At their worst, sales meetings feel like a dull, boring group session or a pointless office tradition. But when conducted properly, these meetings can engage your reps and help them absorb important information for success.
The difference between the two? A sales meeting agenda.
Want in? Great—we’ve created this comprehensive Hoppier guide to help you prepare a successful sales meeting agenda for your team, plus ideas to maximize productivity.
A sales meeting agenda is a planned series of events that ensures the session stays organized, on topic, and under time. Think of it as an internal document that’s flexible enough to move with the conversation, but firm enough to set boundaries on what gets discussed, and how.
A meeting without an agenda is like shopping without a list. You can shop without it, but it’ll be harder and time-consuming—and you may forget the important items.
Plus, 67% of professionals believe that having a clear agenda is critical for productive meetings, and another 72% say setting clear objectives is the key to successful meetings.
We wholeheartedly agree.
A well-defined agenda ensures you don’t forget critical matters, and it creates an organized process to facilitate productivity in meetings. Let’s take a more detailed look at why preparing a sales marketing agenda is worth the effort.
Defines and Completes Discussion Goals
Since agendas create an outline of discussion topics, there’s zero chance of you or team members forgetting to cover something important. They also help the whole team make valuable, carefully thought-out decisions instead of hurriedly discussing important matters that often lead to no results.
Let’s not forget that hearing the perspective of other individuals can lead to better outcomes and higher quality of performance.
Ensures Greater Control of the Meeting
A meeting agenda gives everyone a greater sense of control.
How? The agenda is generally sent out in advance, so that each attendee knows what to expect. Sales reps and managers can give productive feedback about the direction of the meeting and make changes to the agenda as necessary to include topics of special concern.
The meeting also runs within a predetermined time frame, as attendees are less likely to slow down the meeting with interruptions.
Saves Time and Resources
A Doodle State of Meetings report found that ineffective meetings cost US-based businesses over $399 billion.
What's more, the National Bureau of Research’s 2020 study found remote teams reported a 13% increase in the number of meetings held each year, making the stakes even higher. Additionally, 71% of professionals agree they lose precious time each week due to unnecessary or canceled meetings.
Don’t get us wrong—it’s perfectly fine to hold regular or impromptu sales meetings, especially if you want to do a health check for your business. But with a sales meeting agenda in place, these meetings will be more efficient.
Attendees will have a written list of what’s to be achieved at the end of the meeting. If anyone needs to leave the meeting early, they’ll have a general idea of what was discussed and can catch up later to fill in the blanks.
Agendas are also handy for late-comers. People late to the meeting will know what they missed; plus, you won’t have to waste everyone else’s time to get them up to speed on what’s already been settled.
Encourages Participation and Engagement
Since the discussion topics are properly outlined, attendees can prepare for the meeting beforehand. They feel freer to participate—even the more reserved members. Plus, reps are also more likely to attend a meeting if they know that important, relevant topics are going to be covered.
Using the agenda to motivate your team, generate creative ideas, and gather quality insights? Now that’s a win.
Documents Discussion and Events for Archives
An agenda makes it easier to take notes and track what was discussed during the meeting. For example, you can appoint a person to document the results of each discussion, including the action items, wins, insights, and plans for the future.
Past agendas also serve as a record for external and internal organizations and the public to view your company's progress. You can use them to assess past decisions, note important figures and previous events, and create viable goals.
You can also learn more about your most dedicated members by counting attendance and reviewing contributions to each sales meeting. This can help you make better decisions and understand which reps to promote or assign to a specific role.
Organizes Meetings and Boosts Productivity
Agendas allow you to organize your meetings easily, including prioritizing the most vital activities, boosting productivity, and keeping the focus on the members.
They can also be used to highlight action items and owners, allowing attendees to leave the meeting knowing what must be accomplished before the next meeting. You can also review action items on the previous agenda in the next meeting to track and report progress.
