Make Sales Incentives More Exciting with Gamification!

Daniel Debow, VP at Salesforce says this about gamification,” It’s play that helps us do serious things better.”

Gamification was a buzzword for the tech community till a few years back but not any longer. It is a term that is becoming immensely popular in the non-gaming context, especially in the corporate sector. Infusing gaming aspects into the workplace is becoming a rapid trend. An increasing number of companies are embracing it with the hope that it will help enhance performance and more importantly, employee engagement.

Sales gamification may already be a part of your sales incentive program, even though it may exist subtly. For example, sales targets are assigned to each salesperson each month or quarter, and they need to ‘level up’ to get a reward, just like in a virtual game. Or, every quarter, your sales head must be ‘resetting’ the targets, again an essential aspect of an online gaming strategy.

Let’s dive deep into gamification in sales and find out how the strategy can make incentives more exciting.

What is Sales Gamification?

Gamification is about lodging game-like mechanics in a non-gaming environment with the objective of keeping the concerned people motivated and stimulated. Just like in virtual games, sales gamification entails encouraging salespeople to take action and providing guidance throughout the process. Keeping things competitive and exciting, the features are meant to appease the innate human desires of acknowledgment, achievement, competition, and status.

This is a technique that brings an ethos of gaming into sales tasks. Subsequently, the sales team can earn badges and points as they complete different tasks or levels.

The main purview of gamification is to use gaming mechanics and elements to make sales tasks more interesting and exciting.

Just like in games, there’s an undertone of competitiveness with gamification in sales. Consequently, there’s more engagement, fun, and focus as your sales team goes about completing their work ambitiously. The good part is that these techniques can be used to benefit the business bottom line, as in, get better sales, faster conversions, more leads, and so on.

Another aspect of gamification is that this methodology comes with automating many parts of the sales process. This gives each individual salesperson the time to work harder on the real sales challenges on the ground.

What do statistics say about gamification? One study by MarketsandMarkets shows that the market for this technique is growing at a phenomenal rate of 27.4% compounded annual growth rate. It further states that the APAC region has the fastest growth rate with countries like India, China, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia taking the major share of this technology.

Why Does Gamification Work?

Sales motivation is not just about money only, anymore. They want more. The attitude is more about winning a sales competition, making progress, and so on. This attitude can be fueled by using gamification techniques. Thus, you can expect more energy, more focus, and higher levels of excitement in the team.
Gamification automates the process where you can set monthly/quarterly goals for your team members in a realistic and achievable manner.
Gamification gives clarity on the progression path to the team. This is because the technique gives different kinds of incentives to different levels of performance. For example, a salesperson who has a got a few leads will get a different incentive than a salesperson who has clinched a few deals. With sales leaderboards, it is all visual - this means that everyone can see what gets better incentives or what is there at the next level and accordingly improve their performance.
Also, the technique encourages incentivizing all performers and not just the top performers. There’s something for everyone here. It helps create a fair workplace culture.

Gamified Sales Incentives - How To Go About It?

Sales incentive programs should be designed in a way that your salespeople are thrown out of their comfort zones and give them the motivation to achieve the given sales targets. Gamification can help with these elements:

Sales competitions or sales contests make the job engaging. For best results, create contests for all levels for better participation. In these contests, the salespeople are competing with one another like in a game with the purpose of achieving the mission.
Make a mission strategy for an incentive program or a sales contest. A mission is a gaming mechanic that pushes the team to perform high-value tasks to facilitate the achievement of long-term goals.
Missions end the guessing game because everything is clearly spelled out. For example, ‘The region that sells the maximum units by 31st December will get a fast start badge and 1000 points per person.’ This mission is a good way to encourage collaborative work.
Plus, a mission makes rewards instantly available. And you can tweak the missions as and when required.
The scoreboard or the sales leaderboard is another gift of gamification. As Vince Lombardi from Green Bay Packers mentions, “ If it doesn’t matter who wins or loses, then why do they keep score?” Winning is important and salespeople need to finetune their focus and performance accordingly. In a sales competition or contest, gamification allows your people to have quick and visual access to their progress and that of others. They can celebrate achievements, work better together as a team to achieve team targets, and even congratulate the top performers. Thus, there’s a positive competitive spirit amongst all and each tries to give their best and outdo the other, all in a friendly manner. Ensure that the leaderboards are displayed around the office for everyone to see them.
Gamification goes beyond the usual commission and cash reward plans to incentivize your salespeople. Point systems are used to get your people to do the desirable jobs - like points for making a cold call, giving a demo, generating leads, conversions, and more. Therefore, there’s the built-in concept of getting and redeeming points against a range of options. These could be merchandise or experiences, or any other form of reward that is usually out of the purview or budget of a salesperson. For example, a sponsored foreign tour for the family. This gives them the feel-good factor with, of course, the bragging rights within their immediate social group.
Peer-to-peer recognition is an integral part of gamification. With sales leaderboards and transparency, everyone comes out to appreciate the good work of a fellow team member.
Badges are the best way to recognize people for their work. It’s a psychological need and will motivate your people endlessly. Badges should be given only for inspirational or recognition-worthy work.

Conclusion

Gamification can do a lot of good. It’s a powerful tool in your weaponry to keep your sales team motivated and achieve the desired results.

Looking for a gamified sales incentive software. My Incentives is the perfect answer. Call us today for a demo!