There are many ways to motivate someone. A well-structured sales incentive program can take your business from good to great. And one of the best ways to motivate your top performers is with a President's Club.
Motivating different individuals is a tricky business. It can take different strategies to motivate people – even if their situations are the same!
In other words, motivation is a complex psychological process. To effectively implement, it requires the use of a myriad of tools and approaches.
In business, trying to figure out the best combination of these tools can lead to much handwringing. You may wonder how in the world you’re going to motivate Person A to do Task B.
Understanding and overcoming this challenge, in fact, is why incentive programs exist.
Finding the Right Sales Incentive Program
Unsurprisingly, different incentive programs solve different challenges in your business.
Sales incentives are not just one-size-fits-all solution. You can use them to achieve any number of different goals. For example, to motivate under-performing personnel. Other examples include capturing greater market share and accelerating sales of specific products.
What Is a President's Club?
One type of sales incentive program that flies under the radar does so because it happens to be one of the more traditional strategies. A President’s Club is sometimes referred to as a Chairman’s Club or a Diamond Club program.
This type of incentive program is often designed for a company’s top salespeople. It's typically built around a high-end travel award that brings high-performing individuals to an exotic location.
But when it comes to motivation, President’s Clubs function a bit differently than other sales incentives. Most incentive programs have a main goal of improving incremental, year-over-year sales growth. Meanwhile, President’s Clubs function more as a recognition program.
It’s a status symbol reserved for the highest achieving salespeople in an organization. Any good President’s Club program should build them with this in mind.
Choose Your Sales Incentive Program Wisely
What this means, however, is that a President’s Club program isn’t for everybody.
For example, if you have a bunch of underperforming salespeople that you’re looking to motivate, this type of program might not be the best approach.
That’s because it could either end up alienating your best sales performers by lowering the bar for achievement. Conversely, its structure could leave many in your middle 60% feeling like there’s just no way they’ll ever reach the goals you’ve set for them, so why even try?
What a President’s Club can do, on the other hand, is motivate your high achievers by recognizing them as such.
These are your MVPs. A program that helps them earn enough points for a new TV probably isn’t enough to really move the needle for them.
That’s why an exciting incentive travel experience is most used and should be the focus of this type of sales incentive program.
Furthermore, keep in mind that a President’s Club isn’t really an incentive program, it’s a recognition program.
It’s not designed to help your salespeople do something they’d otherwise become unmotivated to do (i.e., sell more effectively). Rather, this type of program recognizes and rewards them for who they already are, and what they’re already able to do.
In this way it’s also a great retention tool, as it will keep these top people engaged and present in your company throughout the sales cycle to achieve the reward (namely, the trip) at the end.
And hopefully, if your President’s Club program is successful, you can run it again the following year to motivate the top people who tend to bring in the most business for you.
The Three "Rs" of Motivation
Without question, the decision to use a President's Club program to motivate top performers offers significant benefits.
While not a traditional incentive program, President's Clubs are a strategic recognition program. At a time when companies may fight to keep top talent, recognizing your top salespeople is an important endeavor. A well-structured program will hit the three "Rs" of motivation: Reward, Recognize, and Retain.
Reward
According to a 4-part study from SITE Global, incentive travel continues to be a highly motivating incentive.
For example, 95.5% of top performers were somewhat motivated, motivated, or extremely motivated to earn their reward. No surprise there. But what's shocking is that 90.7% of those that didn't qualify for the reward were similarly motivated.
This shows that incentive travel programs, like President's Clubs can motivate employees to reach higher for rewards that have meaning to them.
Recognize
The Incentive Marketing Association found that companies who recognize their employees regularly outperform companies who don't, by 30 to 40%. According to a Deloitte study, 1 in 4 employees want recognition for the work they put in, not just the big wins. Not only that, but 85% of professionals want a "thank you" in day-to-day interactions.
In a culture where recognition for daily tasks is highly valued, well-structured incentives like a President's Club can go a long way to making your top performers feel valued.
Retain
A recent Gallup poll indicates that employee turnover is at the highest point since 2015. In fact, 51% of U.S. employees are watching or actively seeking a new job. What's worse is that replacing leaders or top performers comes at a cost of 200% of their salary.
Perhaps more interesting is the fact that employee attrition is in most cases avoidable. Of the employees who exited their jobs, 30% say they would stay for higher pay or increased benefits. Incentives could have a role to play here, especially when it comes to incentive travel. At a time when professionals are looking for more, President's Clubs can be an effective way to retain top talent.
Hit the Three R's of Motivation with a President's Club Program
These three Rs—reward, recognize, and retain—are what a President’s Club program is all about.
If you’re able to structure it effectively and target the right people, this type of program can motivate your top performers to maintain or elevate their great performances consistently throughout the sales cycle.
To learn more about how to motivate your top performers, check out our Incentive Travel Playbook to get the most out of your President's Club program.
