Sales meetings are important to align, coach and motivate your team. However, incorrect cadence and inefficient activities create a negative perception within the team and it is not considered as an important tool for team success.
Consider using the below mentioned tips to focus on what matters and help everyone stay productive.
1. Enforce a CRM Update Before the Meeting
Enforcing a CRM update before the review meeting should save you plenty of time and help bring in more objectivity in the meetings.
2. Understand your Teams’ ‘Game Plan’ vs. Taking an Update on Lay of the Land
Use your time to brainstorm on your win strategy and identify mutual action plans vs. getting an update on what’s going on in the deal. How do you do it? Make sure you have full visibility into their activities before you step into that meeting.
Some of the questions you should stop asking:
– When was the last time we engaged with the buyer?
– Is the buyer engaged?
– Who are we talking to in the buying committee?
– Have we engaged with the technical buyer?
– Have you identified next steps?
Instead, start asking more strategic questions:
– How do you plan to de-risk this deal?
– What is driving the slow deal momentum for high value opportunity?
– Why have you included this deal in the forecast? We are not engaged with decision maker yet – I don’t think this deal will close
3. Measure to Optimize
You cannot optimize your team’s performance unless you measure it. Make your meetings more about data vs. qualitative updates from your team.
Some key metrics to track and measure:
– Rep activity (emails, meetings etc.) across opportunities
– Rep influence in the buying committee
– Result of these activities – stage changes, closed won deals, deals gone dark
How will this help:
– Identify winning behaviours for your team
– Identify coaching areas for your B players to set them up for success
– Identify underserved accounts due to suboptimal pipeline distribution
4. Standardize the KPIs that You Want to Use in Your Meetings
Each leader would want to run the sales meetings the way they deem fit.
They will also start tracking their own metrics and add new fields in CRM. Resulting in extended non-conclusive meetings!
Hence, a common and unified view of the data is required to eliminate subjectivity, bring everyone to the same page and compare reps performance on uniform metrics.
5. Fortnightly Reviews vs. Weekly Reviews
Have your reviews twice a month, rather than having weekly reviews, unless you have a very high deal velocity and transactional sales model.
In the beginning of the month:
– Review closed won and closed lost deals from the last month
– Clearly define next steps for the deals that are forecasted in the month
– Hold your team accountable for next steps
In the middle of the month:
– Pulse check on how the forecasted deals are progressing
– Ensure there are no delays in closure dates
Usually you will end up having multiple 1:1s or daily sync-ups at the quarter end to ensure closures, which is expected and normal!
6. Cross-team Alignment
Include other teams such as Pre-sales, Professional Services, Customer Success team, Product in your monthly discussion so that everyone is aware of what’s happening. Additionally, key operational concerns regarding implementation bandwidth, customer onboarding timelines, and product roadmap can be ironed out.
7. Motivate Your Team
Use a meeting forum to share successes and recognize performance of your reps to motivate them. Public appreciation plays a very important role in staying positive and closing more deals.
8. Keep 1:1s to Coach Your Team on Deal Drivers
Coach your team individually on how to navigate through the sales process (MEDDIC, MEDDPIC, SPIN, BANT whatever works for you). Identify where they need most help and focus only on that problem statement to make it very personalised and specific coaching session
Qualification process:
– Make sure that you’ve got a solution the customer will pay for
– Make sure that they have a budget
– Make sure there is internal alignment
Mid funnel:
– Make sure there is a clear product fit
– Make sure you’ve engaged with the technical buyer
– Make sure you’ve identified a champion and have a mutual action plan to build a strong case internally
Late stage:
– Make sure you’ve engaged with 4 or more people in the buying committee
– Make sure you are engaging with key decision makers
