The Power of Workplace Incentives: Strategies to Drive Performance

Incentives and rewards are powerful tools your company can use to increase motivation, enhance workplace performance, and improve retention rates. Whether you have a staff prize wheel in the breakroom or hand out performance rewards every time your team members reach their sales goals – these small initiatives are powerful tools your team can use to enhance the workplace experience and push your team toward success. 

If your company isn’t currently using rewards to connect with employees, it could contribute to your team’s disinterest in the sales processes. To help combat burnout and boredom – we put together a list of six ways you can use workplace incentives to drive performance. 

Let’s take a closer look:

The Importance of Workplace Incentive Strategies  

It’s not always as easy as it seems to build a thriving workplace that’s motivated and goal-oriented. Whether it’s the end of the year slump, mid-week burnout, or you expect your team to reach unrealistic goals. 

The best way to combat these problems creatively is by incentivizing your team. Incentives help your business drive motivation and can improve sales performance over time. When your team clocks in to start their day, they’ll feel inspired to go the extra mile if they know they may receive something in return.

Six Incentive Strategies For The Workplace

Over 70% of those companies use at least three to six different incentive programs in any given year. These tools can motivate employees to take their success to the next level – top companies everywhere recognize that.

If an incentive program or strategy is what you’re missing from the workplace – you’ve come to the right place. We put together a list of incentive strategies to help you brainstorm new ways to build connections with your team and keep them inspired by their success. 

Here are six strategies to consider:

Set Up a Staff Prize Wheel 

A staff prize wheel is a great way to generate excitement when your team comes to the office. When they see the prizes are on display, it will motivate them to tackle tasks head-on and inspire sales urgency. It’s also a great way to highlight the different rewards you have up for grabs. 

Here are some ideas:

• Extra PTO
• Gift Cards 
• Cash Rewards 
• Concert Tickets 
• Sporting Events 
• Free Services

If you want some additional inspiration, you can use our Spinify Sidekick. You can generate prize recommendations on Spinify Prize Wheels and in the Spinify Rewards store, tailoring the suggestions that align with sales organizations.

Gamified Leaderboards 

Leaderboards are goal-tracking boards that show your sales rep where they are with their sales goals and how their progress compares to their coworkers. When they clock in for work, they’ll see their standings and can strategically think through a game plan to slowly make their way to the top. 

With this game element, you can create your own experience for your sales team. You can customize your leaderboard to only show sales data for the month, quarter, or annual goals – aligning your team’s goals with your bottom line. 

To keep your team engaged with the leaderboard throughout the workweek – consider displaying sales data that aligns with short-term goals. This will ensure that your team doesn’t burn out throughout the week and actually feels motivated by the rewards you give out multiple times a year, not just at the end of the year. 

You can also use sales gamification software, like Spinify, to display leaderboards on the TVs in the office. Our platform uses your sales performance metrics so you can track your progress in real time, so your team will always have a pulse on the current standings. 

Utilize Progress Bars

Progress bars are a gamification tool that helps your team visualize their own success. A progress bar can help your sales reps understand their current standings and create a strategy to help them get a few steps closer to achieving their goals. Every day when they clock in for work, they’ll know where they are, what they need to do, and how their sales compare to their team members. 

As a sales manager, you can use progress bars to inspire friendly competition. Consider setting mini-games that drive your team to push themselves. Whether you’re giving a cash prize or a gift card to a winner, these rewards will encourage your team to go the extra mile during the workweek. 

Host Meetings to Recognize Employees

Recognition is vital to your company culture and keeping your team happy. When you take the time to recognize top performers during weekly all-hands meetings or on Slack – you’re showing your team that hard work never goes unnoticed. 

Consider highlighting your top performers at the beginning of every month. Also, keep an eye on your sales data throughout the week in case big deals come through – so you can recognize your team in real time for their achievements. 

With the Spinify App, you can streamline your recognition using our AI-driven tool, Spinify Sidekick. This tool can help you create a series of badges and provide badge suggestions based on your team’s sales data. So you’ll always have a way to recognize their achievements in real-time, even when days get busy. 

Use Gift Cards and Cash Rewards

Gift cards and cash rewards are the oldest tricks of the trade. A recent study suggested that over 73% of employers use cash rewards as incentives, and 55% use gift cards. They are a relatively low-cost reward that will appeal to your sales reps. 

As a leader, you can use these rewards and incentives to inspire your team to push themselves professionally. Whether it’s a reward at the end of the month or for winning a sales competition – these small jesters can improve company morale and keep your team engaged with their workweek tasks. 

Celebrate Less Obvious Accomplishments

Every workforce always has that one overachiever. The one that has charisma and is excellent at making connections with current customers and prospects. But if you’re always rewarding them for their goals and accomplishments, it will make the rest of your team feel left out and discourage them from the sales contests, competitions, and goals you set for them. 

Instead, consider other accomplishments you can celebrate. Here are a few sales contest ideas for inspiration:

• Books most demos books in a month
• Sends the most emails in a week
• Improved cold calling 
• Adds the most new customers into the sales pipelines
• Best retention rates
• Highest win-back rate
• Most improved 
• Most deals booked or highest revenue for a period
• Winner of a mini-competition or sales games

Incentive Your Team With Spinify

To get the best return on investment, you want to create an incentive strategy and use incentives that appeal to your team. You can gauge your team’s likes and dislikes by using surveys and questionnaires. You can also test different tools, like Spinify, to find new ideas to inspire your team and keep them engaged. 

Spinify is a sales performance software designed with your team’s success in mind. We use the power of gamification and AI to help you create innovative incentive strategies and provide sales training games that complement your company culture and push your team to go above and beyond with their sales goals. 

Ready to inspire your team and create urgency in sales – the fun way? Book a demo today to learn more.