Announcing MAXRewardsNOW: Say “Thank You” to Your Essential Employees
Extraordinary times call for extraordinary action, which is why we are proud to announce the launch of the MAXRewardsNOW program. We want to help you implement an easy-to-set-up rewards program, with high perceived value to your employees. It will save you time and resources–all while giving back to those who go above and beyond for your business.
Introducing: MAXRewardsNOW
It’s an immediate, cost-effective way to show appreciation for the individuals in your organization when they may need it the most. Instead of only saying thank you, attach a reward to it, and make their day.
Say “Thank You” in Three Easy Steps:
- Purchase a block of rewards valued at $25, $50 or $100 each
- Give them out to show your appreciation
- Team members redeem and feel rewarded!
Benefits:
- No set-up costs
- Low investment
- High-engagement rewards
- Immediate and practical
The best part is, MAXRewardsNOW is highly-flexible to meet the needs of your most valued team members. Your recipients can choose from more than 50 restaurants and retailers.
Your team steps up for you every day. Give back to them. Contact us and we will help you to implement MAXRewardsNOW at your organization today.
Get to Know ME with Shannon O’ Shaughnessy
Shannon O’ Shaughnessy is our Get to Know ME spotlight employee this month. It just so happens it’s her anniversary month working at Motivation Excellence! Shannon is a wizard with data and helping our clients set and track goals that tie back to a company’s bottom line. Take a few minutes to get to know Shannon in her own words.
What’s your title and how long have you been at ME?
My title is Senior Program Manager, and my 9th anniversary is this July.
What’s something special about working at ME that you’d like to share?
I couldn’t pick a better group of people to work with. Not only do we treat each other like family, but this is a group of hard-workers who pride themselves on going above and beyond.
Have a special story about a client interaction that you still smile about?
I had a participant who wanted to send me flowers, to thank me for helping him figure out an issue with his account.
What’s an unknown or odd talent you have?
Not sure if it’s a talent – but I can read and write backward and upside down!
What motivates you to accomplish things in your life (work or personal)?
In my work life, what motivates me is knowing that our clients and participants are happy and a program is successful.
What do you enjoy doing outside work?
Reading, astrology, hanging out with my pets, watching documentaries
One thing that always makes you laugh is?
My silly dog, Billy.
If ME didn’t stand for Motivation Excellence, what could it stand for?
Masters of Engagement
What’s the most interesting former job you’ve had?
Coaching pee-wee soccer at a park district.
Why You Should Make Charity a Priority at Your Company in 2024
How can you encourage charity in the workplace? Here are a few suggestions we practice ourselves.
5 Reasons to Not DIY Your Meeting & Events Planning
If you have a company-wide or customer event or conference to organize, you may be looking to save a few dollars by handling the event internally. If you’re a small-to-medium business, it may be easy enough in-house: pick a local venue and coordinate with on-site staff. But it might not be so easy when you have multiple locations, sites, or people to deal with. “What could go wrong?” you ask.
Turns out, a lot.
Here are five reasons a DIY-meeting idea might not be the best option
1. There are only 24 hours in a day
Planning a conference, meeting, or launch event quickly becomes a full-time job in and of itself. There are so many aspects to consider: what location or venue? Have you sourced the hotel? Who’s attending? What’s the budget? What vendors are you using? How about contracts? Concessions and attrition clauses?
You also need to think about your audience, coordinating with the team, and how you can balance their needs while being mindful of cost. It’s no easy feat, especially if that’s not your only responsibility throughout the day.
2. Going over budget
If you’re planning and managing the event yourself, it’s easy to get lost in and overwhelmed by all the details. This has the potential to lead to confusion among employees and customers and – inadvertently – a blown budget. If you’re new to event planning, the little details add up. You may think you’re getting a great deal, only to find surprises in the venue’s small print which can add up to hundreds or thousands more in other fees and add-on costs you didn’t expect. Having relationships with vendors will help, but they will not necessarily help you find the best deals.
3. Problems at the venue
Even for seasoned professionals, it’s inevitable that something will go wrong once you’re at the venue – but it’s all in how you prepared you are and how you handle it. Since you don’t own the place, you can’t control every little thing – and this is where having a professional to take away those problems come in handy. It’s also a good idea to have an emergency plan in place, especially in terms of weather – what happens if the venue you’ve selected was hit by a hurricane just weeks before your event?
4. Disengaged employees
This is a fact. A Google search for “corporate” or “office events” shows hundreds of articles answering the question, “Must I attend that dreaded company event?”