More importantly, attendees can have fun and foster team-building! they’ll leave feeling a sense of accomplishment at the end of the meeting, with the agenda validating their productivity.
When done wrong, sales meetings waste time and cause frustration for everyone. Here’s a look at the dangers that can arise when you don’t take time to outline events.
Unfocused and Unprepared Attendees
A meeting without an agenda spells disaster for concentration. In fact, 73% of executives admit to working on other tasks during meetings, and 16% of professionals confess they have dozed off.
When attendees don’t know what a meeting is about, or they don’t think it pertains to their interests, they’re less likely to be engaged. To avoid this, you want to make your meetings as relevant and structured as possible to hold your attendees’ attention—something that agendas make possible.
An agenda defines the purpose of the meeting. Plus, as the discussion topics are presented chronologically, reps can refer back to it in case they become distracted or go off on a tangent. Also, sharing the agenda at least 24 hours before the meeting gives everyone enough time to prepare any questions or thoughts for each listed topic, which makes things more interesting.
One-Sided Participation
Meetings are supposed to be group collaborations with everyone sharing their unique perspectives and insights. That’s what drives a company towards success. But it can quickly turn into a monologue if your attendees don’t share their thoughts.
The problem with this situation? Not only is it dull; it doesn’t encourage or engage your sales reps to participate actively.
On the other hand, if you have an agenda, you can ensure all voices are heard by calling on specific individuals to participate and share their perspectives, which they’re more likely to do since they’ll be prepared for the meeting.
Poor Topic Priority and Time Management
Without a sales meeting agenda, your meetings won’t have any structure or prioritization of discussion topics. This can lead to time wastage and reduce the quality of discussions.
Moreover, studies find an individual‘s attention span is approximately 15 minutes long. In other words, topics discussed after 20 minutes of the meeting will potentially receive less attention from attendees. That’s why you want to cover the more important topics right away, but this may be a problem without an agenda.
You can add your discussion items in order of importance when preparing the agenda. This way, you discuss the top priority items first while everyone is fresh and paying attention. It'll also bring more structure to the meeting, with everyone respecting the listed agenda items.
Lack of Facilitation
With many unpredictable dynamics at play, sales meetings can veer off-topic. And going off-topic means unnecessary time wastage and hurried, unproductive decisions.
Guiding the conversation becomes solely your responsibility—one that you must do without a lot of non-verbal cues and body language—but not when you have a meeting agenda in place.
Attendees know that an agenda is a strict outline of topics to be discussed in the meeting. So it’s unlikely for them to go off-topic, but if anyone does, you can politely ask them to stick to the agenda.
Sold on the importance of having a sales meeting agenda? Awesome—next, we'll discuss how you can make your agendas more successful and effective.
A successful sales meeting agenda sets clear expectations for what needs to be done before and during a meeting—even after—to help attendees prepare. In addition, it allocates time wisely, ensures everyone is on the same page, and identifies when the discussion is complete.
But just having a sales meeting agenda isn’t enough.
Research has found little to no relationship between the presence of a facilitator (agenda) and attendees‘ evaluation of meeting quality. Clearly, what matters isn’t the agenda, but the relevance and importance of what’s on it—and how you facilitate discussion of the agenda topics.
Here are the critical elements of an effective sales meeting agenda:
Typically, your meeting agenda should have three basic items that each sales rep can report on:
The whole point of this framework is to organize and prepare each attendee for the sales meeting. Keeping this in mind, cross-check that your agenda covers the essential components of the meeting:
One tip for preparing a sales meeting agenda: Start with the end in mind. Define the specific results you want to achieve in the meeting and set the stage for focused discussion.
Next, you want to troubleshoot technology. Technological glitches can eat into your time and derail your meeting, regardless of whether you’re presenting virtually or in person. Whether it’s updating computers, downloading software, or closing unnecessary programs, work out any technological kinks well in advance to avoid delays or losing your attendees’ interest.
