Play Versus Work - Why You Need A Sales Contest
Last post we talked about sales contests and we brought up the fact that we, as humans, would rather play than work.
Need proof ?
See how quick you can find a reason why you can’t when your spouse asks you to run to the grocery on Saturday morning. I can come up with 12 excuses in less than 30 seconds to get out of that terrible chore.
You know…worked hard all week, need my rest, blah, blah, blah.
Now, let one of my friends call and ask if I can fill in his foursome at a nice golf course and you’ll see how good I feel and how quick I can get ready.
We all love to play and we all would rather get out of working.
Thinking of those who loved to play and hated to work, I quickly come up with the name of Tom Sawyer.
You can believe that Tom would have made a great sales manager. Remember the story of how he conned…er, I mean convinced his friends to whitewash the fence. Aunt Polly told Tom to get ‘er done and he did. Tom acted like he was an artist and all his friends wanted to take a turn at ‘painting’. He made ‘em think he was having fun and he soon had more help than he could handle. And to make it even better, they were paying him for the ‘honor’ of painting.
Nobody can explain all the quirks of humans and their peculiar nature. You can, however, make good use of all of these tendencies.
Put this tendency to good use by convincing your salesforce that it’s fun to work harder, while trying to win a prize.
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2 Responses to “Play Versus Work - Why You Need A Sales Contest”
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Thanks for the posting – it is one of my hot buttons.
So many are afraid of play. Afraid it will get out of hand. But play is an important way to arouse excitement and passion.
Without play and the passion it generates many sales professionals are vanilla.
The ancient Greeks knew that passion (pathos) was a key element in persuasive speech.
No play then maybe little or no passion. No passion then maybe little or no persuasion. No persuasion then little or no sales.
Let them play! It’s good for the bottom-line.
You said it better than I ever could have !
Thanks for coming by and for a comment that was better than my post.
We’re all better because of readers that join in like this.