The Top 10 Sales Conferences to Attend in 2016

Sales conferences can be extremely beneficial for sales teams – attendees are introduced to new strategies, hard-earned insights, and new connections from B2B sales world. In fact, SalesForce notes their past events have proven to increase sales productivity of attendees by 30%, increase marketing campaign effectiveness by 59%, and increase customer retention by 31%. While not all conferences can lay claim to results like these, the best provide the tools, resources and insights required for attendees to justify the cost of attendance.

In 2015 we laid out the steps on how to choose a sales conference that would produce a return on investment. Using that process, sales executives can determine which conference(s) from our list they and their teams should attend this year.

In no particular order, here are the top sales conferences of 2016:

1. Sales Conference 2.0

Date and Location	• Boston: May 2, 2016 • San Francisco: July 18-19, 2016 • Philadelphia: November 14, 2016
Cost	$325
Audience	CEOs/CSOs/CMOs, VPs/Directors/Managers of Sales, operations, and marketing
Topics	Leadership insight, sales-management challenges, alignment with marketing, sales enablement, sales strategy and executive, customer management, social selling, coaching, and sales effectiveness
Description	This is a high profile series of events typically held in four of five different U.S. locations each year. The Sales 2.0 conference focuses on helping sales leaders leverage Sales 2.0 technologies and strategies to optimize operations, enablement, and marketing performance. A sales consultant from Oracle described the conference as “a fantastic experience”, expressing it had a tremendous impact on his network as he was able to meet various sales and marketing professionals. There are already a number of speakers confirmed to present at the Boston conference including executives from ConnectAndSell, Selling Power, and The Bridge Group.

2. Inside Sales Leadership Summit

Date and Location	• Chicago: April 20-21, 2016
Cost	$1,395
Audience	Inside sales leaders
Topics	Sales contests, best practices, outsourcing, social selling, future trends, driving sales performance, sales culture, optimization of performance, CRMs
Description	The Annual AA-ISP Leadership Summit, which has earned the reputation as the inside sales conference of the year, returns for its eighth year with all new-presentations from over 70 of today’s most recognized inside sales experts. This conference is tailored to help sales leaders and their teams capitalize on some of the biggest sales trends of 2016 such as the latest tips, technologies, and proven best practices for solving some of this year’s toughest challenges and issues. In 2015, the Leadership Summit featured over 75 presenters with an audience of over 700 attendees, in addition to 50 exhibitors, who all came to learn, share, and network.

3. CRM 2016

Date and Location	• Las Vegas: March 20-23, 2016
Cost	$2,799 (All-Access), $899 (Workshop Only)
Audience	Sales representatives, sales leaders, senior executives
Topics	SAP CRM technology, processes, innovation, and analysis
Description	The CRM 2016 conference is the premier event for SAP sales, providing attendees with detailed case studies and strategies proven to boost sales performance and drive pipelines. For sales professionals interested in developing CRM strategies that can be immediately applied, this conference could be ideal. The three-day event will include over 250 expert-led sessions, over 300 hours of education, and 22 dedicated networking opportunities. The CRM 2016 conference will include various speakers including executives from ECENTA AG, Accenture, and SAP Labs.

4. MarketingSherpa Summit

Date and Location	• Las Vegas: February 22-24, 2016
Cost	$1,495 (Two-Day Summit) and $1,990 (Three-Day Summit and Workshop)
Audience	Marketers, sales representatives
Topics	Email marketing, relationship building, networking using search and social, customer engagement
Description	This conference represents a unique opportunity for sales and marketing representatives to learn from leading digital marketing experts on how to develop and maintain digital strategies. Although this event is primarily focused on marketing, salespeople are presented the opportunity to further develop their communication and digital-prospecting techniques with specialized guidance on subject lines, deliverability, and open rates. Morgan Spurlock, Academy Award-Nominated Director for the film, Super-Size Me, Charles Duhigg, NYT Best-Selling Author for book, The Power of Habit, and Dr. Leonard Mlodinow, Theoretical Physicist and Best-Selling Author, are among the lineup of ambitious and forward-thinking speakers.

