How incentive travel programmes drive sales performance & business growth

There’s never been a more important time for businesses to generate new sales leads to grow market share and profitability. Sales teams are at the heart of stimulating business growth, and those that work in sales would attest to the highly competitive and challenging nature of the role. Motivation is key to meeting and exceeding sales targets and retaining and building customer relationships.

A carefully designed and executed incentive travel programme can increase sales productivity by 18% and produce a return on investment of 112%, according to Incentive Research Foundation. Further, a study conducted by Aberdeen Research showed that 100% of best-in-class companies (those with the highest customer retention and sales growth) offer group travel incentives to motivate sales teams to enjoy a 3-times higher increase in revenue.

Incentive travel programmes help drive positive outcomes by giving organisations a competitive advantage, motivating increased sales, and keeping a focus on short-term goals by showing appreciation for performance, and delivering memorable experiences to employees along the way.

Travel provides employees with an emotive connection to the business and brand by creating unique, shared, and memorable experiences. The opportunity to enjoy a once-in-a-lifetime experience with like-minded people is an enormous motivator for sales teams to hit their targets and a fitting reward for hard work.

Benefits of incentive travel for organisations

Implementing a motivational incentive travel programme is a strategic investment in employees; one which drives business growth and delivers a return on investment. They encourage collaboration and alignment with business objectives. Recent Site Global research indicates that a focus on soft power benefits such as company culture, engagement, and relationships along with hard power benefits like financial return on investment, increased sales, and market share remain key for future incentive programmes.

According to a research study conducted by Incentive Research Foundation, the presence of reward programmes resulted in an average 22% gain in performance compared to organisations offering no reward programme. For incentive travel programmes in place for longer than six months, average performance gains leaped to 44% for individually-based rewards, and 48% for team-based rewards. Further, organisations with effective incentive travel programmes enjoyed 31% lower voluntary turnover.

Cash versus travel incentives

Travel is powerful in motivating employees because it touches on employee emotions through experience. Cash incentives don’t provide the level of social capital or the aspirational goals that travel rewards do. Money is something people generally don’t discuss, but a great memorable travel experience will be spoken about for years to come.

The announcement of the travel incentive programme provides those eligible with something to look forward to. Some may have a ‘fear of missing out’ driving friendly competition to ensure their place on the programme is secured. The reward programme can be used as a regular and recurring internal communication piece, with successful employees and the trip destination creating a focal point in the lead-up, during, and post-event. Travel provides a broad range of content material (images, videos, social, and blogs) to share internally and externally to promote your business’s investment in its people and culture.

Incentive travel programme management

Managing a successful incentive travel programme can be a large task. There are many things to consider such as:

• What is your objective and outcome for the programme?
• Are the goals measurable?
• How will you launch, communicate, and drive engagement?
• What is your budget?
• Will your destination (or content) of choice drive motivation, engagement, and results?
• How will you manage the logistics: pre/post extensions, group movements, and last-minute changes?
• What memorable, meaningful, and inclusive activities will you include? Is it a unique, creative, and fun money-can’t-buy experience or something aligned with your corporate values or sustainability objectives?

Using the services of an event travel management company can ensure your incentive travel programme delivers a return on investment for your business and an exceptional experience for your employees. Working with a professional and specialised team means you can focus on your core business and leave the planning and execution to the experts. An event travel management company can deliver:

• Personalised guest experiences
• Streamlined online registration
• A complete travel and event management service; air, hotel, ground transport, activities, and entertainment
• Themed and creative ideas and solutions
• Communications
• Return on investment (ROI) reporting
• Destination management and onsite logistics, including on-site staff
• Technology solutions – registration, booking, reporting, event apps, and onsite support.

By enlisting the expertise of CTM Meetings & Events (CTM M&E), you can put time back into your day and have confidence that your high-performance sales employees are going to have a trip of a lifetime, inspiring and motivating them to continue to deliver positive results for the organisation.