Another good tip is to ask presenters to meet a few minutes early to test the entire setup. Troubleshoot the equipment and go through the presenting motions as you would during the real thing.
You can also create a sample sales meeting agenda in Google Drive to give everyone a fair idea of what the sales meeting would look like. Be sure to set permissions to “Anyone with the link can view“ so that every attendee can see the document. You can also copy this example sales meeting agenda template for your own use.
Many managers neglect the importance of having food or snack breaks during or after meetings. What they don’t realize is how food can make your next sales meeting a success.
Research indicates eating desirable food can increase the degree to which the accompanying persuasive messages are accepted. Another Muse report found an increase in productivity when employees work for 52 minutes and then take a 17-minute break.
Food is the body’s fuel, and without it, employees may feel sluggish mentally and physically. It may lead to fatigue and brain fog that dulls concentration and focus.
In short: not desirable at all!
That’s why we recommend including lunch or snack breaks in your sales meeting agenda. Luckily, brands like Hoppier make it easier to treat your employees to delicious food and beverages and ensure active participation.
Use Hoppier gift cards to allow your hybrid and remote employees to enjoy delicious food, drinks, or snacks at the same time, regardless of their location or time zone. Here’s how you can go about this:
Trust us; good food and drinks are the answer for positive and focused employees, which will lead to productive meetings with strong results.
Comfort and preparation are two overlooked aspects of sales meeting success. Attendees who actively contribute ideas, brainstorm solutions, and participate enthusiastically will make meetings feel like a group activity and not a one-sided affair.
But how can you ensure this?
For starters, use icebreaker questions to make your reps feel comfortable in the meeting. Ask them about their weekend or what they look forward to this week. You can also begin with successes and wins to motivate your sales team and actively engage them over time.
Also assign appropriate roles to all participants to reduce presentation time and explanation of material beforehand (this will allow you to manage the meeting process effectively as well). For example:
You can also put people into groups for activities to cover the agenda items on time.
Incorporating storytelling in meetings can help you build stronger teams. You can rely on this method to inform, persuade, and inspire your salespeople.
How? Human beings are hardwired to respond positively to stories. We’re natural storytellers, which is why persuading your sales reps through stories of yourself or customers instead of blandly communicating data or facts is more effective.
Here’s what a good story typically needs:
Look for opportunities to tell relevant stories of lessons learned and what it means. You can also refer to case studies and customer feedback to provide suggestions and guidelines to boost performance.
Asking individual sales reps to share stories—both successful and scary ones—is another great idea. Sharing first-hand accounts will improve participation and give everyone access to unique, meaningful insights.
You want your attendees to feel inspired to do better—to be better—after the sales meeting, which is why adding an inspirational interactive element is a critical aspect of a successful sales meeting agenda. And what better way to inspire team members other than inviting subject matter experts?
Ask product leaders, founders, and executives in sales to join the meeting and share valuable insights on:
If you’re part of a wider sales organization, get your directors and stakeholders on board to share their wisdom with your sales team. Showing attendees motivational videos and reading out inspiring passages will also spur them to take action.
Now that we’re clear on why a sales meeting agenda is a good idea, let’s discuss which topics should be included in your agenda and what an agenda template looks like:
Instead of jumping headfirst into the meat of the meeting, get your attendees into the “meeting mode.“
Start with a brief introduction—a quick review of what you’ll talk about in the session to begin on a positive note. This should take you about five-six minutes at the most.
Review your sales team‘s performance based on your key metrics and KPIs. Have people talk about what they are doing and what's working for them to initiate a healthy discussion, where reps can learn from one another.
You don’t want to scrutinize your attendees too much here, but give everyone a gentle reminder about their quotas and goals. If a metric is off, discuss necessary countermeasures and decide who will be responsible for taking the required action.
Discuss sales opportunities and prospects that are already in the sales pipeline. Ask attendees for suggestions on how to move these opportunities on to the next step.
