Convention Club, part two

In a previous post, I shared with you the impetus behind and the success of my Convention Club program. You can click here to read that article: Convention Club part one

Today I'll be outlining the types of business-related activities that you may want to consider when implementing a Convention Club of your own. Many demonstrators run "Business Bucks" or "I-Did-It! Dollars" programs where their downlines are rewarded with money to spend in the catalog either monthly or yearly. These would all be great activities for that sort of reward program, too. And if you're an orphaned or abandoned demo with no support system, consider making up your own reward program, by writing down SU products or fun things that you can "earn" next to the business-boosting activities.

I'll also be sharing some things I learned throughout the inaugural year of this program, which was experimental and top-secret until I'd been through a round of it. I try very hard to only allow advice on this blog that is both tried and true, so even though I was dying to tell you about Convention Club, I hope you'll understand and appreciate my reasons for holding off.

You'll notice I have not assigned point/dollar values to the activites listed below. You should develop your own values based on how important the activity is to you. I strongly suggest that you make sure your team knows you are experimenting with the program and will be making changes as needed so that the system works for everyone, including yourself. Some are one-time tasks; others may be applicable multiple times or every month. Be sure you crunch those numbers and put limits on the number of times a certain activity will count for points. For instance, I didn't want the same person bringing the business topic at every team meeting, so I limited the points they could earn for that task to once per quarter.

If you have more questions about Convention Club after reading all three articles, please feel free to leave a comment (I will not be able to respond via email due to the volume of interest on this topic). I will be adding a FAQ post as Part Three on this topic. But remember, while I aim to be helpful, ultimately you will need to develop a Convention Club that is tailored to the growth areas you want to motivate in your own team, which will be different from mine. So as I stated before, I will not be sharing my actual chart and booklets.

Here are some activities you may want to use when you put together your reward program. I have roughly broken them down by area of growth.  Remember that these are just suggestions and you will not want to use all of them. I suggest that for the best chance at creating balanced businesses in your downline, you select activities from all three areas.

1. Business Growth
2. Personal Growth
3. Group Growth

Business Growth Activities: These are tangible behaviors and events for celebration that I give out rewards for at my monthly meetings. If the person is not in Convention Club, they just pick from my prize basket while we cheer for them; if they are in club, they write it down in their booklet and I initial my approval of the points earned at the end of the meeting.

• Recruit a new team member  
• Recruit at least one new downline a month for three months in a row
• Promote to Senior Associate
• Promote to Supervisor
• Promote to Senior Supervisor
• Promote to Manager
• Promote to Senior Manager or Above
• Promote more than once in a year
• hold your own downline meeting at least once per quarter
• acheive Great Rewards for the quarter
• personal sales of $500-$999 a month
• personal sales of $1000+ a month
• beat Lyssa (insert your name here) in sales for the month
• first/second/third place in sales for the month
• start a stamping blog or subscribe to the DBWS and email me the address

Personal Growth Activities: These less-tangible business-boosting tasks are designed to help my team grow as leaders, strengthen professionalism and integrity, and gain personal confidence. Leadership skills can be taught if they are not innate. Professionalism will help them carry on through awkward situations that may arise. Integrity, something I require of all my demonstrators, needs to be fostered. Confidence is attractive to others. Stampin' Up demonstrators are leaders, and I want my team to be equipped to deal with the success that will come from their hard work.

• read a business motivational book and share a short book report at the group meeting
• listen to/watch a Stampin' Up business-related webinar or video and email me your notes
• listen to a CD from my library of past SU events and summarize for me via email
• download the Upline Handbook template and personalize, then email to me
• attend a regional seminar during the SU year
• attend Leadership Conference during the SU year
• get published in a trade magazine and/or mentioned in Stampin' Success
• Stampin' Success contest winner or honorable mention, or featured artist article
• be selected as a Workshop Wow presenter/Make N Take Helper/Display Stamper
• enter to be on the Artisan Award Design Team
• purchase My Digital Studio and professionally print a finished project, bring to meeting
• learn and add a new social media outlet to your advertising repertoire. Present results to the team after three months and then again after six months

Group Growth Activities: I believe that the stronger and more involved a group is, the less likely recruits are to drop out. In addition to improving retention rates, a healthy, happy team with lots of relationship ties will help everyone be successful at whatever level they choose to work their businesses. I feel strongly that our meetings be fun, informative, timely and full to the brim with solid business and stamping tips. As I mentioned in Part One, I chose to add in some tasks that you might not need to reward your team for because they are already doing it without additional motivation from you.

• share a business topic with a handout at the monthly meeting
• bring a project to demonstrate for the meeting with typed instructions/template
• bring a Make N Take for the whole group
• present a My Digital Studio project from start to finish on the big screen at the meeting.
• organize one of our quarterly charity fundraisers for the whole team to participate in
• organize and edit an entry for the Convention Commercial Contest
• participate in the group meeting swap at least seven of the ten monthly meetings. 

I welcome suggestions for other tasks in these areas of growth. Please leave a comment below and share it with all of us if you have ideas or if something has been working for your team. Check out Part Three of this series, which will hopefully answer any remaining questions you might have about the Convention Club program.

Comments

[Gail K]

Thank you for this Lyssa ... I'm already thinking of how to implement a broader rewards program for my team ... and your list of "rewarding activities" is VERY helpful!

[Meg]

Lyssa, I am reading this for the second or third time.... I am ready to prepare and make the leap with this new calendar year. Thank you for putting yourself out here and for sharing all of your hard work with me and others. I will definitely share back and look forward to seeing how this can inspire me and my team.