Unless it’s a very well organized and engaging event, employees will find any reason they can to excuse themselves. Or if they attend, they may not participate at all. It takes experience and a good understanding of what motivates employees to put together an event that will keep them engaged and will help them come back to work re-energized and ready to contribute more.
5. Not seeing the forest for the trees
When organizers get into the weeds of organizing and managing an event, they often run the risk of forgetting who it is for. With customer-focused events in particular, you may be so focused on the details meant to make them feel welcomed and appreciated that you won’t have the bandwidth to connect in a personal way.
Customer appreciation events are a great opportunity not just to entertain but to listen and learn from your customers. What are some of the problems they are facing, what has changed, what are they looking forward to? Don’t miss this important opportunity to connect and show you care about them.
Done for you means less stress, happy employees – and your time back
At the end of the day, having an event planned for you instead of trying to manage it yourself is worth it for the stress reduction alone. And let’s admit it, no one wants to expend so much effort only to hear later, “I’m so glad it’s over.”
Having an experienced team to work alongside you to iron out the details will not only save you time and money but will also lead to a memorable experience your audience won’t soon forget.
Motivation Excellence Named One of Chicago’s 2019 Best and Brightest Companies to Work For!
We are honored to win this award! Read the full press release below.
Motivation Excellence, an award-winning sales and channel engagement firm, specializing in sales growth, building market share, creating channel loyalty and enhancing meeting engagement was named one of Chicago’s Best and Brightest Companies to Work For® in 2019 by the National Association for Business Resources (NABR).
Each year, companies throughout Chicago compete to be named one of Chicago’s Best and Brightest Companies to Work For. Only organizations that distinguish themselves as having the most innovative and thoughtful human resources approach can be bestowed this honor.
An independent research firm evaluates each company’s entry, based on key measures in various categories. They include Compensation, Benefits and Employee Solutions; Employee Enrichment, Engagement and Retention; Employee Education and Development; Recruitment, Selection and Orientation; Employee Achievement and Recognition; Communication and Shared Vision; Diversity and Inclusion; Work-Life Balance; Community Initiatives; and Strategic Company Performance.
Motivation Excellence CEO & President, David Jobes said, “We live by our mission statement, Inspire Extraordinary Performance, where we pride ourselves in offering an innovative and empowering environment with a focus on community involvement for our team.
“Our culture centers around how we impact people’s lives for the better and that starts with our own colleagues. Winning this award is a validation of that, we remain committed to focus on how we can inspire people to achieve greatness, however they define this.
“The war for talent is raising the bar each year. Team member expectations continue to grow and our clients continue to evolve. Each of our solutions and services leverage our clients’ organizational culture, target specific goals, create unique experiences and build best practices for engaging their top performers and channel partners. It is all about achievement, relationships, and putting people first. That is how we define excellence at Motivation Excellence.”
Over 1,200 companies participated in the competition. Motivation Excellence and 175 other organizations were selected.
How to Escape the Commodity Trap
Commoditization, a lack of meaningful differentiation, drives products to have razor thin margins that are differentiated and bought only on price. Unfortunately, we see it far too often:
- Supply Chain/Sourcing driving for a low price
- Contractors don’t see product cost/benefits
- Amazon making it easy for customers to compare prices and availability without picking up the phone
Distribution companies are recognizing the world is dramatically changing and are finding ways to escape the commodity trap by de-commoditizing and differentiating themselves beyond price:
- Segmentation: Driven by market research and analytics, segmentation serves as the foundation of where to focus time and investment
- Determination: A mind shift and attitude to de-commoditize by saying “no” to less profitable customers/markets and “yes” to new higher profit markets. The decision of where to compete accounted for 80% of the differences in growth in a McKinsey & Company study of the 100 largest U.S. corporations
- Product, brand and service differentiation: Expanding the markets served such as MRO, safety, fluid power, power transmission and the industrial market
- Innovation: Being positioned as the market leader for innovative new products and technology then adding value via knowledge and expertise
- Bundle: develop a package of complementary products and services around commoditized products to provide long-term value
- Customer Experience: Maybe most important, create an environment that serves the customer, empowers and enables employees to deliver and finally, drive a customer-centric culture
If you have not read it and are looking for a practical approach to get above the commodity business, check out Blue Ocean Strategy. Recently updated with fresh content, the book discusses how cutthroat competition results in nothing but a bloody red ocean of rivals fighting over a shrinking profit pool.
New Year, New Sales Performance Tips
Kick off your 2018 sales performance initiatives with the latest best practices.
So, the champagne has run dry, the wreaths are back in storage, and for many, the new year’s resolutions have already fallen by the wayside. But 2018 is still a new year and an opportunity for a fresh start, especially for your sales performance.
