5 ways to get the most from monthly sales meetings

Love them or hate them, monthly sales meetings are an important part of any business. They can help you track progress and make changes to help get better results.

But after the first few, people can start to hit auto pilot as soon as they step into the meeting room.

Here are 5 ways to make the most of these vital meetings…

1. Know your targets

The key with sales is to know your target. Unlike other areas of your business, sales is an area that you can measure easily. Before the meeting, make sure every knows what their monthly and yearly targets are.

In the meetings, start with everyone saying how close to their target they’ve got. This isn’t about naming and shaming those missing the target, but about measure long-term trends.

If someone continues to under-perform then you’ve got to step in – but one bad month is nothing to worry about.

2. Recognise and reward success

And for those who are hitting or exceeding their targets, let them know you appreciate their efforts. Instead of highlighting the negatives, look at the positives.

Ask anyone who performed over and above the stated goals to give a quick chat on what they did different that month.

It could just be luck – but it might be they’re discovered a way of finding better sales targets or cutting down admin to give themselves more time to focus on selling. These tips are always useful to pass on.

3. Expand their skills

Every meeting you should be looking to grow and move forward as a company. And one way to do this is by mastering new skills.

Set aside 15 or 20 minutes at the end of each meeting to introduce your team to something new.

This could be some new software that could help them in their job or simply a blog post giving insights into sales techniques. Get them to report back the following month on how useful it was.

4. Use good examples

One way to give people ideas and motivate them is to use good examples of successful sales.

They don’t have to come from your own company. Search online and through social media for examples where people have beaten their targets.

If you can use case studies from your own company, then even better. It doesn’t even need to be from the sales team – maybe someone in IT has a breakthrough that could inspire your sale people.

5. Set new goals

It’s always worth revising your goals. If people are always well away from achieving their targets it can be demoralising. On the other hand, if the targets are too low it might get boring and people might start coasting.

You don’t need to set new goals every month, but you do need to pay attention to them. Even some fine-tuning can make a difference. Lowering targets by £1,000 or so could bring the finish line into view for many, giving them extra impetus to go for it.