Let’s be honest—running a sales competition that only rewards the person who closes the most deals is like throwing a birthday party and only giving cake to the person who brought the balloons. Not cool. 🎈
Your pipeline has multiple stages, so your competitions should too. That’s where Multi-Round Competitions come in. Think of them as your sales team’s ultimate obstacle course—equal parts thrilling, strategic, and designed to keep everyone moving.
Round One: Top-of-Funnel Hustle
Start the show with a bang by making Round 1 all about activity.
✅ Cold calls
✅ Emails
✅ First touches
This stage rewards hustle. It gets your team pumped up and filling the top of the funnel with fresh opportunities. Bonus: it also gets those early-career reps a moment in the spotlight.
“I’m just here to make dials and chew gum… and I’m all out of gum.” —Every rep during Round 1
💡 According to the Progress Principle (Amabile & Kramer, 2011), even small wins lead to big motivation boosts. Focusing reps on making progress through initial outreach keeps energy high and the dopamine flowing.
Act Two: Meeting Mania
You’ve sparked some interest—now let’s turn up the volume.
Round 2 shifts the focus to meetings booked or held.
This is where momentum meets meaningful connection. Your smooth-talkers and calendar ninjas thrive here, and everyone gets a chance to flex their follow-up game.
Encourage reps to keep booking those demos, check-ins, and discovery calls like their coffee depends on it (because it probably does).
💡 This round also supports the concept of chunking (Miller, 1956)—breaking the big goal (revenue) into digestible chunks (calls → meetings → deals) so reps stay motivated instead of overwhelmed.
Act Three: Deal or No Deal?
By Round 3, it’s time to get down to business. Now we’re closing deals, sending contracts, and fist-bumping across Slack like it’s our job—because it is.
This round rewards finishers. It keeps reps focused when it matters most and brings the whole competition full circle.
And guess what? Even if a rep didn’t win a previous round, they can still get back in the game with our Lifeline feature that gives players an extra life. That’s the beauty of multi-round—every stage matters.
💡 According to research from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, people perform better when working on consistently challenging tasks over time—not just at crunch time. A structured, round-based approach keeps pressure evenly distributed throughout the sales cycle.
Why Multi-Round Works (and Works Well)
Let’s break it down:
- Better pipeline coverage– Your team stays focused on the right things at the right time.
- Higher conversion rates – Activity leads to meetings. Meetings lead to deals. Simple math, major payoff.
- Motivation for everyone – Reps of all strengths get their moment to shine. No one’s sitting on the sidelines.
Multi-Round competitions help your team think like pipeline pros. They build good habits and consistent motion across the board. No more end-of-month fire drills. Just steady progress and stronger results.
💡 Implementation Intentions (Gollwitzer, 1999) show that “if-then” plans significantly increase goal completion. Multi-Round comps naturally encourage this: “If I crush Round 1, then I’ll double down on Round 2.”
Need Some Structure Ideas?
Here are a few ways teams are structuring their competitions:
- Weekly rounds: Calls → Meetings → Demos → Deals
- Stage-by-stage: Custom rounds aligned to CRM pipeline stages
- Hybrid hustle: Mix activities with outcomes (e.g., Dials + Meetings in Round 1, Opportunities created in Round 2, Wins in Round 3)
Bonus tip: Make the prize evolve each round. Maybe it starts with lunch on the company, then steps up to an Amazon gift card, and finishes with a big reward like extra PTO or a team dinner. Keep the stakes rising like a Netflix drama.
The Bottom Line
If your current sales competition is just “who can close the most,” it’s time to upgrade your strategy. Multi-Round competitions are the cheat code to a healthier pipeline, more engaged reps, and higher conversion rates.
Start at the top, race through the middle, and celebrate big at the bottom—that’s the power of a well-aligned comp. 💪
