If you’re reading this, you’re probably a marketer that is at your wits end in trying to find ways to improve your marketing meetings. Welcome to the club! We’ve all been in scenarios and positions where our marketing meetings feel like a black hole that eats time and doesn’t get us anywhere. But we’re here to change that.
Marketing meetings are such a crucial part of team alignment, company alignment, reporting, and growth identification. They aren’t meant to be the worst part of anyone’s day, they’re meant to be the best part of everyone’s week. A time for a quick refresh, a quick overview of what’s happening, and a place to ensure everyone is doing their part. This is why we chose to tackle this beast in our third installment of our “Mastering Your Marketing Role” series.
No one enjoys a meeting that goes nowhere or veers off the path into a completely different topic. These meetings go on and on but no goals or initiatives are discussed or tackled with true objectives that can be initiated. At the end of the day, these meetings feel like a waste of time and soon enough no one cares to join.
Now is the time to take back the power in your marketing meetings and begin holding meetings that make a difference and benefit everyone involved, internally and externally. This is the place to deliver wins, have updates on projects, discuss roadblocks, and prioritize the next tasks at hand. Here are four roadblocks that commonly occur in marketing meetings and how to tackle them with actionable solutions.
If you’re in this boat, you’re likely used to meetings having no goals, no purpose, no tasks to complete, and a general lack of focus. You’re probably getting fewer invitation confirmations, more meeting cancellations, and a general lack of interest in your marketing meetings. Then when you do get everyone in the same room or on the phone the conversation goes on and on but gets you nowhere.
Meetings that run longer than 30 minutes are a dread to see on your calendar. By shortening up your meeting time, people will hopefully get the hint that you mean business! Not only that, but be sure to send out reminders at least 24 hours in advance with a meeting agenda about what your attendees can expect to discuss. And keep your agenda standardized through a template that your entire team can use, ensuring notes and action items stay centralized. Then stay on task. When you’re done with your action items, you’re done with your meeting.
Let’s be real, once we are off of a Zoom call or out of the conference room, our mind goes onto the next task we had planned for our day. Then the routine continues until you’re getting ready for your next meeting and realize you haven’t completed your part of the assignments. If this isn’t you, then it’s most likely what some or all of your team members are experiencing.
Decide in your meeting who is doing what and when they will be expected to deliver their part. Make note of this in your agenda and then send a follow-up email within 24 hours with assigned to-dos and deadlines. Don’t ever expect that your attendees will take their own notes. This way, you can set the precedent of your expectations and there will be no excuse of “I didn’t know that was my responsibility!”
Your marketing meetings are always siloed to one specific task or project and no one knows how your activities are actually performing. Not to mention, you have no idea how they are working holistically to provide tangible results!
It’s simple, add a section to your meeting agenda that speaks specifically to KPIs that matter to your team or your client. And don’t just report on numbers, report on impact. And don’t get hung up on how certain metrics look compared to others. If you’re reporting on website sessions and sessions to conversions, those numbers will most likely have a large variance between them. Verbalizing how your numbers are impacting your prospects, customers, and revenue will deliver better influence than stating how many people have been on your website this month.
The blank stares, disengaged behavior, typing/texting, or overall disinterest by management or a client can make you want to hide or fear that your information is not significant or meets their standards. Now imagine how your trigonometry professor felt when he taught his class. But if this information is important to you, shouldn’t it be important to them? Not necessarily.
Don’t just assume that your Director of Sales wants or needs to know about your organic traffic rate. Marketers are usually gatekeepers of data and often assume what they think leaders will find value in. Align your reporting or audits with the company or department goals, then create those separate reports for those various silos. Once you’re reporting on metrics that your management is interested in, those blank stares will hopefully begin to go away.
Don’t slow down! You’re just getting started and now is the time to continue optimizing to make your meetings more productive, efficient, and meaningful than ever before. With these tactics, you’ll be well on your way to crushing your marketing role and delivering more success than ever. If you’re looking for additional resources and templates, be sure to check out our resource library. There’s a plethora of guides, eBooks, templates, and webinars to help you continue making moves and building revenue.
If you’re still finding yourself stuck, let us take a turn! We’d love to help out with a free marketing assessment. We can discuss your current activities, what your goals are, and where you can improve. Our experts will be able to uncover new paths for growth while bringing a new perspective with a fresh set of eyes.