November 10, 2025
by Mary Clare Novak / November 10, 2025
The start of a new sales period is full of optimism: fresh goals, clean pipelines, and the belief that this will be the quarter that breaks records.
But as weeks go by, motivation often slips, and even top performers can lose steam. Motivating a sales team isn't about one-time pep talks or generic quotes. It takes a structured method based on consistency, empathy, and performance metrics, supported by tools such as sales performance management software.
Sales reps are most motivated by performance-based incentives, including commission, bonuses, and recognition. Clear career advancement, achievable targets, and autonomy also drive motivation.
When done right, motivation becomes part of your sales culture, not just a temporary boost. This article explores 10 proven strategies for sales team motivation to keep them inspired and prepared to meet their targets.
A motivational sales quote or two might do the trick in motivating your sales team for a little bit. But something as important as the productivity of your primary revenue generators shouldn’t rely on a string of words. After all, actions speak louder than words.
Here are ten sales team motivation techniques that should be in constant motion to keep your reps inspired and wanting to deliver results.
Getting to know your sales team and how they work best, both as individuals and as a collective unit, is a vital part of any sales management strategy.
Because feeling inspired appeals more to the personal side of things, this practice becomes even more important as you look for ways to motivate salespeople and ultimately drive results. Leaning on a generic approach here might offer a quick fix, but long-term, it’s best to understand your team and match a technique to who they are.
Besides getting to know them, your sales team also needs to trust you to feel motivated by you. A person will only feel properly inspired if they know the motivator has their best interest in mind.
Observe each person on your sales team, and then do the same for the entire group as a whole. Do your best to identify any challenges or goals specific to each person. Even set aside time to sit down with them and ask them directly why they’re there, what makes them feel inspired, and how you can help.
Make it clear that you understand that everyone’s personality is different, and that you are willing to tailor your management style to fit their needs.
Don’t make this a one-off interaction. As a leader, you need to nurture your team with consistent check-ins to make sure everyone has what they need to work at their best. Ask them point-blank how you can foster trust in the workplace.
Perhaps one of the most defeated feelings in sales is putting in the time but not seeing the results. Prospective customers can choose to exit the sales pipeline for a number of reasons. Whether it be that they don’t have the budget or their company is redirecting their attention to another solution, there are times when it is no fault of the sales rep. However, they might still feel disappointment.
Accompany every sales quota, conversion rate goal, and revenue expectation with an activity metric. Examples of activity metrics include the number of prospecting calls made, the number of emails sent, and the number of meetings scheduled with prospects.
While you want sales professionals to close deals, placing too much emphasis on that one north star can be disheartening if it isn’t reached. Hitting a sales activity goal will offer a sense of accomplishment for reps, helping motivate them to find the best way to make those activities worthwhile by closing a deal.
Tip: Before setting sales activity goals, you want to be sure reps are having effective conversations with customers. Check it with top conversation intelligence tools on G2.
There is value in communicating long-term sales goals. Seeing potential accomplishments shows sales teams that you believe in them and what sales forecasting has calculated they’re capable of. However, those annual sales goals shouldn’t stand alone.
Set short-term goals for every quarter, month, or even every day. Making progress during those shorter periods will only make the long-term goal seem more attainable, boosting the team’s motivation and inspiration. Similar to activity metrics, translating an overarching goal into something more achievable on a weekly or daily basis will fuel a sense of achievement.
This is another reason why getting to know what makes your sales team tick is important. For some, it’s the long game they love. For others, they want to walk out of the office every day feeling like they checked something valuable off their to-do list.
Determine what will have the most impact and allocate expectations accordingly. Even if someone doesn’t feel the burn of short-term goals, you can set them for the purpose of tracking progress on your end.
When it comes down to it, incentivizing your sales team can go a long way.
Many people immediately think of money when they hear the term 'incentives.' There aren’t a lot of jobs, especially in the B2B SaaS world, where it makes sense to offer someone more money for doing a good job, but sales is one of them. If someone on your sales team closes an exceptionally valuable deal, they should be monetarily compensated to reflect that revenue, right?
A good place to start when finding the right way to encourage reps is with your sales compensation plan. Make sure it includes incentives, whether that be through a commission-based payment plan or with bonuses associated with certain milestones here and there.
While monetary rewards are effective, there are other things you can offer your sales reps that also qualify as incentives. Create a contest where the winner gets an extended long lunch break or an extra vacation day.
Not every salesperson will feel motivated by the same incentives. This is another reason why you need to know what works for each sales representative and then find an appropriate incentive to motivate them to work toward it.
If you’re hesitating to make these “sacrifices” to boost motivation and performance, remember the time and energy your sales reps put into generating revenue for your business. While substantial salaries are important, candidates are looking for more than that from an employer. Additional incentives, such as compensation and benefits, can give you a competitive advantage when it comes to hiring top talent for your sales team.
We’ve all sat through a meeting that could’ve been an email. While coming together as a group can be good for camaraderie, long meetings without much unique information can be a huge time suck. Not to mention, they take away time from reps that could’ve been spent selling.
Ensure that all meetings with your sales team are absolutely necessary. If there are only a few key stakeholders required to discuss a certain topic or project, give everyone else that time back in their day to sell more or take a much-needed break.
You can also be strategic with this by cancelling unnecessary meetings towards the end of a month, quarter, year, or whenever people are going to have to push extra hard to meet their sales quota. Chances are, they could use that extra time to make a last-ditch effort to close a deal or take a break from all of the madness that comes with the end of a business period.
Similar to incentives, good-hearted team competitions can be a good way to motivate your sales team.
