5 Reasons Why More Sales Teams Should Embrace a Leaderboard
According to a Great Place To Work survey, employees who are recognized are twice as likely to go above and beyond. Leaderboards play a significant role in a sales team’s success because they:
- encourage a competitive spirit
- recognize and motivate employees
- improve training
- make goals easier to communicate
- keep your employees satisfied
Below we’ll get into more detail about what your sales team is missing out on if you haven’t already embraced the leaderboard.
Encourages healthy and friendly competition
Competition can encourage hard work and productivity. Just like on the sports field, vying for pole position usually sparks people to put in more practice, refine their skills and exert maximum effort.
Similarly, a leaderboard can help instill a sense of healthy competition driving your team to spare no effort in their work. It helps if the culture in your organization supports teamwork. So, put a framework in place to develop a supportive culture, for example, through:
- a sales training program that shines a light on teamwork
- work events to get employees interacting with each other outside the office
- creating more than one leaderboard so you can also recognize rising stars
Improves motivation and engagement
Seeing how the top performers are hitting targets can help motivate those reps who are struggling so they can push themselves to achieve more.
On top of that, it unmasks any excuses reps may have for falling below the bar. Disengaged employees tend to hide behind circumstances and events, for instance, blaming the CRM for failure to follow up on calls to prospects.
With a leaderboard, all employees can see how others are performing. Once reps see how high other salespeople are reaching, they are more likely to swing into action to pursue targets.
It’s also important to note that you may demotivate the other reps if you have only one leaderboard that showcases the same list of employees. Instead, try using multiple leaderboards based on different metrics. For instance:
- email open rates
- calls completed
- revenue from new business deals
- new accounts acquired
Improves training outcomes
Leaderboards can be a powerful tool for providing the right data to fine-tune your coaching programs. With leaderboards, management can quickly pinpoint where the sales team is performing best, and the processes more members struggle with. These insights can help you augment and refine your training which can contribute to your team’s improved performance.
You can use this information to develop tailor-made coaching which helps your sales team hit more targets.
In addition, all team members can easily visualize how they are performing making it easier to track their performance. Management can also easily identify weak links in the team and decide on a plan of action.
For instance, if the same person is always falling short of targets even after coaching and training, it’s usually time to part ways.
Easily communicate goals
Leaderboards make it easy for everyone to see the targets for each period. Reps can easily see the performance targets. To make the process more effective, management can consider linking the leaderboards to the CRM.
By connecting the leaderboards to the CRM, the boards will update in real-time, helping salespeople keep an eye on goals. Management can also track the results or training programs in real-time without the need for tedious reports.
In addition, the gamified nature of leaderboards provides a visually appealing method of communicating goals. Visual cues tend to help improve memory retention.
In addition, you can use interactive software to make leaderboards fun and interesting. For example, you can use sales TVs to display the leaders with custom backgrounds or GIFs, which can help create positive associations.
Promotes job satisfaction
Leaderboards provide an excellent way to recognize the exceptional performers and those showing the most improvement.
When employees are recognized for their efforts, they feel valued and are often more satisfied with their jobs, helping your company retain top talent.
Remember to keep your leaderboards dynamic and incorporate different metrics.
Stimulating your sales with leaderboards
Used correctly, your leaderboards can motivate your team and promote job satisfaction. You can also design better training programs and communicate goals clearly. So, consider using leaderboards to spur your sales team to success.