The whole point of this agenda item is to share feedback. Since each sales rep faces customers directly, they know what’s happening in the market and can share unique insights to maximize results.
Have your sales team share a recent win—a big deal, big insights, or meeting a sales target—to boost morale and engagement.
The other advantage of sharing success stories is providing other team members ideas for what they can do to improve.
Your sales reps likely have specific goals assigned to help them be successful at their jobs. Use the sales meeting agenda to analyze these objectives from time to time to keep the team in check.
This can include training objectives or attending key events or trade shows to connect with more prospects and close more deals. You can also set SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-related) goals for the next meeting to achieve a long-term goal.
Your salespeople will be more likely to attend team meetings that provide them immediate value.
Keeping this in mind, find out areas or obstacles that are most challenging for reps, and assign one topic per meeting to train and share tips to help them overcome it. We recommend assigning the topic to one or two salespeople that have developed best practices in that area for best results.
Cover important company business and housekeeping issues relevant to the sales team. This can include policy changes, announcements, process updates, and feedback from other departments.
Doing this will help you align your sales team with the marketing team, alongside other departments, to achieve your organization’s big-picture goals.
Competitive intelligence or sharing market trends will keep your sales team agile and up-to-date with strategic decisions for the betterment of your company.
You can assign one or two rival companies to each salesperson and have them give a quick update about each at every meeting. Ask them to share the recent news or developments that may have surfaced concerning the competition since the last session.
SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. Analyzing these areas can help your sales team prepare effective strategies to capitalize on and counteract situations and circumstances to improve your company‘s bottom line and steer it towards growth.
Here, you can also discuss potential roadblocks that may deter your reps from achieving targets and other miscellaneous items that need addressing. Use a few minutes to see if something else needs to be discussed quickly, but this shouldn't be at the cost of prolonging the meeting. Set aside more elaborate topics for the next sales meeting.
Close the sales meeting by recapping notable takeaways and action items. Make sure everyone is clear with what’s expected of them and the tasks that should be achieved by the next meeting.
For example, if you want a rep to collect more information about a potential marketing offer, clearly specify the materials and collaterals you want from them. Don't be vague.
Most importantly, be sure to end the meeting on time. If you want your sales team to respect your team meetings, you need to respect their time too.
If you’re looking for a meaningful and affordable way to say thank you to your salespeople for making your meetings a success, try Hoppier.
Give reps our smart digital Visa cards that enable them to order from the millions of global and local vendors. Whether you want to treat them to their favorite foods and drinks or give them a small token of appreciation—or both—Hoppier has you covered.
Customize the design and dollar amount for each virtual card. Send it to your reps so that they can place orders from our global group of vendors, who will then deliver the purchased items to each sales rep‘s specified location.
What’s more, you don’t have to worry about the unused funds! We’ll refund any leftover amount right to your bank account.
It seriously doesn’t get better and easier than Hoppier.
Planning and preparing your sales team meeting agenda will save you both time and energy in the long run. It’ll also help you set the tone for the meeting and give everyone a fair idea of what to expect and what's expected of them.
The end result? Higher productivity, better attendance, and more employee engagement—all of which can contribute to better results for your organization.
Food and snack breaks don’t need to be stressful anymore, too. Give your sales reps the personalized Hoppier experience and deliver healthy snacks, food, and beverages right to their doorstep.
Ready to 2x your global engagement at your next event, with Ox stress?
Make Hoppier your unfair advantage today, schedule a demo
Ready to 2x your global engagement at your next event, with Ox stress?
Make Hoppier your unfair advantage today, schedule a demo
Ready to 2x your global engagement at your next event, with Ox stress?
Make Hoppier your unfair advantage today, schedule a demo
Ready to 2x your global engagement at your next event, with Ox stress?
Make Hoppier your unfair advantage today, schedule a demo
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