5 Ways to Invest in Employee Experience to Increase Sales

There is no running from the fact that Customer Satisfaction is the foundation of any business. The sole purpose of any venture is to bring in customers and keep them happy, satisfied, and engaged.  In all this hullabaloo of getting constant targets, the employees are what get mislaid.  Employee experience is indeed directly proportional to Customer experience. Research shows that companies who have a great employee experience outperform their competitors by 147%. 

Let’s take an example, Hilton Hotels is known to deliver a stellar employee experience. In 2018, the company went a step further and renovated its employee’s locker rooms and cafeterias as an initiative to improve the employee experience. As a result, the stock price of Hilton rose by 20$ and showed thriving progress. This move by Hilton might not have been necessary from their cost perspective, but the kind of goodwill, rewards, and retention it got will help the company in the longer run. 

Investing in employees not only shows company culture but also increases sales. This is because customers now want to resonate with your brand’s “Heartbeat”. They want to buy from a brand that speaks to them more like a human than a technology. Also, satisfied employees are the best influencers you can have for your company. They can get you enormous business(as they are at the bottom line) just with their word of mouth and personal networking.

But the question remains, why do companies fail at creating employee engagement? 

One main reason can be the overdependency on the HR department. Employees need much more than free office snacks, appraisals, and vacation time to stay engaged. They wish to be valued, trusted, and challenged. 

Having a designated system in place also helps. Many companies have EX tools that enable employees to submit feedback, raise complaints, and schedule one on one with management.

Improving Employee Experience is a journey that is long but can yield you the best possible results for your business. Here are some ways to build EX : 

Ways to leverage recognition during Covid-19 Pandemic – 

• Using technology for recognition 

It’s probably when the employees come together in the office every day, they acquired numerous ways to celebrate achievements together. You might rejoice to close a sale by having a round of applause, or maybe buying the office lunch. Now that the employees are working remotely from home, inviting them to a virtual meet using tools like Zoom or Skype to celebrate these major accomplishments. The employees can try to socialize together, celebrate wins, and might feel that office feeling they might be lacking at home. Additionally, the extra face time will help alleviate the loneliness remote workers often feel on the job.

• Give Employees Local Gift Cards 

Numerous local businesses are merely surviving during the COVID-19 pandemic due to past mandatory closures. The easiest way to support these businesses is by buying gift cards that might be redeemable by the employees at a later date. It’s a very commonly known fact that employees usually prefer to be recognized with gift cards instead of cash, so this might be the perfect time to stock up. This would not only lend a personalized touch to your recognitions, but it will also support the community in a time of need. Brownie points if the gift cards are purchased through an automated rewards platform which can be forwarded to them via email. These platforms help eliminate the hassle of mailing gift cards to remote employees.

• Recognize Employees for Specific Actions

Adjusting to working from home can be hard, which is why it’s now more essential to reward specific behaviors/attitudes you would like to see more of in the current time. This not only shows appreciation but also encourages other employees to learn and follow. 

• Using Public Channels

Make sure that the recognition is public and company-wide to celebrate the achievements. This means that you should recognize the employers in a public channel like Slack, your company intranet, or on a recognition platform that includes a social feed where everyone can view recognitions of their peers. This encourages other employers to engage with the recognition as well. When recognized publicly, recognition is a huge motivator for employees, and encouraging peers to participate in the celebration only drives motivation further.

• Provide Opportunities for Professional Development

One of the more creative ways is to reward and recognize employees by distance is by providing them the professional development opportunities. With all this spare time and valuable time (especially for your sales team), now is the time to handle new projects, learn and grasp new skills, and develop your repertoire.

We now have more spare time than ever to develop our professional skills, so taking advantage of rewarding employees with online classes is one of the most rewarding experiences which goes both ways.

• Giving Remote Workers a Voice

Many things can go wrong in an organization but, few things are worse for an employee than feeling like they don’t have a voice or they’re underappreciated in their organization. This can create perceptions like they’re only a number or a cog in the perpetual machine. Implementing and analyzing an employee feedback system or even asking for suggestions on how to improve the company offers a chance for interaction, which gives them an identity that might be more important than their monthly paychecks. In addition to this, organizations can obtain some fresh ideas that could boost productivity or streamline a particular process, setting you up for success in the coming future.

• Creating informal communication sessions 

It’s a good start to introduce a new habit/rule among your remote workforce to hold informal “water-cooler” session through Skype once or twice a week to keep the lines of communication open and which indirectly help the team to become friendly with each other. These sessions might provide a space for team chit-chat and the best place to update one another about work-related matters or personal things that are not in line with another senior management team.

The Value of Recognition for Remote Employees

When compared to 10 years ago, the number of remote workers has now increased by 115%, currently, this number is sharply increasing with the ongoing of COVID-19. According, to a Virgin Pulse survey, remote employees are more likely to be disengaged and quit, a shocking truth when currently the majority of the workforce has moved to remote work. With multiple distractions while remote working, from crying children to the allure of checking social media with no one looking over your shoulder, it’s easy to disengage from the job.

A simple way is to keep the remote workforce engaged by regularly supporting and engaging them. Recognition also strengthens a peer-to-peer relationship, manager – to – peer relationship & understanding of the organization’s core value.

Survey2Connect is a global award-winning customer experience management (CMX) solution that offers 3 core suites designed to help businesses seamlessly improve customer experience, employee experience, and market research. Survey2Connect is an agile CX solution that constantly learns and improves with every experience to give its clients best-in-class experiences through the successful deployment and delivery of 5,703 surveys, 68,804 tickets, 1,743,203 responses, and 756 dashboards.