Whatever you decide to make of a sales game, it’s important that you abide by the following rules to ensure results and keep it friendly:
Making a game out of a sales goal is a good way to motivate reps, but it must be followed up with a reminder of the importance of teamwork and collaboration. Stress the importance of those values over any competition by rewarding things other than sales metrics, such as mentoring relationships or knowledge sharing.
People on your team are going to struggle to hit their quota during a certain time period. It’s inevitable. However, there’s a difference between a bad week and a noticeable trend of poor performance.
Identify areas where your sales reps are struggling and address the issue before it can cause significant damage to productivity. This can be done at both the individual and team levels. Offering constructive criticism isn’t easy, and that’s why you need to be strategic in doing so.
Give people time to correct their mistakes and identify areas for improvement on their own. If it gets too far along, have a friendly and transparent discussion to point out what you’ve noticed and brainstorm a solution.
As a manager, you need to be a coach committed to constant learning and sales training. Don’t show up with sales tips just after mistakes and losses. Be proactive in your commitment to building a capable sales team. Do everything in your power to enable and help them to perform. They’ll notice that hard work and feel the motivation to act on it.
Tip: Find bottlenecks in your sales process using the pipeline management feature in your CRM software.
A little appreciation can go a long way, making it an important aspect of any plan to motivate your sales team. There are a lot of ways to go about this.
The first is to celebrate the little things, the small wins that might not seem to have too much impact. There’s no need to throw a party every time someone schedules a meeting or gets a promising callback. However, offering kudos to someone after a good day on the job can make them leave feeling happy and come back the next day ready to do it again.
Have your sales team keep track of their wins. They don’t have to be directly tied to metrics, but rather any outcome they feel particularly happy with. These can be daily, weekly, or monthly wins.
Lastly, praise the group publicly. Some people might not be comfortable with so much personal attention, so doing this for the group is a safer bet. Compile those tracked wins into a group accomplishment announcement and share it with key stakeholders.
Your sales reps should always be aware of how well they’re performing against their current goals. Offering visibility into their progress as both individuals and a group will inspire them all the more by showing them how far they’ve come and how much further they have to go. It’s a simple tactic, but it can be effective in motivating people to keep working toward their goals.
Take this technique a step further and make sure to include progress in areas outside of sales quotas. Analyze qualitative goals and let people know the impact those efforts have, even if it isn’t directly tied to a number.
For most people, your career is what pays the bills. We have the jobs we have because they help us provide for ourselves and the people we care about. While that’s a big motivator to wake up every day and dedicate our time to the organization we work for, our jobs also offer the potential to find deeper meaning in our work.
Emphasize your company’s mission, vision, and values on a regular basis. Tie those notions with a sales goal, activity, or metric, and show the team the potential impact they can have. Find proof of the good your organization can bring to the people and community around you. Customer success stories, case studies, testimonials, and user reviews are going to be prime currency here.
This can also serve as a valuable reminder to consider who you’re doing business with. Are your customers making it easier or more difficult for your sales team to be motivated? Do they actually want to help these people, or do they not feel the human connection required to establish a positive, mutually beneficial relationship?
Sustainable sales motivation isn’t about hype; it’s about habits. The most effective teams stay energized because their leaders:
Even the best-intentioned sales managers can inadvertently lower motivation if their strategies aren’t aligned with what actually drives performance. If your team seems disengaged or stuck in a slump, chances are one of these common missteps is to blame.
Got more questions? We have the answers.
Effective incentives include a mix of financial rewards like commission accelerators and performance bonuses, as well as creative perks such as team contests, personalized prizes, and access to high-value accounts. The most impactful programs align with specific goals and are tailored to what each rep finds motivating.
Non-monetary incentives that drive motivation include extra time off, flexible work hours, public recognition, professional development opportunities, and leadership exposure. These rewards create long-term value by reinforcing autonomy, appreciation, and personal growth beyond just financial gain.
Underperformance is often tied to misaligned goals, lack of clear coaching, burnout, or insufficient motivation systems. Teams may also struggle when they don't trust leadership or feel disconnected from the purpose of their work. Addressing these root causes requires regular check-ins, feedback loops, and visibility into performance metrics.
The most motivating sales metrics are those that track meaningful progress, such as meetings booked, new opportunities created, pipeline value added, and activity conversion rates. When tied to achievable short-term goals, these metrics reinforce momentum and give reps a clear sense of control over their success.
Managers build trust by getting to know each rep individually, following through on commitments, and creating a culture of open communication. Engagement grows when reps feel supported, heard, and recognized, particularly when managers tailor motivation strategies to their personal drivers and consistently coach toward growth.
If you’re looking to motivate an entire sales team with one tactic, you’re already doing it wrong. Sales leaders need to get to know the people on their team so they can lead them in the most effective way possible.
When it comes to inspiring others, take the time to understand what motivates them to get out of bed in the morning and come to work every day. The rest should come naturally.
Ready to turn motivation into measurable performance? Explore G2's top nine sales peformance management tools to keep your team focused, hit targets, and stay motivated.
This article was originally published in 2021. It has been updated with new information.
Mary Clare Novak is a former Content Marketing Specialist at G2 based in Burlington, Vermont, where she is explored topics related to sales and customer relationship management. In her free time, you can find her doing a crossword puzzle, listening to cover bands, or eating fish tacos. (she/her/hers)
We can all agree that payday is the best day.
by Mary Clare Novak
If there’s any person that finds it almost impossible to walk away from a challenge, it’s a...
by Mary Clare Novak
Sales performance doesn’t fall apart all at once. It slips through the cracks of scattered...
by Harshita Tewari
We can all agree that payday is the best day.
by Mary Clare Novak
If there’s any person that finds it almost impossible to walk away from a challenge, it’s a...
by Mary Clare Novak