Alex Tatham is the non-executive director for CI Group, one of the UK’s leading marketing agencies with a specialism in IT and Retail.
Alex’s recent blog for the CI Group focuses on the all important Distributor Call-Out Day, and Alex provides 10 suggestions on how to maximise results, to ensure the time, money and effort spent on them is well invested. We focus on the first 5, and if you would like to know all 10 suggestions, you can find Alex’s blog here.
Solutions to Making Distributor Call-Out Days Effective
- Ensure there is a financial sales goal agreed with sales management
Marketing departments shy away from this as this puts a level of risk against claiming success. However, it does buy in senior management from both vendor and distributor and has the advantage of ensuring that the effort is worth it! All sales staff involved should have financial targets commensurate with their account base. However, frequently sales cycles for products are longer they have been so these targets can be created over a reasonable time period (a month – no longer than 3 months).
- Don’t make payment of MDF from vendor conditional on hitting targets
This makes it unattractive for the marketing team. However, whilst marketing can claim for the call out activity in full, any incentives paid to sales should be conditional on achieving the overall objective. This is not always practical (eg experiences) but if possible allocation of prizes can be held back until sales management agree proof performance – not just on the day but also for the period.
- Always combine training with the day
At least there will be value for all parties and any incentives should be conditional on attending training. If possible, combine with official sales accreditations that vendor offers or those that resellers have to go through. This gives strong reinforcements to the vendor and the distributor a PR opportunity to differentiate from competitors. It provides value for distributor employees and sales management. It will also last much longer in the memory than a cupcake!
- Experiences are better than physical prizes
Team building activity and time away with vendors can provide reward, camaraderie and a chance for further vendor engagement. Gifts are forgotten quickly and if withheld due to lack of target achievement can provide a disincentive. Money should be in the form of vouchers (for tax).
- Don’t be annoying
Constant sales floor disruption can be very distracting. Most distributors work on open plan areas. Loud games are annoying to those not involved.
- Make it more targeted
Looking for 6 to 10? Look no further than Alex’s top 10 solutions, found here.
