Two questions come up when a New Zealand company makes its first US hire: how to employ someone legally in the US, and how much it costs. Both matter. The most important question is whether you should be hiring in the US at all. Here is how the mechanics work, what a US salesperson actually costs a NZ company, and the timing mistake that burns a year of runway.
You have two ways to put a person on US payroll.
An Employer of Record (EOR) employs the person on your behalf. Deel, Remote, Rippling, and Velocity Global are the common ones. They handle US payroll, tax, benefits, and state compliance. You pay roughly US$500 to US$700 per employee per month on top of salary. You can hire in a week without a US entity. This is the right choice for your first 1 to 3 US hires while you are still testing whether the US move works.
Your own US entity means you set up a Delaware or state company, register for payroll tax in each state where you employ someone, run payroll through a provider like Gusto or ADP, buy workers compensation insurance, and manage benefits yourself. It is cheaper per head at scale and gives you full control, and it is more work and more fixed cost. This makes sense once you have 4 or more US staff or a permanent US presence.
Start on an EOR. Move to your own entity when the headcount justifies the overhead, not before.
This is where NZ founders get surprised. US sales compensation is high, and it is structured as base plus commission (on-target earnings, or OTE).
SDR (sales development, books meetings): US$60,000 to US$80,000 base, US$80,000 to US$110,000 OTE.
Account Executive (closes deals): US$120,000 to US$180,000 base, US$240,000 to US$360,000 OTE for enterprise.
Sales leader / VP: US$200,000+ base, US$400,000+ OTE.
Load in benefits, payroll tax, and the EOR fee and a single mid-level US AE costs you US$200,000 to US$300,000 fully loaded in year 1, before they close anything. That is often more than a NZ founder's entire domestic sales budget.
The expensive error is hiring a US seller before the US model is proven. A salesperson is an execution engine. They amplify whatever plan you give them. If the pricing is wrong, the target buyer is wrong, or the channel is wrong, a great salesperson executes the wrong plan faster and burns US$250,000 doing it. Then they leave, the pipeline they built evaporates, and you have a year of lost time and a damaged story to tell your board.
The pattern I see repeatedly: a NZ company gets early US interest, reads it as validation, hires a US head of sales to go capture the market, and discovers 9 months later that the interest never converted because the underlying model wasn't ready. The hire wasn't the mistake. Hiring before the model was resolved was.
1. Resolve the model first. First buyer, pricing, channel, and unit economics. Founder-led or with an advisor, not with a US$250,000 hire.
2. Prove it yourself. The founder should close the first few US deals before handing sales to someone else. If the founder can't sell it, a hire won't fix that.
3. Then hire, on an EOR, into a plan that works. Now the salesperson amplifies something real.
FREQUENTLY ASKED
What is the cheapest way to hire a US employee from New Zealand?
An Employer of Record (EOR) like Deel, Remote, or Rippling. You pay roughly US$500 to US$700 per employee per month plus salary, with no US entity required, and can hire within a week.
How much does a US salesperson cost a New Zealand company?
A mid-level US Account Executive costs US$200,000 to US$300,000 fully loaded in year 1, including base, commission, benefits, payroll tax, and EOR fees.
When should I hire my first US salesperson?
After the founder has closed the first few US deals and the pricing, buyer, and channel are proven. Hiring a seller before the model works amplifies the wrong plan at high cost.
BEFORE YOUR FIRST HIRE
Before you make a US$250,000 hiring commitment, the US Market Entry Diagnostic tells you whether the model is ready to hire against.
Start the conversation