Developing an award-winning, results-driven incentive program

The Challenge

HP Inc., a global information technology company, was looking for innovative ways to increase channel rep engagement, build a program community and track its impact on driving higher sales across North America with strategic partner groups.

It was important to HP to centralize these activities within their existing Blue Carpet community and go to market with one voice. Additionally, HP wanted to ensure flexibility in addressing the unique business needs and objectives of its diverse product lines and partners.

HP also recognized that seeking expertise and outsourcing these efforts would optimize results because of limited internal resources and a desire to go to market quickly.

The Solution

ChannelAssist developed GEM Club, an annual incentive program that rewards and recognizes channel reps for their pre- and post-sales activities. It also allowed opportunities to track continuous engagement with the brand through program participation.

Within GEM Club, channel reps earned non-monetary GEMS for completing in-program activities such as product trainings and submitting sales claims. These counted towards monthly prizes and the grand prize: an all expense paid trip to The Bahamas!

To create momentum within the program and build a program community, GEM Club was promoted through a robust omni-channel campaign through various channels including social media, promotions, trainings, surveys and events. The online platform also utilized a series of dashboards and leaderboards to accelerate competition.

The Result

GEM Club was hugely successful, resulting in:

• Activating over 2,900 participants
• Awarding more than 2 MILLION GEMS
• Increasing HP Blue Carpet social media followers by 550%
• An average engagement rate of 84% for GEM Club videos available exclusively on the HP Blue Carpet program site!

With GEM Club, additional program activity engagement levels also increased with a 135% YoY increase in case study submissions, 40% YoY growth in overall Blue Carpet program participation and MoM increases as high as 120% in sales claim submissions. Additionally, it strengthened strategic alliance partnerships by achieving sales objectives.

GEM Club was recognized by the industry as the winner of the Commercial Channel Marketing Award for Marketing Excellence and has become essential to HP's ongoing channel engagement and incentive initiatives.

Overall, GEM Club addressed HP's business needs, exceeded all success factors, created effective engagement opportunities and permanently changed rep behaviours that drive sales across HP's portfolio.