Page 66 - DMGT507_SALES AND PROMOTIONS MANAGEMENT

Sales and Promotions Management

Notes
Productivity also improved. Telus saw its total annual sales transactions grow from 1,328
to 16,656 for two years after the implementation of its enterprise incentive management
system. In total, the company achieved a 103 percent return on investment by the end of
the first year of deployment and an astounding 3,316 percent ROI by the second year.
Esteem and a Sense of Belonging
Moving further up the modified Maslow hierarchy, we come to two principles that are
closely linked in terms of motivating a sales force: the need to belong and feel a part of a
group, and the need to be held in esteem and receive recognition.
One important aspect of belonging and esteem is the respect accorded to individuals by
senior management. But recognition from a peer group is also critical to motivating the
sales force.
Joannou describes it this way: "There are two things that Nortel has never stopped or
changed, even through challenging economic times. One is our annual sales conference,
where we bring our sales team together, both to interact with each other in a forum
setting, but also to do peer recognition. You get the sales team up there on stage and you
reward them in front of their peers. That is hugely important to them."
The second thing Nortel has never changed is what Joannou and his team call their "circle
of excellence." With this program, he continues, "we take the top 10 percent of our sales
force and treat them to an all-expenses-paid trip to a nice location. One reason we've never
cut that program, despite all of the cost pressures, is because it motivates your best
performers to do even better because they want to be a member of this elite group."
In planning social or peer motivation programs, companies must bear in mind that such
programs should be keyed to the transactional speed of the business. When a sales force is
selling business solutions and not just products, the sales cycle is generally longer.
The shorter sales cycle for transactional sales, on the other hand, means that sales results
must be posted at least once a month, and perhaps even more frequently. The posting
itself becomes part of the reward, as it is a form of public peer recognition. Those results
generate financial rewards as well, cycling back into the more basic elements of
compensation-based motivation.
Creativity is often the key to devising meaningful recognition programs that have an
impact on individual performance and the bottom line. At one company we have worked
with, the top 10 percent of the sales force is rewarded with the authorization to hire an
administrative assistant. It is an interesting case of the "rich getting richer," since these top
performers can then leverage the additional help to generate even better sales. And the
turnover rate for that level of the sales force is not just low; it is zero percent.
Fulfillment of Potential
At the highest level of Maslow's motivational hierarchy is what he called "self-
actualization," which we have expressed more simply as the fulfillment of potential.
People have an instinctual need to make the most of their unique abilities, and they
advance toward that goal by having the conditions in place – which often means acquiring
new knowledge and skills – that enable them to take on ever-greater challenges.
Understood in this context, it becomes clearer why such a high percentage of salespeople
around the world appear so unmotivated and disengaged from their work and seem to
lack a commitment to their organizations. The complexity of the business environment
often means there are deep structural obstacles preventing salespeople from living up to
their potential.
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