Issue: September 2005

Industry Projects High Demand For Employee Retention,
and Morale-Building Incentive Programs

It’s all in the numbers and directly tied to the emerging retirement of the Baby Boomers. Every year for the next 30 years, Baby Boomers will be retiring en masse, while the number of Americans entering the labor market will not be enough to replace those who are retiring. According to a 2000 Bureau of Labor Statistics study, there could be a shortage of four million workers by 2006, and by 2010 there could be 10 million more jobs available than there are employees to fill them in the U.S. A labor shortage of those dimensions will cause the cost of acquiring new employees to skyrocket. As a result, more and more companies are turning to “employee retention and morale building incentive programs. Here are just some of the incentive applications around which employee-focused retention and morale-building programs are being developed:

• Improve Safety/reduce accidents
• Peer-To-Peer Employee Recognition
• Employee Recognition and Rewards Programs
• Generate Cost Savings Ideas
• Years of Service Program
• Holiday Gift Program
• Quality/Productivity Improvement Program
• Employee Wellness Program
• Employee referral programs (recommend new hires)

Important Planning Considerations
There are an infinite number of ways to develop and manage an employee-focused retention and morale-building program. The following are general guidelines for what must be put in place to effectively initiate, develop, launch and implement an effective employee-focused incentive program.

• A corporate-wide all employee program must be derived from specific goals which can be clearly measured and effectively communicated.
• The program must be “packaged” or positioned in a clear, concise and memorable format.
• Senior management support is essential, however “buy-in”, commitment and support must come from all levels of management.
• Specific program initiatives must produce measurable results that directly impact the bottom line and deliver substantial ROI.
• All elements of a corporate-wide all employee performance program must be linked to the achievement of specific and clearly defined goals.
• Participating employees must be presented with timely awards at a value commensurate with their efforts and contributions. A base award earning opportunity should form the foundation of the program and be linked to achievement of corporate goals. In addition, instant award and discretionary award opportunities should be present to generate ongoing enthusiasm and reinforce the overall importance of the program.
• The program must be clearly, effectively and frequently promoted in order to build awareness and maintain enthusiasm and excitement

Are You Getting All The Business You Can From Your Existing Customers?

Does the thought of prospecting and building new customer relationships appeal to you? If not, maybe you should go back to the well and dig a little deeper to uncover new business opportunities from your current customers.

Most sales professionals would agree it is easier to work with existing accounts to increase sales volume than to prospect for new business. However, getting more business from your current customers can sometimes be a daunting challenge. Here are some basic tips for going to the next level with your existing clients.

Earn Your Right To Be At The Planning Table
The best and most successful way to penetrate existing accounts is to be invited to your clients' sales and marketing planning meetings and sessions. In other words, be at the planning table. At this point you have the ability to directly work your capabilities and resources into their marketing and sales plans. The only way this becomes possible is when you have successfully established yourself as a reliable resource and, more importantly, an authority on your clients’ business.

Do Your Homework
If your client is a public company, get a copy of their annual report. Learn as much as you can about every division, product line and distribution channel they utilize. Find out who their competitors are and how they stack up against them. If you can, try to learn how their competitors are utilizing the same services or products you are providing.

Know Their Website
If they have a website, visit it and become familiar with its content. Company websites can have a wealth of information including how the company and its products and services are presented to their customers, who the company senior management is, an account of the company history and copies of recent press releases or news events. Don’t overlook the links to sister companies where you could possibly duplicate the incentive or recognition program your are already supporting.

Ask Questions
In addition to offline and online research, ask questions. When you have your client's attention get him/her to tell you about their sales and marketing goals, the obstacles they face, the marketplace challenges and distribution channel problems. The more you can get them to talk about their business and the challenges they face, the greater your ability to identify new business opportunities. Also, you should ask for recommendations about who else within the organization you should meet to learn about problems and challenges from another perspective.

Live A Day In Your Client's Shoes
One of the best ways to get to know your client's business and identify problems is by spending time with your client in their marketplace. One salesperson once spent a day working behind the counter in a McDonald's restaurant. He was looking for a way to penetrate deeper into the account by presenting crew incentive recommendations to help them reduce employee turnover. To effectively develop and present incentives to motivate 16-20 year-olds, he needed a better understanding of what life was like during an average day. As a result of a day “in the trenches” he established credibility and was able to justify his recommendations by recounting what had been learned “on the job” and in interviews with crew members and store managers. A new door was opened at an existing account!

