From free lunches to limousine rides, these companies are investing in unique ways to celebrate and motivate their sales teams.
According to Gallup, organizations with high employee morale are 21 percent more profitable and 17 percent more productive. For sales teams, that means that a supportive culture translates into closing more deals — which ultimately benefits their companies’ bottom line.
At the two companies featured below, sales leaders say they are intentional about creating opportunities to praise everyone from newcomers to seasoned pros. In addition to celebrating their top performers, they recognize feats such as highest conversion rates, most improved and most created pipelines.
Employees from Centerfield and Telesign sat down with Built In Los Angeles to share more about the spiffs, incentives and rituals that keep their teams connected and competitive.
With its outcome-based digital marketing solutions, Centerfield helps brands acquire customers at scale.
Describe your company’s sales culture. What makes it unique?
Our culture is built around enthusiasm, empathy and understanding of what motivates our sales team. We have a team of experienced sales leaders who understand that a culture of servant leadership, positive reinforcement and continuing education drives consistent success.
Centerfield knocks it out of the park when it comes to engaging its remote team, with virtual team trivia competitions, group yoga and meditation sessions, cooking and mixologist nights and more. Celebrating our wins is one of the 10 traits of being a Centerfielder.
What spiffs, incentives and rituals does your team use to stay motivated?
Running a virtual sales team makes it difficult to celebrate wins in the traditional sense, so we have a “Production” Slack channel where we shout out every sale that happens on a daily basis. The team gets as excited for a top producer having a dominant day as they do for new names that hit the leaderboard.
The team gets as excited for a top producer having a dominant day as they do for new names that hit the leaderboard.”
A few days a week, we try to spice things up either with individual spiffs, in which three deals yield an added bonus, or team goals for free lunch based on quality and quantity, such as the highest conversion rate and most deals.
On a monthly basis, we follow the same rationale with incentives, paying out first- and second-place prizes for the highest conversion rate, most deals and most improved. The most improved is important, as most sales teams have established top producers and having the same people win over and over again often has a negative effect on team motivation.
Additionally, we ran a March Madness promotion during which top sales representatives were given small pods of junior team members, giving them the opportunity to see what leadership in sales can look like.
What do you and your team enjoy most about these spiffs, incentives and rituals?
The friendly competition that comes with them and the virtual engagement. Most of our incentives have an unlimited number of winners that can achieve the target. For example, we recently awarded extra $100 bonuses for three sales in a day.
By having our “Production” Slack channel where we celebrate wins, people’s personalities really come out through the GIFs and emojis they use to display enthusiasm. When I joined this organization, I never realized there were so many unique GIFs of people slam dunking in basketball, a common theme in our sales excitement.
Our busy season is the annual enrollment period, which is October 15 to December 7, and we have an awards night in quarter one to celebrate top performers and all representatives with awards and raffles. People wear suits, tuxes, fancy dresses and gowns to class up the event, and we buy everyone dinner and enjoy some spirits as a group.
Telesign creates solutions that prevent identity fraud by verifying more than five billion phone numbers each month.
Describe your company’s sales culture. What makes it unique?
Over the past year, Telesign doubled the size of our sales team in the Americas, which is so exciting. Our growth and success attract a diverse, talented group of sales professionals who are seizing the opportunity to be a part of something truly special.
Everyone on the team brings unique skill sets, perspectives and experiences that make us more competitive. We collaborate constantly to harness and recognize all that everyone contributes to the company, creating a culture of learning, sharing, recognition and success.
Some of our best ideas come from this team, which creates a sense of ownership as we scale rapidly. We have both tenured and new salespeople working side by side and learning from each other; equally as important, the team is genuinely committed to each other’s success.
What spiffs, incentives and rituals does your team use to stay motivated?
Each quarter, we have a spiff to reward and recognize sales success. Prizes range from experiences to cool gear to special meals, and all come with bragging rights! A recent example was that the sales development representative with the most created pipeline took a limo to our revenue kickoff closing party in Barcelona, while the rest of the teams rode the bus.
With a growing sales organization, there are many steps to revenue recognition, from enablement to building pipelines to closing deals. We look for ways to recognize and celebrate over-achievement at all points. Small wins eventually become big wins, and early successes result in better results over time. While recognition is free, it is incredibly valuable. We go beyond rewarding just “the deal closed” by celebrating things like most pipelines built, the first closed deal of the quarter, the fastest time to close and the most interesting use case.
We go beyond rewarding just ‘the deal closed’ by celebrating things like most pipelines built, the first closed deal of the quarter, the fastest time to close and the most interesting use case.”
Another key motivator is our well-defined career path. Many of our most successful salespeople have risen through the ranks at Telesign, so we know this model works. Setting clear metrics for promotion gives the team a target. When they meet those targets, they are eligible for more senior roles.
What do you and your team enjoy most about these spiffs, incentives and rituals?
When we win, we have “Clap and Learn” sessions. These give the sales team chances to be recognized for their hard work and accomplishments and share their steps to success with the team. We amplify the success stories throughout the global sales organization and the company. People take great pride in telling their stories during these sessions, giving them a moment to shine and help their teams improve.
Our team is fueled by our cumulative successes. We love to get together and celebrate. While internal competition is friendly, make no mistake about it, it is there; everyone wants the top spot! When you have people who truly care about each other, the company and their customers, it’s rewarding to celebrate together. We work as a team, and recognizing that success together is hugely rewarding.
