With apologies to Jeff Foxworthy of "You might be a redneck" fame, I bring you my list of "You might want to talk to a different incentive company if..."
Not in any order and not nearly as funny - but more than true.
They talk about "prizes" instead of awards.
Prizes are what you get based on chance. Awards are what you get based on effort and performance. Any incentive company that talks about prizes doesn't understand people - or your business.
They say "won" instead of "earn."
See point #1 - winning is function of chance - not of effort. No one wins in an incentive program - they earn.
They guarantee your program will "pay for itself out of incremental sales."
It's possible - but not guaranteed. If your top performers sell more than your poor performers it's possible. There are many programs that reward the participants based on incremental volume (or profit) which means those individuals only earn if they sell more than their goal. But if everyone else sells less - you're in negative territory man. Not only that, there are fixed expenses in every program - managing the data, communicating, etc. There is no guarantee.
They use the word "incentivize."
I know some of you disagree - but I'm somewhat of a purist when it comes to words - and there are many others that do a better job.
They think a "top performer" program is an incentive.
In order to reduce budgets many companies run programs that award only the top 10% of their audience. That's not an incentive program - that's a recognition program. When you announce a top 10% program you're really announcing a bottom 90% program because that's the percentage of people in your audience who already know they can't "earn" the "award."
They tell you to "mail" something monthly to communicate the program.
In today's email-twiiter-blog-IM-RSS driven world monthly print communications using snail mail should be ONE of the many ways you communicate. Monthly mailings are so 1950's. C'mon - get in the game!
They say... "all you need is (fill in the blank.)
It's never a single recommendation. Performance is a function of a lot of different things. Your strategy for driving performance should be more of a portfolio of activities targeting different behavior triggers. Sometimes it's awards - sometimes is competition. It's never one thing.
They use "case histories" of success from a different industry and different audience group to prove their capability.
There are very few companies, audiences and markets that are similar enough to just overlay a program. If so - why would you want parity with past programs? Wouldn't you want your program to be the result of learning something from that program and upping the ante? I don't want last year's iPhone - I want the 3Gs.
My catalog is bigger...
(giggle) Sorry - I'm still a teenager at heart. But c'mon folks - with amazon.com playing in the incentive space - no one's catalog is bigger anymore.
More Choice is Better
Not always - it's better because I'm more likely to find what I want. It's worse because it is harder to find what I want. Too often participants are paralyzed by too many choices. Ask your provider how they intend to help the participant work through their "bigger" catalog and find what truly will motivate them?
Am I right or am I right or am I right...
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Marketing and Incentive Design Consultancy