IMA Circle of Excellence Awards Showcases Top Companies

Autos, IT products, home mortgages score big gains through incentives

CHICAGO, Sept. 18 /PRNewswire/ -- The road to increased sales gets a lot smoother with creative customer and employee incentive programs. Five creative companies are showing the way, winning the Incentive Marketing Association's (IMA) 2008 Circle of Excellence Awards, which will be presented Sept. 23, 2008 at the annual Motivation Show in Chicago.

This year's winners are: Subaru Canada, Inc.; Toyota Motor Corp. Australia; BigPond - TELSTRA, Sydney, Australia; LJ Hooker Financial Services, Alexandria, Australia; and Modis of Jacksonville, Fla.

Launched in 2000, the Circle of Excellence Award identifies and recognizes outstanding examples of successful customer and employee incentive programs designed to help drive their businesses.

"In today's challenging economy, companies have to distinguish themselves from the competition by developing creative ways to entice and excite customers and employees alike," said Karen Renk, CAE, executive director of IMA. "The five winners - together with their marketing incentive partners - achieved great results for their efforts."

Here is a summary of the winners, their programs and their successful results:

Subaru Canada makes big impression with Impreza reward package - Subaru Canada partnered with Carlton Group, Ltd., Markham, Ontario, to roll out a rewards club program to buyers of the sporty Impreza WRX STI hatchback. New owners received a prepaid reward card valued at $2,500, redeemable for service, extended warranty, accessories, apparel and Subaru-branded merchandise at any participating Subaru Canada dealer. The incentive promotion was backed by 100 percent of the country's Subaru dealers, and boosted Impreza STI sales by 28 percent.

Toyota dealers delight in sales, aftermarket program - Australia's 224 Toyota dealers seized the opportunity to boost sales and maintain market leadership by working with Synchro Marketing, Sydney, Australia. Together, they established the Toyota Sales Society, a multi-tiered program which recognizes individual dealer employee performance, and successfully integrates the business goals of the dealers' new car, used car, and service departments. As a result, Toyota Australia posted its highest year ever annual sales in 2007 - up 10.7 percent over 2006 sales - beating overall Australian vehicle market sales growth in the same period, and maintained market share leadership for the fifth year in a row.

LJ Hooker lands boatload of new mortgages with Achievers Program - LJ Hooker Financial Services and incentive professional Solterbeck, South Melbourne, Australia, designed and launched a successful, easy-to-use software program to link and efficiently manage the diverse network of real estate brokers, agents and offices across multiple regions in Australia to drive home mortgage referrals and sales. The Achievers Program offers a variety of awards, and resulted in 19,000 referrals last year - up 125 percent from 2004. Referrals converted into home loans generated $2.1 billion in new business for LJ Hooker.

BigPond makes waves with "BigPoints" program for IT products - BigPond, an Internet hardware provider, teamed with its incentive advisor ACCUMULATE, Port Melbourne, Australia, to create and implement its "BigPoints" incentive program to increase sales among retailers and call centers. Rewards include Internet-related, as well as traditional merchandise. Today, BigPond enjoys the highest (4:1) new customer acquisition rate and a 48 percent market share among Australian Internet providers.

Palm Beach playground motivates Modis sales team - The opportunity to gain "celebrity" status at The Breakers, a noted Palm Beach, Fla., resort for the rich and famous, is reaping remarkable results for IT provider Modis, which, together with USMOTIVATION of Atlanta, has operated an annual sales incentive plan which continues to result in bigger improvements from top performers. At the same time, the program entices newer team members to participate and prosper together with their more-experienced colleagues. The Modis motivational model has helped boost its North American sales to $513 million last year, compared with $472 million in 2006.

In-depth case studies of the 2008 Circle of Excellence award winners are available through IMA headquarters (info@incentivemarketing.org).

About the Circle of Excellence Awards - Past Circle of Excellence Award winners have included noted companies such as GE Financial Services, Glaxo Smith Kline, Kohler, Kraft Foods, Purina, Microsoft Corp., NBC, and Sprint Communications. The growing archive of Circle of Excellence Award case studies illustrates the power of incentives and has set even higher standards for the incentive marketplace. Judging criteria includes overall success in meeting program objectives, program originality/creativity, appropriate incentive selection, perceived value of the incentive, and effectiveness of communication strategy and promotional materials.

About IMA - Headquartered in Naperville, Illinois, the Incentive Marketing Association (IMA) is the leading voice of suppliers in the incentive marketplace. IMA provides education and information services, publications, conferences and seminars, and research to business to help them efficiently use incentive programs to motivate employees and customers. IMA is a founding member of the Incentive Performance Center and is a leader in the Incentive Federation, the industry's government relations organization. IMA is comprised of several strategic industry groups, including IMA - Canada Council, IMA - Europe, the Global Incentive Council, the Incentive Gift Card Council, the Incentive Manufacturers and Representatives Alliance, the Incentive Technology Council, and the Performance Improvement Council. More information about the IMA and the incentive marketplace is available on its web site at www.incentivemarketing.org .

    IMA
    1601 North Mill St., Suite 303
    Naperville, IL 60563
    630.369.7780
    info@incentivemarketing.org

    Press Contacts:
    Karen Renk  630-369-7780
    karen@incentivemarketing.org
    Sue Voyles  734-667-2005
    sue@logos-communications.com

SOURCE Incentive Marketing Association