10 Sales Team-Building Exercises to Strengthen Your Team

Summary:

• Implement a Virtual Salesfloor for collaborative selling and live coaching without distractions.
• Enhance learning and team spirit by attending sales conferences together, suitable for both in-person and remote teams.
• Utilize gamification to improve sales performance and motivation through competitive, collaborative, or fun sales games.
• Strengthen team bonds and enjoyment through food-related events and competitions, catering to both office-based and remote teams.
• Promote team health and unity with group fitness activities, encouraging participation through a dedicated Slack channel.
• Foster a sense of community and purpose through charitable activities, including fundraising and local community service events.

The strength of your sales team as a whole plays a huge role in the success of the salespeople within it.

Sales teams can support each other’s efforts, teach and learn from one another, and encourage each other to continue growing for the company and for the customer.

As a result, team building is a crucial part of the puzzle when striving to reach goals together. Thankfully, there are plenty of great team-building exercises you can employ.

Here are 11 smart team-building exercises that will make your sales team stronger:

1. Virtual Salesfloor

A virtual salesfloor is the ideal way to bring to your team together to do what they do best - sell.

This immensely popular team-building tool works by providing a shared online platform where team members can make live calls together (AKA a call blitz). Smart controls provide valuable coaching and collaboration opportunities, without active reps interrupting or distracting each other.

If you're looking to create an environment that promotes fun, camaraderie, and genuine skills training, a virtual salesfloor hits all the right notes.

You can learn more here.

2. Go to a Conference

There’s a reason why sales conferences are so well attended and used to build successful teams: they work. Taking your sales team to a conference allows for learning and professional growth, but it also keeps everyone on the same page regarding strategies, initiatives and goals.

In-person events are ideal for building camaraderie, especially for remote teams who don't often meet face to face. However, online conferences or webinars are certainly an option as well.

3. Let the Games Begin

Educational research has proven over and over again that people often retain knowledge better when learning is turned into a game.

Gamification can improve general sales performance and motivation as well.

A live leaderboard - a reporting tool that updates KPIs in real-time - such as calls made, talk time, and appointments set - is a great way to do this.

You can make your sales games competitive, collaborative, or simply fun. Whatever path you choose, ensure that the game isn't too serious so as to detract from your goal of building unity.

4. Feed Your Team Spirit

Food is one of those rare things in life that virtually everyone is interested in and enjoys. So why not use it to help in your team-building efforts? Consider taking your team out to lunch, or cater a sales meeting as a reward every so often. Arrange a best-tasting dessert competition in the office, or make it photo-based (cupcake competition anyone? best halloween-themed food) for your remote team.

Our team uses Slack to host food/food-photo competitions and people really enjoy them!

5. Now Work It Off

As much fun as it can be to build bonds over food, you also want to promote good health and fitness. Besides, athletics is a great way to promote teamwork and leadership. It also helps with focus when the exercise is done.

Office leagues, team hikes, and friendly competitions are all great options.

Once again, creating a slack channel for fitness challenges works really well.

6. Giving Pays Off

Another way to build bonds is through charitable giving activities. You can keep it simple by encouraging people to fund-raise for an agreed-upon cause. Or just allow team members to donate privately to a cause they believe in - perhaps offering to match contributions. Even if the efforts are independent, they contribute to a positive company culture or work environment.

If your sales team lives locally, you can even go the extra mile and organize an event where team members come together to do something positive in the community.

7. Escape the Office

Why not escape the office for an afternoon of team building? An escape room challenge is a cooperative and fun activity the requires everyone to come together to solve puzzles. A scavenger hunt is another great option.

8. Award Nights

Consider a quarterly or annual award night to recognize achievements from individuals and teams. These events can be full of pomp or as relaxed as you'd like. Either way, they are a great opportunity to acknowledge and reward your team.

Awards don't just have to be for sales performance. You can recognize attendance, improvement, mindset, productivity, helpfulness, leadership, dedication, and more. Bring out the best in your team by showing them all of the different ways they can succeed.

9. Mock Presentations

Break up your sales team into groups. Then give each group the challenge of "selling" something related to your product or service to the rest of the team. Like in a debate, each team has to take a different side.

• Why feature X/Y/Z is the best feature.
• The best success story, and why.
• Why your product is better than that of competitor X/Y/Z.
• Why X/Y/Z is the best sales resource to use.
• X/Y/Z is the most effective sales outreach method.

Each team has to research and create a compelling argument for their side. In addition to helping them become better presenters, they also get to hear some valuable, well-researched selling points or sales methods that they can then use going forward.

Presentations can be made during a sales meeting, or for a remote team, conducted via video conference.

10. "Channel" Your Sales

Does your company use Slack or another collaborative messenger application? Create a channel for your sales team to ask questions, address concerns, and discuss strategy. It's a fantastic, and very simple way for team members to learn, lead, and build relationships.

11. Best Sales-Related _____

This idea is simple whether your team is in an office or working remotely.

Task people on your team to come up with the best sales-related __________.

• Joke
• Meme
• Podcast episode
• YouTube Video
• Motivational Quote
• Blog Post or Article

If you have a small team, everyone can participate. If you have a big team, choose a handful of participants each time. The sales manager can pick a winner, or let the team vote. Either way, the team gets to consume relevant content that's either enjoyable, educational, or both.

Make Your Team Stronger with Sales Team-Building Exercises

No matter how you do it, building up your team through group activities promotes personal connections and sales success. When sales professionals feel like they are part of team, they are more likely to support both personal and company-wide success.

Here are 11 smart sales team building activities that can work wonders:

• Sell together with a Virtual Salesfloor
• Attend conferences and learning events
• Employ friendly games and competitions
• "Feed" team unity
• Get some exercise
• Get everyone involved in charitable giving
• Escape the office
• Recognize employees at an awards ceremony
• Conduct mock presentations
• Have a sales support channel on a messenger app
• Give me your best sales related ________