly venting. Thanks anyway.

Furious in Massachusetts

Dear Furious,

You claim to be a cynical sales rep who understands that the workplace is oftentimes unfair, but you’re letting this get you so angry that you want to quit? Why is that?

The real question you should be asking is the following: is my current role maximizing my talents and income potential? If the answer is yes, then stop stressing out about some lame underachiever who got his big break and focus on what you can control. If the answer is no, then look for a better opportunity where you’ll get paid what you’re worth, and will have the opportunity to advance – something you can control.

Aside from that, just let it go. There’s nothing to be gained from sitting around and stewing in your anger, and everything to be gained from focusing on closing deals, living your best life, and looking for the next opportunity. All you have to do is decide who you care about more: yourself, or the guy who got the job you feel you deserved. Good luck!