SALES TEAM MEETINGS Copy

SALES TEAM MEETINGS Copy

Weekly Sales Team Meetings

It is vital for the team supervisor to have weekly meetings, to interact with their team, inform them, train, and coach them, energise them, and provide tools to help them in their day-to-day jobs.

These meetings will:

  • Provide clarity to the team of what is expected of them, including their goals and performance;
  • Review team and individual performance for the previous week:
  • Reviewing on a one-to-one basis each team member’s performance;
  • Giving and receiving feedback;
  • Providing coaching to the team or individuals based upon the needs identified.
    • Reinforcing training and coaching on sales techniques, such as how to overcome buyer resistance;
    • How to be more effective when interacting with customers;
    • Any new process involving sales or access to reports.

Reinforcing training and coaching on products and services, such as:

  • Information about the product or service;
    • The characteristics of prospects or customers who may want the product;
    • What the competition offers;
    • The benefits to the customer or prospect buying the product or service.

Sharing news or press release from the company, such as:

  • Performance when it is published;
    • Innovations or new capabilities being introduced;
    • New policies or rules, such as claiming expenses;
    • Explain new compliance or legal requirements.

The content of the weekly meeting must be provided by the bank’s central Sales Planning and Administration Team, which coordinates and prepares the content and format with the input and support of teams such as Human Resources, Customer Management, Marketing, and Products and Channels. As required, other areas of the bank, such as Legal, Risk or Compliance, may contribute with content.

The Sales Supervisor should not waste much time on preparing such meetings. An average weekly meeting should not last over two hours, exceptionally, three hours.

Identifying Sales Training Needs

The best way for supervisors to identify their team’s training and coaching needs is to accompany them on visits to customers. If a salesperson or a sales team spends over 30 per cent of their time on administrative activity and is not selling or interacting with prospects and customers, something is wrong. The bank must re-engineer its processes to eradicate, delegate, or automate non-productive tasks.

Quarterly Bank-wide Sales Meetings

Besides team meetings, it is important to have central Sales Planning and Administration Team sponsored meetings that are held not less than quarterly. These meetings should last no longer than a weekend. It is organised by the Sales Planning and Administration Team in partnership with Customer Management, Marketing, Products, Operations, Human Resources, and any other area that has messages to communicate to the sales team.

The bank’s leaders must use the quarterly meeting to reinforce important messages, provide more information to help sales professionals understand the opportunity, provide tools to make them more effective, and to recognise performance. If they don’t, the ‘flame’, or the individual’s energy, will fade.

These meetings differ from weekly team meetings and are used to:

  • Share important messages regarding the market, any legal or compliance changes, or new rules or practices of the bank;
  • Provide information and training concerning new products and services, performed by product managers and experts;
  • Present new marketing or sales campaigns by the marketing team;
  • Reinforce product or service knowledge, and hold question-and-answer sessions with experts;
  • Provide competitor intelligence and the preventative measures that the bank is adopting;
  • Discuss the bank’s performance in the previous quarter;
  • Celebrate campaigns, teams, and individual achievements;
  • Seek feedback on ways to improve products and services and support to the sales team;
  • Give the front-line access to the leadership team, promoting the exchange of knowledge needed in any company;
  • Provide the bank’s leadership with the opportunity to identify new talent.

These quarterly meetings must be delivered smartly: it cannot be a death by PowerPoint. The leader must find creative ways to communicate the messages. As the meeting is often conducted at a weekend when salespeople are already tired from a stressful week or job, it must not waste their time. Speakers must be trained to deliver meaningful information in a clear and interesting fashion. Speakers should communicate in a fun, light and effective way, or much of the message will be missed.

Publicly recognising employees by celebrating their achievement is very important. Salespeople need recognition, reinforcing what they are doing right, to continue to deliver above and beyond what is expected.

The bank must not transform the meeting into a ‘witch hunting’ exercise, with executives only noting non-performing individuals. Employees will resent such an environment and will hate to be there. ll the learning and exchange of experiences is lost, as the focus of the attendees is to avoid being noticed – and to avoid being humiliated in public.