Define Goals for the Sales Kickoff Event
Define specific goals for the event production like launching products, aligning around new strategies, or improving professional skills.
Launching a New Product: Present the product launch with event production and SKO best practices. Provide detailed information on features and target market. Equip teams to promote the new product through experiential and interactive methods. Be receptive to feedback and leverage the event for organizational learning.
Craft An Excellent Agenda with an Event Production Company
Create a schedule balancing informative sessions, interactive workshops, and team building activities. An experienced event production company can advise on best practices for networking activities to facilitate impactful introductions and collaboration.
Proper Speaker Selection
Work with your event production company to identify experienced speakers to deliver compelling content aligned to SKO goals. Transform talented employees into event highlights that build organizational pride.
Location, Location, Location
Global companies often hold SKO events abroad. Extracting employees from their comfort zones is a great start to facilitate connections between departments. Choosing the location sets 70% of the experience’s character. Alongside location selection, the concept, event style and planned activities emerges. The venue also dictates available tech infrastructure, vendors and services that will also lead to the event’s success. It’s important to understand key timeline anchors – if you’ve planned a main assembly and breakout sessions, you need to ensure the venue provides for that. Such advance requirements will help devise a realistic budget encompassing all components from flights, content, design and hotels. Countries with lower costs of living than the origin country, can provide greater overall value. Major cities near an international airport also provides strong value given high potential employee flight volumes from different points around the world.
In order to create a connection between employees, they need to be disconnected from their daily routine. An event at a surprising location will cause them to disconnect from routine and reconnect with the organization and their colleagues
Proper Casting Prevents Disaster
Invite experienced speakers able to deliver compelling, relevant content aligned to your goals. Naturally it’s best to engage internal senior managers and opinion leaders in speaker choices. Also consult high performing sales staff or external industry specialists. Include inspirational speakers with fascinating personal stories embodying company values alongside subject matter experts – combining inspiration and practical content provides attendees added emotional value. Leverage internal surveys and solicit field feedback to understand on-the-ground needs. Don’t hesitate to brainstorm internally.
The world’s a stage and employees are the leading actors
Stage content is an important topic on its own. The more complex the event content, the more critical having a director to craft a precise script and manage items and transitions at every turn. The director also usually leads writing the screenplay and texts, casting relevant content with the production team, and constructing the various pieces. If you have musically or vocally gifted employees, the director will orchestrate those pieces to transform them into the event’s rock stars. This always builds tremendous organizational pride and mutual encouragemen
Workshops & Networking
Provide training and development opportunities alongside enjoyable networking. Offer workshops and think tanks as part of the agenda to help your sales teams develop new skills, learn about new products, or hone sales techniques. This is alongside networking gatherings like dinners or team building activities, which have great value in cultivating interpersonal relationships within the organization. This investment will later enable quality communication and collaboration while working remotely.
Some creative ideas you can use for super cool workshops:
- Create a scoring competition in an app where conference participants earn points for actions performed. The actions can relate to social interactions, knowledge about new products, etc.
- Enhance public speaking skills via improv exercises that strengthen abilities through humor while providing a bonding experience. Such workshops can leverage insider organizational culture, terminology and common complaints.
- Feature your own “Shark Tank” sales pitch workshop where sales teams present ideas to a judging panel. An activity that introduces competitiveness and elicits creativity among the sales personnel. Of course, spatial design and theming can turn this into an exceptional experience. Likewise the organization’s ability to take an idea and actualize it.
- An “Escape Room” requires collaboratively solving puzzles and challenges related to company offerings and operations – encouraging teamwork, creativity and interactively reinforcing key concepts.
Reinforcing Core Messages
Message reinforcement during the event can be done experientially, like through a cool photo booth creatively integrating the central message or an interactive digital activity echoing important themes.
Post-event, share key presentations, emphasize main talking points through training or ongoing messaging, tracking progress towards your goals. If you have internal communications apps like Connecteam for announcements, photo sharing, gauging satisfaction via surveys – leverage them here as well.
Recognition & Rewards
Acknowledge and reward not only veterans or top performers – celebrate successes and outstanding achievements during the event. This can motivate everyone to strive for excellence across other areas like community service.
SKO kickoff events are critical tools for global enterprises. Human connections that encourage ideas sharing and build trust. The events create a collaborative infrastructure between organizational divisions and people. Beyond that, the gathering provides an important element of employee experience and strengthens employer branding efforts. Bottom line, concentrates resources for an extremely efficient cost-benefit ratio.
