My coaching client Daniel asked me, “Bill, are you a Hunter or a Farmer? Do you constantly prospect for new business, or do you focus on the clients you currently have?”
salesperson prospecting and speaking to clients on the phone
I replied, “I’m more of a Trapper. I like to apply the principles of value-centered marketing, so people see me as a resource and come to me for further assistance.” However, even though I take on this persona, it’s still essential to understand how different salespeople like to work. This post will explain the difference between the hunter and farmer sales persona and how they take on sales activity.
The main distinction between the hunter and farmer sales personas is what each spends their time doing. Farmers cultivate existing relationships with clients and seek opportunities within existing accounts, while hunters are constantly prospecting and seeking opportunities with new, unfamiliar leads.
Below we’ll go more in-depth into each sales persona and its main characteristics.
As the name suggests, the hunter salesperson goes out and hunts for new opportunities, prospects, and accounts. They’re independent and enjoy moving from one deal to the next as they’re motivated to continue finding and drawing in new leads.
Hunters are good at quickly building rapport with prospects but not necessarily cultivating long-term salesperson and client relationships. They go to many networking events, join other organizations, use LinkedIn and social media platforms to reach out to leads, make lots of calls, and ask for referrals regularly.
A hunter will thrive in a role where they can be independent. People with this persona will do well as account executives, field representatives, or business development managers.
The farmer salesperson is most comfortable fertilizing and watering existing relationships. They work to foster relationships and build long-lasting rapport with their existing accounts before anything else.
Their clients know that they’re there for them should any issues arise, and the farmer is eager to assist when they do. Their client-first mindset greatly influences and increases customer retention and loyalty. They also drive revenue with existing clients, sometimes through encouraging upgrades to higher software tiers as a business scales.
Sales roles that farmer personas thrive in are account managers, customer service representatives, or client success managers.
While hunters and farmers are on either end of the spectrum, the trapper persona falls somewhere in the middle.
The trapper salesperson has a critical understanding of their business’ target audience and buyer personas, and they meet prospects where they already are in their buyer’s journey.
A trapper may use inbound marketing to create a fine-tuned way to communicate the value of what they’re selling to their prospects in the channels they’re already present, like social selling to B2B professionals on LinkedIn.
An effective trapper is also adept at generating various forms of social proof, such as testimonials and case studies, to present to clients as a means of inspiring them to do business with them. Trappers are also closing-focused in their roles.