In our previous blog article on gamification, we discussed that implementing some typical gaming elements to your recognition programme can help to improve employee motivation, learning and performance.
This time, we’ll be looking specifically into the benefits of sales gamification and how they can be applied to bring great results to your organisation.
What is Sales Gamification?
While competition has always been a powerful tool in sales to drive exceptional results, being able to gamify the sales team aims to make use of salespeople’s competitive nature all while encouraging positive behaviours with incentives and technology.
Making a game of the entire sales process is a great way to always keep motivation high at work.
Gamification tools such as real-time leaderboards, badges and internal competitions can all increase engagement in sales or channel incentive programmes.
Creates Healthy Competition
Gamification platforms and tools today often integrate the Sales data from the organisation’s CRM in real-time, which means that leaderboards and sales activity reflect personal, individual or team results as sales come in.
This feature adds another dimension to sales competitions as each sales person will be able to see how the other programme members are faring overall and what is required to climb the leader board without having to wait for the sales manager to update the scores every week or month, creating a healthy competitive environment.
Drives Goals and Productivity
Recognition that gamification provides, amongst peers and management, can seriously improve employees’ long-term engagement, loyalty and performance.
Rewards have their place, but sometimes it’s the journey that they remember most. Achieving regular and consistent praise through points, badges status, progression continually motivates your sales team and partners on a daily basis. And in their desire to achieve more and quicker, they will work harder and faster.
Also with set KPIs, each programme member will know exactly what is necessary for them to earn a reward or the remaining sales or tasks to complete before reaching a defined goal within the programme.
Increases Team Collaboration
Although gamification usually focuses on the individual, when teamwork is valued and rewarded, you will find that collaboration between team members increases.
Rewarding players for demonstrating best practices or bolstering confidence in lower performing team-mates, seeking and receiving advice from those who have already earned a badge, there are lots of ways to foster a team mindset.
In channel incentive programmes, leader boards or competitions across locations can create a sense of unity between independent resellers for instance.
It Makes Work More Personal
By driving clear outcomes, salespeople can better see how their performance is improving and how they compare to their peers. Furthermore, incentives can be personalised with custom messages or a defined value, rewarding individuals in a way that suits them.
“Gamification by Design” co-author Gabe Zichermann states: “Gamification is 75% Psychology and 25% Technology.” You can also create badges that represent your organisation's company values which can shape employee and partner behaviour over time.
It’s Not a Flash in the Pan
The beauty of gamification is that it scales up without additional expense as rewards are virtual (status, power, recognition). Gamification is becoming mainstream rather than reserved merely for start-ups or millennial-heavy companies.
As you can see from the Google Trends graph below, gamification started to become a popular search worldwide in early 2011 and has continued to rise steadily as more and more people are becoming aware of the term.
Gamification is on its way to becoming the norm in sales departments and will become expected from sales people joining the workforce in the years to come.
Gamify Motivation Conclusion
Using gamification to motivate sales teams is an incredibly powerful and effective tool with which to boost sales revenue, productivity and motivation in your sales or channel incentive programme.
From rewarding positive behaviour to creating healthy competition, it’s a must-have for every sales team.
Interested in how gamification tools can help your organisation? Get in touch with one of our experts today! You can also read more about our sales incentive platform here.