Start by asking yourself: what’s holding your sales team back?
What benchmarks did they set in 2017?
Welcoming a New Era: Announcing David Jobes as Our New Owner
We are thrilled to announce that David Jobes, our former President , has officially taken ownership of the company, effective January 22, 2018. David now holds the title of owner & CEO. The change takes place as our former CEO, Greg Lewis, announced his retirement earlier in the week. (more…)
How to Show Your Channel Partners Some Love
Put the “partner” back in channel partnership with smarter engagement.
Ever hear of the 80/20 rule? It applies to a lot of scenarios, but as a distributor, dealer, or manufacturer, it particularly rings true for you: in short, you get up to 80% of your business from 20% of your customers and partners. So, whether you realize it or not, loyalty is a huge part of your business. Even so, unlike the B2C world with its big networks and even bigger budgets, you can’t afford to lose a few thousand loyal followers.
You want to keep your best customers while attracting new ones. So, to graduate from “just another loyalty program” to “I’ve gotta get in on this!,” you just have to keep your channels engaged.
Uhm. HOW DO YOU KEEP YOUR CHANNELS ENGAGED?
Back to Incentive Basics: Types of Incentive Programs
Get to know the types of incentive programs you can use to drive performance.
When it comes to motivating your team in this day and age, you’ve got multiple types of incentive programs to choose from. But while that can be a blessing, it can also get confusing, and fast. What works for one organization might not work for yours. How much do you spend? Who’s eligible? How do you figure out the best incentive program for you?
It’s OK to feel under-informed and overwhelmed at the same time. But don’t worry, we’re here to help. Whether you’re rebuilding an old incentive program or starting from scratch, let’s introduce (or review) the different types of incentive programs available.
But first, the basics BEHIND the basics:
Know your business. And know your people.
That’s it. Learn ‘em, love ‘em, live ‘em. If you don’t follow those two simple instructions, no incentive program you come up with will ever hit the mark. Now, once those are covered, how do you choose the right way to motivate your team to achieve higher performance levels?
- Define clear goals: What are you trying to accomplish, and why? Is it achievable? Is it measurable?
- Set your budget: If you’re developing your first program, start small – you don’t want to set a bar you can’t reach next year. If you’ve run programs before, leverage your existing data to determine the most bang for your buck.
- Consider your audience: Is age a factor? What about location and demographics? You don’t want to reward your beach-loving Hawaii rep with a North Face parka. What will motivate them? What’s worked well with past incentives? What’s relevant and valuable? And what will make your people feel appreciated?
This may seem like a lot of questions, but the more you can answer now, the more successful your program will be. Now, once your homework is done, there are three basic buckets of incentives to consider for your program:
Cash and Bonuses
This is still the easiest, most common, and often the first type of incentive people think of. But while cash is king, it’s not the most personal option, and can be easily forgotten. And, although cash can be an effective motivator to hit goals on a deadline, many organizations (and recipients) don’t tie this incentive to a specific goal, often relegating it to an end-of-year bonus for overall performance. To make this option work harder, consider tying it to specific tasks or goals, and then putting the cash towards an experience or personal goal, like finishing a degree, learning to sail, or putting a down payment on a car.
WORKS WELL FOR:
- Sales teams
- Employees (company-wide)
Points-Based
With this type of incentive program, recipients earn incrementally and have significantly more personal choice in their award than a check at the end of the year. You can set your program to accrue points based on sales, leads, calls (for call centers), or any other desired action. Then, much like popular loyalty programs, your people can cash in their points for experiences, travel, merchandise, or gift cards whenever they choose, whether it’s one gigantic top-tier item, or several mid- or lower-tier items.
WORKS WELL FOR:
- Sales teams
- Employees (company-wide)
- Distributor/partner programs
Travel Incentives
One of the best ways to reward your people with experiences rather than “stuff” is the travel incentive, which is often tied to larger goals over a longer period of time, and awarded to an elite group of performers. You choose a destination and event that fits the culture of your business – but also one your people aren’t likely to get to on their own (high-profile conferences, conventions, concerts, or festivals come to mind). Once goals are set, either individually or as an organization, progress (sales or other metrics) can be tracked to determine eligibility for the group travel experience, and just like that, you’re making memories worthy of your company’s “About Us” page.
WORKS WELL FOR:
- Sales teams
- Network marketing teams
- Distributor/partner programs
So, there are the basics – a good starting point if you’re just ramping up your incentives journey, or rebuilding your program. Need help taking the next step? We work with you to ensure that every base is covered, every incentive is meaningful, and you get just the right fit for your business and your budget. Just contact us today to get started.
