What Bartle Player Types Are on Your Team?
Get to Really Know Your Sales Reps
Decode your sales reps’ unique motivation preferences by knowing the 4 Bartle player types: Killers, Achievers, Socializers, or Explorers. By understanding what truly motivates your team, you can tailor your software to motivate them, enabling them to reach unprecedented heights and set record-breaking sales achievements.
The 4 Bartle Player Types
The 4 Bartle Player Types, also known as the Bartle Test or Bartle’s Taxonomy of Player Types, is a framework developed by Richard Bartle in the early 1990s to categorize players of multiplayer online games based on their motivations and behaviors. We’ve applied this to the real world of field sales and seen amazing things.
Killer
The Killer player type is defined by a focus on winning, achieving rank, and direct peer-to-peer competition. They are very autonomous with their work and make up 24% of field sales teams.
The Most Competitive Person You’ve Ever Met
Most sales teams are fortunate to have just one or two of these exceptional performers, and motivating them is as straightforward as launching a competition and watching them shine.
Competitive and Aggressive: Killers are driven by competition and challenge. They enjoy engaging in combat, defeating other players, and exerting dominance.
Conflict-Seeking: They may not necessarily be interested in the game's story or socializing; instead, they relish the thrill of outsmarting or overpowering opponents.
Power and Control: Killers often seek to gain power or control over others in the game, whether through strategic play or sheer force.
Killers + Amplify Gamification
Using our Gamification software, you can engage Killers with:
Battles: Let Killers prove who’s best in friendly head-to-head contests.
Competitions: If your Killers love an audience, let them run competitions across the entire organization.
Leaderboards: Any Killer would love to see themselves ranked #1 among the entire sales team until the next contender challenges them.
Rewards Store: Even a Killer can’t resist a good prize. Customize it to whatever that individual person would love with online and physical options.
XP & Levels: Of course the Killers want to be the highest rank, right?
Coaching: A Killer is going to look for any weakness in their game, so having an individual coach is perfect for them.
Learn About Amplify GamificationAchiever
Achievers are defined by a focus on obtaining status and achieving preset goals quickly or completely. Achievers roughly make up about 43% of average field sales teams.
You Can Never Have Too Many Badges, Right?
In sales, achievers prefer to have the freedom to choose their own path and focus on their work. They’re always striving to meet their goals consistently.
Goal-Oriented: Achievers are primarily motivated by achieving in-game objectives and goals. They enjoy completing quests, collecting rare items, and gaining levels or achievements.
Progress-Driven: They thrive on measurable progress and competition, often seeking recognition for their accomplishments.
Focused on Rewards: Achievers enjoy the rewards and recognition that come with their achievements. They are the players who often excel in competitive aspects of games.
Achievers + Amplify Gamification
With Amplify Gamification, Achievers will be more motivated if you have:
Achievements & Badges: Badges that are difficult to earn (like our secret ones) are perfect for players who aim to be exceptional.
Dashboards: Give these players something to reach for with goals that outpace their last performance.
Social Feed: Let them have their moment by marking their latest win with a celebration.
XP & Levels: Earning a new rank with XP points is the bread and butter for any Achiever.
Rewards Store: Who doesn’t love a good physical or digital prize for your achievements?
Start Player Type Quiz
Explorer
Explorers are defined by a focus on exploring and a drive to discover the unknown. In sales, this translates to someone highly motivated to find the next big client or industry to target. Explorers make up roughly 28% of the sales force.
The Wilderness Must Be Explored!
Explorers enjoy becoming experts in what they do, but they may have a tendency to keep to themselves, which can be a challenge.
Curious and Inquisitive: Explorers are driven by their curiosity about the game world. They love discovering hidden secrets, exploring uncharted areas, and learning about the game's lore.
Knowledge-Seekers: They may not be concerned with competition or socializing; instead, they derive satisfaction from mastering the game's mechanics and understanding its inner workings.
Enjoy Discovery: Explorers find joy in the journey of uncovering new aspects of the game world rather than just the end result.
Explorers + Amplify Gamification
These are just a few of the ways you can motivate Explorers within Amplify:
Achievements & Badges: Explorers love the chance to unlock an achievement or badge that no one else on their team has. There are hundreds of options already available for your team in our software.
XP & Levels: Explorers can find and unlock new levels as they earn experience points.
Rewards Store: Any player type is going to love receiving rewards.
Data-Driven Scorecards: Allow them to see how they’re progressing in real time.
Learn About Amplify Gamification
Your Secret Sales Weapon
While you might think that the outgoing nature of Socializers could create challenges in sales, socializers could actually be your secret weapon.
People-Oriented: Socializers are motivated by building and nurturing relationships with other players. They thrive on interaction, collaboration, and social aspects of the game.
Community Builders: They often form or join guilds, clans, or groups and are more interested in the social dynamics of the game than in achieving specific objectives.
Enjoyment through Interaction: Socializers find the game more enjoyable when they can chat, cooperate, or compete with other players. Their primary focus is on the social experience.
Socializers + Amplify Gamification
By using our Amplify Gamification software, you can achieve greatness with Socializers by providing:
Social Feed: These players are hard-wired to work in teams. Call out their efforts publicly with personal shout-outs.
Achievements & Badges: Reward collaboration with “team player” awards for positive social behavior.
Rewards Store: Socializers will love any gift. But being rewarded with a free lunch of their choice with the team? Perfection.
Coaching: Socializers will love the unique opportunity to build a relationship with a coach dedicated to their improvement.
Start Player Type Quiz
Leverage the Player Types of Your Team
“Knowing an employee’s type can help managers if they know how to reward that type. All too often, they don’t… You reward people with what they want, not what you want. If someone is a socializer, give them more opportunities to socialize and build meaningful relationships: don’t give a socializer-of-the-month award to the socializer who socializes the most. That will only get you achievers who are resentfully socializing to win the award.” —Professor Richard Bartle
What to Do With Your Player Type?
Understanding not only your player type, but the player types of your reps, coworkers, and bosses is going to help you learn how to properly motivate them. However, knowing your player type is half the battle—you need to have the software to create and then automate competitions, battles, achievements, and other perks according to their player type for real motivation and engagement.
Explore Software Options to Motivate Your Team
Socializer
Socializers are defined by a focus on relationship-building and a drive to develop a network of contacts. Socializers are responsible for nearly 5% of field sales teams, making them the least common player type among sales professionals.