Meeting News - April 12, 2010 - (Page 14)

Viewpoint By Chris Schultenover Founder, 360e Productions A p r i l 1 2 , 2 0 1 0 Vo l u m e 3 4 , N u m b e r 4 Ensuring Success Of Annual Sales Meeting Is A 365-Day Endeavor Companies that hold live annual sales meetings need to sustain the meeting’s energy and objectives because the strength of your relationships with front-line salespeople often determines how favorably your customers view your brands. While the annual sales meeting can be used as a launch pad, the key to building stronger relationships with your sales team is using more personal, holistic and sustained communication to inform, poll and engage them and foster interaction with their peers throughout the year. To do this, survey your sales team to understand their biggest questions and challenges before setting the annual meeting’s objectives and planning the content. Learn how they and your customers feel about your products, what messages resonate, where sales break down and what future products they would like to see.Encourage them to share specific thoughts and experiences. Then, use their feedback to develop the meeting’s content,including presentations, training sessions, onsite event environment, product showcase and activities that are consistent with the team’s preferred ways of learning, retaining, networking, etc. It demonstrates you understand, respect and support them, and in turn they will likely accept your messages and respond more strongly. The key to achieving a strategically successful meeting is to weave a compelling story throughout the presentations,speeches,guest speakers, staging and venue space that connects with your audience in human and emotional terms. Reinforce that story using consistent messages, imagery and live interaction for the duration of the program. For example, use positive anecdotal stories as meeting openers, transitions between speakers and as a climactic finale. Project quotes, video interviews and references to specific work experiences by your various presenters.Add credibility by bringing your customers, your customers’ customers and individual sales and distribution team members that truly value your products onstage to share their stories directly with the audience.Make them available afterwards for face-to-face greetings at a reception or other networking activity. Finally, record and share these personal and inspiring moments to extend their impact. After the meeting,gather feedback on its content, i.e. objectives, messages and how they were received, and use it to inform what you do next.Act on it to demonstrate you’ve heard your sales team and to encourage more participation in the future. Use current technologies strategically and creatively to connect sales representatives, management, outside experts and existing clients in a two-way conversation about key issues, sales tips and strategies, best practices, day-to-day experiences and trends throughout the year. For example,create a blog so salespeople can share what’s working and what isn’t. Record those sound bites and create a quarterly audio CD or streaming audio to help road warriors address customer questions and corporate directives. Create phone applications that interact and help them close sales. Discuss fieldgenerated topics face-to-face in your regional meetings. Preferably, you should allow the sales team to own and drive most of the content,always creating a channel to regularly inform and engage product managers,sales managers,customer service and marketing managers about those front line realities. A strong brand is built from the inside out, starting with the people on the front line.Take a holistic view of sales force communication. Make it regular, accessible, current, one that captures information as much as ideas.By creating communication experiences about and for them, their day-to-day realities and the impact they have with customers, your sales force will feel respected and involved. Make it part of your culture 365 days a year and you’ll witness a new level of field unity, motivation and performance until you all meet again. ss Editorial David Meyer, Editor-In-Chief (646) 654-4431; dmeyer@meetingnews.com Chris Davis, Executive Managing Editor (646) 654-4437; cdavis@meetingnews.com Jay Boehmer, Senior Editor (646) 654-4434; jboehmer@meetingnews.com Michael B. Baker, Senior Associate Editor (646) 654-4433; mbaker@meetingnews.com Seth Harris, Associate Editor 770 Broadway, New York, NY 10003-9595 Editorial Fax: (646) 654-4428 Art Jonathan Chan, Art Director (646) 654-7338; jchan@ntmllc.com Marketing Catherine Marchese, Marketing Manager (646) 654-5131 Production Noah Klein, Production Manager (646) 654-5179; Fax (646) 654-7318 Subscription Information: (847) 763-9050 Subscription Fax: (847) 763-9037 Single Copy Sales: (847) 763-9050 Custom Media Alison Golub, Executive Editor Karen Gines, Executive Editor (Performance) Sarah Veit, Associate Editor Tessa Sestina, Creative Director Information Marketing Shelly Patton, Audience Marketing Manager (646) 654-7258 Reprints The YGS Group Barb Karmilowicz (800) 290-5460 x106 MN@theYGSgroup.com List Rentals For postal mailings: Julius Single (845) 731-2731 For e-mailings: Nicole Guarascio (845) 731-3828 Business Manager Leslie Musick Northstar Travel Media, LLC Chairman and Chief Executive Officer: Thomas L. Kemp Chief Financial Officer: Linda Davachi 14 MeetingNews April 12, 2010 www.meetingnews.com http://www.meetingnews.com http://www.meetingnews.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Meeting News - April 12, 2010

Meeting News - April 12, 2010
Contents
Meeting Post
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Meetings Spotlight
Viewpoint
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Event Profile
Association Watch
Meeting People
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MeetingNews Roundtable
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Meeting News - April 12, 2010