Okay! So if you want your organization to reach its highest potential, you need to get your best from your sales team. It’s but obvious that one of the most important work teams of an organization is the sales team. As a leader/manager of an organization, one must have the Leadership skills to keep your sales team motivated all the time.
Motivating your sales team is not always an easy task, you have to come up with new ideas and ways to keep them motivated. One would always tell you that there are a few basic ideas that would always work. Yes, to the extent they work but you have to make some changes to those basic ideas too. A company always has its own motor skills but getting new ideas is always helpful. You could also review some Sales training programs if that helps.
Motivation can have two sides to itself; the positive and negative outcome. Of course, everyone wants to see a positive outcome and for that, you also need to have good Leadership Skills.
So here I am listing down 10 steps to motivate your sales team which according to me will work in most
1. Measure and Reward behavior, not results:
Rewarding behavior is important. As only then the sales representatives will know that you care for them and are not just bothered with what the end results are. Yes, results are important but if you cannot engage with the hard work your sales team is putting in, then it is a waste.
For e.g. If you give your sales representative the task of selling 20 electronics to a single customer and he manages to sell 15. It is clear that he has worked hard for which he should be appreciated.
Therefore, first, acknowledge what a sales representative has put in to get good results, and then give feedback. This will make sure your sales team has a clear path to success and everyone will be rewarded.
2. Celebrate Success:
The word success means that you have achieved something. So for anything that is achieved you would want to celebrate. The same way sales representatives expect a celebration on a successful day of sales.
Success is not always easily available. Whenever something impossible is achieved by your sales employee make sure to boost his morale. This will help him in selling products in the future.
For example, if an automobile sales employee is asked to sell a non-terrain vehicle in a mountainous area and he succeeds, make sure to reward him on his return.
3. Set Clear Goals:
Every sales representative of an organization works towards achieving a goal. But, if the goal itself is not clear to him, then it gets difficult. You cannot have goals like, ‘there is a target of 100 that have to be completed’. That is confusing as to what the 100 refers to. Instead you could set a goal like ‘a target of 100 products to be sold with complete customer satisfaction’. This sounds more clear and is easily understandable. Having short and clear goals will keep the sales representatives in focus as to what to work towards.
Also keep in mind your goals shouldn’t sound too blunt. Like; “we want maximum profit by the end of the year” or “get me sales of 100 products by the end of the day”. No! that puts too much pressure on the salesman. Be a little kinder when you are putting your goals out to your salesmen. For e.g. you could say “let’s work towards getting the best profits we can achieve” or “let’s get as many people to buy our products today”. Once goals are in place all activities should naturally align.
4. Competitions:
Having competitions amongst your sales representatives is always a go-to method of keeping them motivated. It also helps in better results in the overall picture. Competition must always be healthy because unhealthy competition will lead to jealousy and fights amongst the sales representatives.
Now the thing about competition is that there can be positive as well as negative competition. Therefore, it is necessary to get your Sales motivation training bang on.
For e.g. Have basic competitions like ‘make two sales groups’
- Indoor sales group
- Outdoor sales group
Now the competition you can have is; the group that gets the most sales for the month will get one free half-day in the following month.
5. Positive Showing-off:
What is a positive showing-off firstly? Positive showing-off is a small activity. Like, when a sales employee finishes his work, he can make a burst of loud laughter depicting that he has completed his work first. With this process, you will get your work done faster, and there will be a light-hearted atmosphere in the workplace.
Like competition, there are two sides to a picture here too. Sales representatives might go too far with this process. For e.g. if they keep working towards getting things done first, they will lose out on the quality of work.
Therefore, be sure to keep things under control with this process. If successful, these activities, drive team spirit, boost positive competitiveness and make everyone feel a part of the company’s success.
6. Give and request Feedback:
Feedback is as important as a student’s annual report card. Sales Employees tend to make adjustments to their work on the feedback they receive from their manager. Also, it is good to receive feedback from your sales employees to know how you should make changes to your management skills.
A salesman will always be open to receiving feedback. As it helps him/her in their work. But, as a leader you must also be open to feedback so that the sales team know that you are a listener.
Be sure to give immediate feedback. Getting feedback or giving feedback at the end of the year on a topic that happened at the beginning of the year, does not make sense.
7. Play Games:
Playing games is nothing but just to relax your sales team. Games make your employees less stressful about daily work. Games have always resulted in a positive way.
Playing games can also be used as an incentive for sales representatives. You can have games like indoor cricket, pool, football, human chess, tug of war, etc.
The best example of an organization using games is GOOGLE. Google’s offices all around the World have a very gaming friendly infrastructure. They have pool tables, table tennis tables, indoor golf mats, etc.
There is a saying “all study and no play makes Jack a dull boy”. The same way all day if salesmen work without any other activities it will cause boredom.
8. Incentives:
Incentives are one of the most important things to keep your sales team motivated. Every sales employee working for an organization looks forward to getting some incentives. As children itself, parents have given us the habit of working for incentives. Like, our parents would always tell us you do your homework and you will get to play.
Incentives of an organization can be of any type, monetary as well as non-monetary. Most organizations don’t like giving monetary incentives as it feels like a hole in the pocket. Sales employees are always motivated to work better if they get some extra money.
Non-monetary incentives are much easier to give because it does not really affect the accounts of the organization. These incentives would include promotions, having games, holiday covers, mediclaims, etc.
9. Usage of Graphs for your training Programs:
Graphs are always more flashy and interesting when referring to targets and performances. Nobody would want to read long paragraphs on how they have performed over the last few weeks.
Graphs tend to attract a reader’s attention. This means, if a manager uses graphs for his/her Sales Training programs then it’s for sure you have the attention of your sales team.
A very basic example of using graphs is by asking a question; “Would you want to read a long lengthy paragraph about your heartbeat or would you just rather want to watch the heartbeat graph machine?”
10. Communication:
By communication here I don’t mean Hi! Hello!. Communication here means having a proper chain of communication between sales employees and management. Communicating with each other is very important. Only then will the sales employees know what they have to do each day at work.
For e.g. there should be communication devices all around the workplace. This will help the whole department get tasks at the same time and nobody misses out.
I would not like to work in a place where communication is not clear. I don’t want to ask 10 different people what the task is for the day.
As the sales team we all like bonuses, so here is one bonus tip from my side to all my readers, at this too is an important tip;
11. Increased Visibility:
Visibility and transparency are very important to a sales employee. Every sales employee wants to know what is happening in the organization and does not want to stay in the dark.
For e.g., If you ask a sales employee to sell an electronic product of which he has never been briefed before he will be lost.
I have put out these amazing tips for you. Now you can reply in the comment section. Do tell me, which one of these tips will help your organization grow and succeed.
nimabi
Thank you very much for sharing, I learned a lot from your article. Very cool. Thanks. nimabi