The Do’s and Don’ts of National Sales Meetings

The Do’s and Don’ts of National Sales Meetings:from The Sales Challenger™ by Scott Collins

It’s time to start thinking about getting the team together – picking that critical, fun, but productive location…putting together a program that is going to motivate, inform, teach and drive the commercial business to the growth goals we’ve put in place. That’s right, it’s planning time for your national or global sales meeting.
Seems simple enough, but as many of us know, it certainly isn’t.
Over the years, our members have given us many opportunities to be a part of their National and Global Sales Meetings, so we thought we’d give you a few tips on some interesting and not-so-interesting parts of a schedule.
The Good
1) Doesn’t everyone love a good way to fire people up?
We’ve seen members use various competitive games to get the sales force excited, one popular approach being a “minute to win it”-type game.  Now, when it comes to this approach, it’s about executing it the right way, because games could backfire. What we’ve seen create the most success here is keeping it short and simple.  For example, having a few teams compete at a time on stage, creating a lively, fun experience for the entire audience.
The Bad
2) You’re giving away what?  No thanks, I’ll pass.
Certainly, everyone likes free things and it’s a great gesture by an organization to thank hard-working employees, but occasionally we see some giveaways that don’t meet the excitement bar.  You don’t want the reaction of your reps to be “actually, you can keep that, that’s not even worth taking home.”
For example, as prizes or giveaways for “placing” in a game or as an award, we’ve seen rubber band balls handed out, or folders with the company name on it.  As you can imagine, these items didn’t elicit fantastic reactions from the recipients – in fact, it’s probably not even worth handing items like this out as giveaways.
You want to be sure your awards or giveaways have enough value for recipients that they (and non-winners) will, at a minimum, be something that people would want and see as a nice expression of the organization’s gratitude.
3) It’s systems’ training time – Look at what our CRM can do!
Now, to be sure, a national or global sales meeting allows you to have the attention of an audience in one place – an opportunity that you might not have at any other point in the year.  So you’ll want to get critical, new information in front of them.  But, again, it’s all about the approach.
Here are a few items to keep in mind:

• Avoid system training in a large room where people will struggle to read the projector screen.  We’ve seen presentations full of screen shots that are unreadable to all but the front row.  When that happens, no one is listening or watching.  It’s time to breakout the smartphones.
• Beware product update sessions.  They are often delivered by those in the product group and can struggle to be energetic and engaging.   Second, it’s information overload for the sales force – We’ve seen companies that have four to five day meetings where three of the days are all product reviews and updates.  And, finally, companies are unknowingly teaching their reps to lead with features and benefits, reinforcing the “show up and throw up” sales behavior they are trying to break.

And here’s a general suggestion: Do what you can to effectively fight the lunch coma…don’t feed the beast.  We all know it’s a tough spot on the agenda, the hour after lunch.  You’ve got to fight this with your best weapons – place some type of dynamic, engaging material in the post-lunch spot.  The speaker is going to need to be as energetic as ever, which means the content should also be something that plays to this (so, probably not a CRM training…).
SEC Members, see the advice your peers shared about planning national sales meetings, including determining meeting objectives, topics, and speakers. You can also see peers’ recommendations for inspirational keynote speakers.
We hope this list of Do’s and Don’ts was helpful, and assists you with designing and holding the most successful annual sales meeting you’ve ever had!
What other tips or pitfalls have you encountered when planning your national sales meeting? Please share your experiences in the comments section below.