Sales meetings shouldn’t be a chore. Your team should leave them feeling refreshed and excited about making the next call. So when it’s time to plan your next meeting or conference, use these tips to ensure you’re setting your team up for success.
Start with a Professional Speaker
Your salespeople hear from you every day. Maybe it’s time to add another voice. Professional trainers and speakers bring a new perspective to your sales training and can usually work with almost any topic you envision. Speakers tend to stay well-informed about modern trends and audience engagement. They’ve spent countless hours presenting to a variety of groups. Their advice can be valuable as you develop a theme, so if you’re feeling stuck, hire a professional to brainstorm with you.
Make it Meaningful
To settle on a theme, start by making a list of sales goals that would be meaningful for your company. Is web sales a top priority? Are you struggling to attract small businesses? Your list of goals - at least 10 or so - can then be narrowed down to a few potential themes. If necessary, share this handful of ideas with your boss or top salesperson, to see how they’re received.
No matter what, your goal is to narrow it down to just one specific theme. Less is more. You should be able to state the theme in just a few words. Don’t overwhelm your audience with mixed messages. If you can’t narrow it down, organize a series of focused meetings or post additional video-coaching online.
Make it Memorable
When your theme is identified, spend a few minutes figuring out how to phrase it in a way that’s catchy, memorable, and short. You can even ask a clever friend or marketing coworker to help. So instead of titling your event, “Learn how to effectively market our products to small businesses in the metro area,” call it, “Small Biz Savvy.”
Maximize excitement by printing the theme on giveaway items for event attendees. Freebies like bags, pens, and food are crowd pleasers. You can also tailor items to your event - like frisbees for a health-themed conference - or get matching shirts for everyone on your team.
A memorable theme not only catches the audience’s interest, it also creates an easy shorthand for referring to it later. Someday when your team seems to be forgetting what they learned at the meeting, you can mention “Small Biz Savvy” to jog their memories.
Add Interactive Games and Graphics
Consider incorporating an interactive game that enhances the presentation’s theme. Games engage the audience while reinforcing details you want them to remember. You can also create interactive graphics that require audience participation to interpret. These interactive strategies keep energy high to ensure your message is heard during the meeting, from start to finish.
Keep it Social-Friendly
A short, catchy theme also sets up your business for social media-friendly sharing. Your theme can build interest beforehand on social media, and keep the excitement alive later with photos and comments. You can even share video clips from the presentation and tag it all with your theme title.
Ready to give your next meeting a boost? Contact Option Technologies today to learn more about successful strategies for ongoing learning, retention, and team participation.
