Align Sales and Marketing with These 6 Types of Meetings

By Market Veep

4 min read

Meetings are an excellent tool for helping you align sales and marketing teams. Hold regular formal meetings between your teams to keep them in step, but don't neglect informal outings.

Sales and marketing are a package deal, whether we like it or not. Because of their essential relationship, it's critical to make sure the two departments work together. When you align sales and marketing, you can efficiently establish (and measure) goals and promote a healthier, more productive work environment.

After all, companies that align sales and marketing departments achieve 20% annual revenue growth. What can you do to align your sales and marketing teams? The first step is getting the two to meet together. The next step is figuring out how you want that meeting to go. Here are some ideas for productive meetings:

1. Weekly Debriefs

Holding weekly debriefs are a good start to sales and marketing alignment. It keeps everyone in the loop. These weekly meetings allow marketers to understand how your sales team is doing with their quotas and goals. They also allow sales teams to know about upcoming marketing campaigns, as well as what kind of content the team is coming up with.

This allows the two departments to keep up with each other and even analyze their combined performance. A helpful tip for this kind of meeting: keep it short and to the point. You don’t need to re-invent the wheel, just keep everyone informed in so they are aware of how their efforts will interact moving forward.

2. Attend Events

Attending events is a good way to improve office morale. Why not get your sales and marketing teams to do it together? They could go to business conferences or speaking engagements, for example. However, you don’t necessarily need to choose events that are business related. The fact that you're giving your staff a chance to get out of the office and do something as a group is enough.

This practice also enables the two departments to get to know each other on a personal level, something they can’t always get in the office. They can share an experience, the effects of which can bleed over into work performance and help you align sales and marketing. Going to an event gives the staff a chance to blow off steam and can make for a healthier work environment. After all, people who work hard, need to play hard sometimes too.

3. Lunch Outings

Sometimes a small change in atmosphere is all it takes to increase productivity. Going to a local restaurant for a meeting is a great way to curb that rinse-and-repeat rut both departments can find themselves in. This can help you align sales and marketing in a more relaxing environment, just by giving them a chance to cut loose. Think of it as a reward for their hard work: something both teams can look forward to.

4. Identify Weaknesses

Sometimes it's important to get together and objectively look at performance to identify what isn’t working. This practice can apply to sales and marketing teams alike, not only on an individual level but holistically. What are the two teams doing as a unit that could be improved?

It can be as simple as developing a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats). This not only applies to work performance but internal operation as well. Identifying weaknesses are the stepping stones to making improvements in things like communication, customer service, and overall workflow. Identifying weaknesses is also a great way to highlight strengths.

5. Brainstorm Content Together

Sales and marketing both share the same goal: find customers. So it's a good idea for the two teams to brainstorm ideas for content together. Marketers can better orient content towards the needs of customers by addressing common questions that the sales team has heard. Sales teams can also receive insight into the marketing process by understanding the work behind blog posts, eBooks, or webinars. Combining these perspectives can lead to some great ideas.

6. Hold Meetings Outside

This is as simple as it gets. Holding meetings outside (weather permitting of course) is a great way to align sales and marketing in a comfortable setting. In case you hadn’t noticed a theme here, sometimes getting out of the office is just what your teams need to break down walls and work together. Simply going outside is an easy remedy to the cabin fever even the best of us can get. This is a good way to set the stage of a good meeting. It warms everyone up, gets them refreshed, and keeps them ready to work.