Effects of Covid-19 on Sales Incentive Compensation Policies

The world is so dynamic now, more than ever before. Everything is evolving constantly and keeping up with it is a task. Traditionally sales were a seasonal game. Policy changes were minimal and sales teams knew their target markets beforehand, basically, everything was pre-planned in advance and nothing was impromptu.

Now, companies need policy modifications almost every week. The sales plans are dynamic and the teams need to be incentivized based on them. Just for example purchases on Diwali in India may not be as high as the sales teams expected them to be but on the contrary, the sales might pick up weeks before Christmas before people embark on their holidays. Hence the incentives cannot be seasonally aligned based on past sales. Incentive policies are expected to be flexible and instantly deployable.

Take the financial sector for example, because of the pandemic (covid-19) there was a steep surge in the sales of health policies. If a salesman was able to close maximum deals during that time then he/she should definitely be rewarded. This requires financial institutions to be able to take instant decisions and also bring those decisions to life in the form of incentive policies.

 

Impact of Covid-19 on Sales Incentive Plans

 

Blackbird and bluebird scenario checks

Blackbirds are unpredictable events that impact sales negatively and bluebirds are unpredictable events that shoot-up sales. Every financial institution needs to be armed to accommodate any of these circumstances into their sales incentive policies and in a very agile manner. Zero-Code policy modelers are a great help here. They remove the dependency on IT, third-party vendors to make changes in the policy plans. They are simple to use and anyone (even a non-IT folk) can make changes to the plans and put it up in action.

 

Interesting read – Why are Incentives still Computed Manually in BFSI Industry?

 

 

Clear Communication with the Sales Teams

It’s now more than ever that you need to be super connected with your team and understand if they are getting accustomed to the new normal. Every organization has goals to achieve and sales quotas are clearly the most important ones. Having honest and clear communication with your sales team and encourage them to achieve their quota. Remember, their variable pay might be drying up and the pipe-line might look lean but with the right sales incentive policies and strategies their confidence can be boosted beyond boundaries.

 

 

Consider Short Term Bonus and Rewards

If a sales professional can churn up extraordinary sales even in this pandemic situation then they should definitely be entitled to a reward. Accommodating these short term/ time-bound bonuses into your policy plans quickly will only be a booster to your sales team.

 

Must read – 10 ways to Craft your Sales Incentive Plans and Achieve Pathbreaking ROI!

 

Is your Policy Modeling Platform Agile Enough?

Policy modeling and implementation is the most important part of boosting sales. If a financial institution has a policy model that has the below features then for them to accommodate any change in policies or to launch a new policy will just be a cake-walk.

  1. Zero-Code policy modeling platform
  2. Feature to test policies before making them live
  3. Easy to use tool, that can be operated by non-IT folks
  4. Real-time policy implementation feature

 

If your policy modeler has the above features then that’s incredible! But if now then it’s time to adapt an incentive compensation automation solution that will boost the game of sale in multi-folds. Check out the worlds best incentive compensation automation solution by ACT21 Software – Hyperform

 

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