Are you having sales meetings or just gatherings? What do you achieve in your meetings that you couldn’t do with internal communications (memos, emails)?
A sales meeting should be used to generate business, not just share sales figures and traffic reports. Don’t get me wrong. Meetings are great for sales training and discussing key topics. Just be sure that when you pull together your salespeople, you understand that you do so at a cost. If that meeting isn’t productive, the time was an expense, not an investment in your business. What if, instead of a wasteful meeting, you could have had a sale instead?
Before you determine how you should run your sales meetings (frequency, length, topics goals), do a little math. Multiply the average profit of just one home or homesite sale times the number of meetings per month. Factor in the average commission of each participant. Is it more valuable to sit everyone around a table, munching on donuts, than having them work their prospects?
Bottom line: Have the meeting; just be sure there is a high ROI.
• Never use meeting time for traffic reporting: Refer to Profit Leak #3. If you have a CRM, your reports are observed daily.
• Select the right day: Mondays are traditions, and traditionally, Monday meetings are sales reporting days. Fridays are sales creation days.
• The Principle of 15 minutes: 50-mini-training sessions a year!
• 15 minutes X 50 meetings/year = 750 minutes = 12.5 hours
• “I do not fear the man who practices 10,000 kicks once. I fear the man who practices one kick 10,000 times.” —Bruce Lee
• Gain commitments for weekend appointments. The minimum standard is that every sales pro must have one appointment going into the weekend.
BOTTOM LINE: Make it a profitable investment by using the time to increase business, not sharing reports and having policy sessions.
