Pipeline to Paycheck: Salesforce Adds Incentive Compensation Management to Sales Cloud

Salesforce today announced the launch of Salesforce Spiff, incentive compensation management functionality built right into the world’s #1 AI CRM, to automate commissions and motivate sellers. With this additional capability, Sales Cloud provides sellers and sales leaders with a complete growth platform from pipeline to paycheck.

Recently acquired by Salesforce, Spiff empowers organizations to drive more revenue by helping sales leaders manage complex incentive compensation plans and understand the many factors influencing revenue performance. The product features an intuitive user interface, real-time visibility, transparency into key financial data, in-depth analytics and reporting, and seamless integration with other Salesforce applications.

Why it matters: Sixty-four percent of organizations report correct quota setting as a major challenge for their sales compensation programs. As incentive-based pay is a standard piece of total compensation, with 90% of top-performing companies using incentive programs to reward their sales associates, this hurdle runs counter to optimal sales performance and can impact organizational goals. Additionally, incentive packages vary by level and business objective. Without compensation management technology, these packages can be difficult and time-consuming to manage manually.

Innovation in action: Salesforce Spiff addresses these challenges by allowing sales and finance teams to automate every step of the commission process. Sales reps benefit from:

• Salesforce Spiff Commission Estimator: View estimated commissions and align with business objectives while building customer quotes in Sales Cloud.
• Salesforce Spiff Rep Dashboards & Mobile App: Review real-time dashboards to track commission trajectories within workflows.

Commission administrators can save time and reduce administrative headaches with: 

• Salesforce Spiff Commission Designer: Use a low-code commission builder to visualize the potential impact of various plan amendments.
• Salesforce Spiff Assistant: Use a conversational AI assistant to quickly and easily gain insights into sales plans, rules, and calculations. Commission admins and sales reps can get logic, error, and filter explanations as well as formula optimization in natural language, making plan building and management faster and simpler.

Salesforce perspective: “Sales leaders know the importance of compensation in driving rep behavior. The challenge these leaders face is in how to align these compensation plans to desired outcomes – all while navigating data across siloed-point solutions,” said Ketan Karkhanis, EVP & GM, Sales Cloud. “Spiff connects what sellers want – transparent compensation – with what sales leaders want – compensation planning built into CRM that aligns behaviors to strategic outcomes.”

Spiff connects what sellers want – transparent compensation – with what sales leaders want – compensation planning built into CRM that aligns behaviors to strategic outcomes.

Ketan Karkhanis, EVP & GM, Sales Cloud

Reaction to the News: “One of our biggest challenges was getting our sales reps invested in their comp plans, so they would work harder to meet their goals. Spiff has given us the platform to showcase our investment in our culture and employees. Spiff has truly catapulted our commission program.” – Lindsey Sanford, Senior Director of Sales and Marketing, RadNet

“Success in the sales industry is defined by how well reps meet and exceed their quotas. Accordingly, sales organizations almost universally operate on an incentive model. With Salesforce Spiff, organizations have a simple interface to give their reps the same access to and understanding of their compensation breakdown that is provided to a salaried employee. This transparency nurtures internal trust and provides seller motivation, helping companies exceed their quotas and drive revenue for their bottom line.” – Rebecca Wettemann, Valoir

Availability

• Salesforce Spiff will be available as an add-on for Sales Cloud customers in the coming months. 
• Non-Salesforce customers will also be able to purchase the product by visiting Salesforce.com/salesforcespiff.

More information:

• Learn how Incentive Compensation Management can motivate sales performance
• Read more about Salesforce’s acquisition of Spiff