The way you design the compensation plan for your sales team is fundamental to your solar business’s success. It’s one of the best ways to keep your team engaged, interested, and motivated towards a common goal.

Here, we’re going to answer the critical questions: How does a good compensation structure work? And how can you build a comp plan that really stands out and attracts A-player talent?

The Foundation of a Comp Plan

 

Whether you’re a solar installer or a sales organization, you’ll need to establish a baseline pay for your sales compensation. When sales reps come in fresh, it’s okay to start them out at a lower rate and let them work their way up.

Incentivize things like team building, innovation, recruiting, education, and training to give them ways to increase their base. And of course, this will be supplemented with incentives and bonuses.

Try to keep your spread anywhere from 20 – 60 cents per kilowatt to stay competitive while fixing your margins as much as possible. 

To incentivize even your baseline pay structure, you can take a tiered approach: 0-4 installs/month earns X /watt, 5-9 installs/month is a higher X /watt, and so on. 

Bonuses & Incentives

 

There are so many ways to do bonuses, but whatever you choose, it has to be based on measuring something. A few good metrics to use are, of course, personal sales, but also consider close rate on appointments set, team sales volume, and number of appointments sat. 

 

Another great way to incentivize and keep things interesting is through a recruiting incentive program.

Let’s say one of your top reps recruits a new guy, and next month he sells four deals. You could count 50% of the recruited volume (two deals) towards that top rep’s volume for the month.

Not only does it increase his volume, but if you have a tiered baseline plan, it pushes him into the next tier for higher earnings per kilowatt. Now you’re not only motivating for higher volume, but for recruiting skilled salespeople.

 

Let’s Play A Game

 

A key to success in the solar industry is to run your sales team like you’re playing a big game.

You want to design your compensation structure the same way. Just like a professional sports team– at the end of a winning season, they get a championship ring– your sales reps need to feel that same dynamic.

If your reps start to feel stuck in a rut, or like they’ve fallen into a boring 9-5 pattern, they will fail to perform consistently.

One of the best ways to combat that feeling of stagnation is to create a game-like compensation plan that makes every individual member of your team feel like they are 1) providing huge value and 2) receiving an exchange for that value. 

 

So, what are some vital components to creating a ‘game’ dynamic? First, games always have some sort of point system.

Second, there needs to be obstacles (we recommend there be certain criteria that qualifies you to earn the prize, like a minimum number of personal deals, attending every team meeting, etc).

Third, when you win a game, there is some kind of reward given for that win. One way to implement this is with competitions. 

 

Here’s an example:

 

 “Every rep on the first team to close 20 deals this week will receive a $1,000 bonus. The minimum to qualify is 3 deals.” 

 

A few other examples: 

 

 “Johnny, if you close 10 deals this week, we’ll retroactively give you an extra $100 per kilowatt for the last month,” or

 

“If we close X amount of deals by EOB on Friday, we’ll all go out to X hotel or X restaurant.” 

 

You get the idea.

Games can be long-term or short-term. Maybe you have a few long-term ones that are well-known and established– 20 deals in a month earns you a Rolex or 100 deals in a year gets you a Tesla.

Those are great and should definitely be used, but don’t underestimate the power of a quick, off-the-cuff micro game.

Send a Friday-at-2pm text to your group chat offering a $100 bonus to anyone who closes a deal in the next three hours and watch your reps jump into action. Get creative with these and keep people on their toes.

These are all some form of competition or game. Although this type of thing may be common in sales industries, people are simply not using them frequently enough. 

 

Games and competitions are powerful tools for keeping your team motivated and keeping the momentum high.

A baseline pay alone is not enough to keep people motivated and engaged. Whether you feel like you’re right on the cusp of a revenue breakthrough or you’re having a down month, implement games to help crush your goals while keeping your reps happy and your pay competitive. 

 

As you build a strategic and competitive compensation plan for your reps, word will get out that your organization is the best one to be a part of.

Not only will your current reps be happy and motivated, but you will continue to attract the best talent in the solar industry.

Build your comp plan on a strong foundation, use bonuses, incentives, and game-like competitions, and new talent will come running.
Zain Jan