Each year I’m invited to speak at numerous sales kick-off meetings, and as such I can say I’ve been to some amazing meetings and some downright terrible ones.
I don’t think anyone starts off with a plan of having a terrible meeting, but due to competing agendas, it happens too frequently.
Sales kick-off meetings go sideways when too many people claim they need to have time during the meeting to talk about the latest product upgrade, inventory change, etc. They claim what they have to say is incredibly important, and when you push back, they say something stupid like, “But I have to as part of my annual objectives to speak at a sales meeting.”
Well that’s sweet. Now your sales kick-off meeting has turned into a Toastmasters meeting!
It’s your meeting! It’s a meeting for Sales. It’s your job to take control, pound on some desks if you need to and say “no” to those agendas that are in conflict with yours.
There is nothing more lame for salespeople than to sit in a room listening to people who have no clue how to speak, talk about how what they do is so important. News bulletin to Marketing: Put it in a memo and let the salespeople read it ahead of time, and at most you have small group discussions about the inventory issues, etc.
99% of what Marketing wants to say to your team is not going to change the course of mankind or alter the earth’s trajectory.
Let me now turn my wrath to your CFO. You know who this person is. They’re the one who gets excited reviewing spreadsheets, goes giddy over figuring out prime numbers, and spends their evenings calculating how they can increase their miles per gallon on the family minivan by 2/10 of a mile.
Yes, I’m throwing them under their own minivan. They simply don’t know the impact of what a motivated sales force has on the business. Your sales team is not going to be motivated by having someone from Finance bore them with PowerPoint consisting of an endless sea of numbers they can’t read.
I hate it, and I know you do too when the person from Finance says while speaking to the group, “I know you can’t read the numbers I have up on the screen, so let me read them to you.”
Please save the free world and capitalism! This is behavior we must stop!
Your sales kick-off meeting must be viewed as an investment! It’s not an expense, no matter what the CFO might want you to believe. It’s an investment, because if the sales team is not motivated to make it happen when they leave the meeting, then the year is toast (with no butter and no jelly!)
Nobody should be allowed to speak at your sales meeting who is not going to help move the team to its appointed goal of growing profitable sales! Sales is a mental game, and it’s won or lost in the minds of the salesperson even before the first sales call is made.
To achieve this means you can’t afford to allow Marketing, Finance, or any other department take control of your meeting.
I know it can be a hard sell, especially to your CFO when they think having the CFO and the new guy in product development speak is what you need. My response is ask your CFO if they were ever a salesperson? Ask them if they know what it takes to succeed in sales? Ask them when was the last time they were out on a sales call?
Yes, you need to ask them the tough questions, because if you don’t, you won’t get the money and control you need.
If you’re going to have the year you need, you better make your first sale a success, and your first sale is a successful sales kick-off meeting.
The reason for this message is two-fold. First, I need to help you have a better sales kick-off meeting. Second, I want to be part of it.
You’ve got a tough task ahead, and that is to not just to make your numbers, but exceed them. And that’s what I’ll help you with.
Check out the below video and then call me and let’s talk.
Let’s determine if I’m the right person for your meeting, and if I’m not the right person, I’ll help you find the right person. We share the same goal, and that is to make sure you have the best sales kick-off meeting ever, resulting in the #SalesBoom you need!
A coach can help you excel in your sales career! Invest in yourself by checking out my coaching program today!
Copyright 2017, Mark Hunter “The Sales Hunter.” Sales Motivation Blog. Mark Hunter is the author of High-Profit Prospecting: Powerful Strategies to Find the Best Leads and Drive Breakthrough Sales Results.
