Competition Sales Blitz

Last week I reported on a sales blitz I was on with students from my sales class in Indy.  Today I am  posting this blog from the Sheraton and Towers in Chicago.  I am here with a group of seven Purdue students who are members of the Hospitality and Sales Marketing Association.  We are having a sales blitz competition with one of my colleagues, Jeff Beck, and 10 of his students from Michigan State.

The blitz kicked off with an opening reception with students and Sheraton staff on Sunday.  This morning started with a great breakfast, followed by Purdue and MSU alums who work on this property sharing  what their current job is and how they got to be working in it.  They provided lots of career tips.  We also had a nice presentation from the DOS and GM of the property. 

Then it was blitz time.  The MSU students hit the phones in their meeting room and the Purdue kids hit the phones in their meeting room.  The goal was to make the most points based on a points system established by the sales staff ranging from making a call, to talking to someone who books events, getting a new contact at the company, and booking a lead.  Booking a lead was worth many more points than making a phone call, of course.

When all the points are tallied we will announce the winner of the competition at the awards dinner tonight in Shula's.  The winner gets to take the travelling trophy back to campus, which had just spent a year at Purdue as we won it last year here in Chicago for another hotel.  There are lots of prizes, including room nights, for the students who earned the most points.

We then had a great lunch where we asked for phone calling stories that were good and not so good.  Then we really surprised the kids.  We told them in the real world it will not be Purdue vs. MSU like this morning, and as they saw earlier, they will have to work together to make their hotel successful.  That was when we created hybrid Purdue/MSU teams of two to compete for gift cards this afternoon.

Well, the kids are now downstairs making calls and learning alot about hotel sales in the process.  The Sheraton is contributing to their education and also prospecting for future sales (which the kids were able to book this morning) and providing rooms and meals for the students, myself and my colleague.

I encourage you to do these kind of competitions.  They are good for students to practice elements of their career while in school and getting all kinds of benefits ranging from staying in a very nice hotel, having some great meals, learning sales, and networking with potential co-workers one day down the road.