A Never-Ending Process
To successfully penetrate an existing account, you need to work at it constantly. Aggressively look for opportunities to get in front of your client to learn of new challenges, opportunities to present them with solutions. If you've done your homework, established a reputation, and are perceived as a solutions resource, you are certain to expand the volume of business. Much more than if you just waited for them to come to you.

PFI Offers You The Products and Services You Need To Penetrate Deeper Into Your Existing Accounts
Here are just some of the ways PFI can help you further penetrate your existing accounts with products and services developed to achieve a wide range of incentive program objectives:
 

Continue reading this newsletter for more information about these value-added PFI products and services


It’s Almost Time For The Annual Motivation Show—Look For Us At Booth 2748

Once again, PFI will have a booth at the annual Motivation Show which will be held at the McCormick Center in Chicago, September 27th - 29th, 2005. Joy Smith, Mary Ann Comotto, Joyce Dale and Jim Kapcar will all be attending and welcome you to stop by and discuss your incentive needs.


You Can Save Time, Resources and Money by Partnering with PFI

If you are planning to add incentive program development and support services to your product mix, we can help you put your plans into action. With the largest collection of stock catalogs in the industry, a team of merchandise buyers to offer custom solutions, a customer service and support department second to none, you owe it to yourself and your clients to check out how a partnership with PFI is the perfect solution to delivering incentive programs to your marketplace.

Adding incentive program fulfillment to your company’s capabilities is easy with PFI. We are ready to help you with all facets of developing, presenting and implementing merchandise incentive award programs.

We’ll see you in Chicago!


Contact PFI For Your 2004 Corporate Gift Needs

The holiday corporate gift-giving season is already here. If you or your customers are still procrastinating or even trying to decide whether or not to put a corporate gift-giving program in place, PFI can help.

First, consider this statistic. A study recently completed by the Promotional Products Association International (PPAI) shows that vendors and suppliers who gave out corporate gifts were twice as likely to increase their chances of being contacted by customers as those who didn't have a gift program. Good will aside, corporate gift programs are a solid business development strategy.

There is still time to plan and implement a corporate gift program and PFI has a simple and effective solution. We have an attractive holiday gift cover that can be bound on all of our plateau award collections. This means you have 13 gift levels at 13 price points. This translates into complete flexibility to implement a program that meets your budgetary requirements.

Plateau levels 1-8 are already bound and ready to use. Levels 9-13 can be bound at your request in whatever quantity you require. There is no easier way to introduce a corporate gift program than picking up the phone and giving us a call.

To order a Holiday Gift Collections contact sales at 1-800-292-7371 or e-mail us at
sales@spihq.com.

Odds and Ends . . . How PFI Is Dedicated To Your Success!

PFI Worldwide

Well, nearly worldwide. As has been reported in previous newsletters, PFI had developed strategic award fulfillment partnerships in both Europe and Mexico. Through these merchandise fulfillment partnerships you can provide your clients with the ability to implement incentive programs that include merchandise rewards in all European Union countries and Mexico. This means your clients can run completely independent programs in these areas of the world, or include client participants who reside in these regions in existing incentive programs. The real value is that all awards are shipped within the countries. This means no import/export hassles, no customs brokers and, more importantly, no currency exchange issues. For more information contact sales@spihq.com

Don't want to present a catalog?
Let PFI Customize Your Incentive Merchandise Selection

PFI is an industry leader when it comes to merchandise sourcing and award fulfillment. PFI supports 8 award catalogs and an online awards collection of 2000+ items. If it’s out there, PFI buyers will find it. What that means for you and your clients is that if a general lifestyles merchandise catalog does not meet your client’s needs, PFI buyers will work with you to research, source and fulfill a custom merchandise awards selection. Custom award selections can be used to uniquely appeal to a target audience. Examples include:

• Youth oriented award collection (18-24)
• Gender-focused award collection
• Travel-related merchandise selections
• Business related merchandise
• Theme related award collections ( music, electronics, golf, sports, fitness etc.)

If you need a unique merchandise selection, PFI stands ready to help and support your efforts. It is our goal to provide you with the resource you need to bring value to your customers and help them achieve their goals.
 

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