The Key to Motivating Sales Teams

Taimour Azizuddin

The single most important mechanism for motivating sales teams is the sales commission structure. Salespeople want to earn more. No matter how many pizza parties or Starbucks gift cards are promised to a sales team, their earnings potential will always be more important. The commission plan is their starting point to find ways to increase their earning potential, and they are intrinsically motivated to execute against it. 

The key to motivating sales teams is minimizing differences between the behavior required for desired business outcomes, and behavior incentivized by the sales commission structure. 

A well designed plan should create a win-win situation, leaving both parties satisfied. If salespeople are motivated based on their earnings, and their earnings are tied to behaviors that drive positive business outcomes, their motivations are essentially driven by positive business outcomes. Sellers will always find ways to gamify their plans; when plans are closely tied to positive behaviors and outcomes, however, gamification becomes a good thing and helps the business succeed. 

If commission plans are designed well, the sales team should be highly motivated. At that point, it’s up to sales leaders to set realistic targets, empower their reps to execute, and provide guidance and coaching when needed.

Subscribe to our updates

Latest news, best practices, and industry insights - stay up-to-date on everything you need to know about sales compensation!

Sign up for our newsletter, we promise not to spam you.
Thank you! Your submission has been received!
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.

Why Palette?

Automate calculations

Automate sales commission payments. Create commission rules, define a payout schedule and access monthly statements for each sales rep.

Motivate and coach with real time dashboards

Motivate sales professionals with real-time visibility into commissions. Coach your team, align everybody with company goals and drive long term sales performance.

Compare, simulate and design commission plans

Roll out new commission plans with ease. Compare plans and simulate new rules with a single click.

No more errors

Palette keeps history logs and tracks every calculation detail, helping you to reduce sales commission errors.

Reconcile revenue with CRM data

With Palette you can reconcile invoices and payments with CRM data and pay commissions to your reps only when the money is in the bank.

Create challenges with one click

Incentivize your teams on short term goals. Create a challenge targeting any KPI you want to uplift, drive better results and boost your company’s culture.