5. LeadsCon

Date and Location	• Las Vegas: March 15-17, 2016 • New York: August 22-24, 2016
Cost	$795 (Conference only)
Audience	B2B marketers, sales leaders
Topics	B2B customer acquisition, lead nurturing, lead conversion, customer retention, driving revenue through email, converting on social, maximizing B2B trade show success, website optimization for lead generation
Description	LeadsCon is the only conference devoted exclusively to B2B lead generation with a specific emphasis on lead acquisition, nurturing campaigns, and conversion optimization. This event presents opportunities for attendees to acquire proven ideas from industry experts that can be applied immediately to an organization’s marketing strategy. LeadsCon features several experts in B2B lead generation including Scott Brinker, Co-founder/CTO of Ion Interactive, and Stacy Durand, CEO of Media Design Group.

6. SiriusDecisions Sales Leadership Exchange

Date and Location	• San Diego: February 24-25, 2016
Cost	$2,195
Audience	CEOs, senior sales executives
Topics	Channel marketing and the pipeline, fueling sales teams, alignment, forecasting, sales effectiveness, enablement-to-revenue
Description	The Sirius Decisions Sales Leadership Exchange is an opportunity for B2B sales leaders to learn from industry experts on implementing successful growth strategies and enhancing the productivity and performance of a sales force. This event allows attendees to connect with leading sales executives with insights on emerging sales trends and features various keynote speakers including Heather Cole, the Senior Director of Sales and Enablement Strategies, and Mark Levinson, the Service Director of Sales and Operations Strategies.

7. Topo Sales Summit

Date and Location	• San Francisco: April 7-8, 2016
Cost	$895
Audience	Sales executives
Topics	Sales leadership, sales development, sales technology, sales effectiveness
Description	The Topo Sales Summit presents sales executives with the opportunity to learn best practices, patterns, and strategies for driving revenue growth from over 600 successful sales leaders responsible for more than $50 billion in revenue. Attendees include senior executives from companies such as Google, LinkedIn, Netsuite, Mulesoft, Ringcentral, and much more.

8. INBOUND

Date and Location	• Boston: November 8-11, 2016
Cost	$999 (Early-bird pricing ends April 15, 2016)
Audience	Marketing and sales professionals, business owners, agency executives
Topics	Inbound methodology, content, social media, email, lead nurturing, account targeting, web design and development
Description	Hubspot strives to inspire, teach, and empower sales and marketing leaders to transform their business in its annual INBOUND conference. This event allows for attendees to learn the latest marketing strategies from presenters, enjoy networking events, sign up for training on content strategy, website creation, and inbound marketing basics and sales. In 2015, INBOUND had over 14,000 attendees, 170+ educational sessions, and 5 keynote speakers. Past keynote’s included Arianna Huffington, Seth Godin, Nate Silver, and Scott Harrison.

9. Dreamforce

Date and Location	• San Francisco: September 15-18, 2016
Cost	$999 (Early-bird special)
Audience	Sales Professionals
Topics	Sales cloud introduction, top pipeline management reports, sales secrets of the big guns, sales cloud and platform roadmap, forecast accurately with Salesforce Forecasting
Description	Hosted by salesforce.com, Dreamforce boasts a 95% recommendation rate by its past attendees. This conference provides attendees with a week of idea sharing amongst peers, thought leaders, and industry pioneers. The innovation-focused event offers over 1,000 breakout sessions, sales-focused themes, reduced-cost salesforce.com training and certification opportunities, and a gala and benefit concert featuring the Foo Fighters. This year’s speakers include Marc Benioff, CEO of SalesForce, Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, Jessica Alba, Found of The Honest Company, and Susan Wojcicki, CEO of Youtube.

10. CEB Sales and Marketing Summit

Date and Location	• Las Vegas: October 18-20, 2016
Cost	$1,595 (Early-bird rate)
Audience	Senior Sales and Marketing Executives from large enterprise organizations
Topics	B2B sales trends and changes
Description	This conference is designed to boost the participants’ knowledge, understanding and adaptability to the substantial changes B2B commercial teams are currently facing. With over 900 senior sales and marketing executives from large enterprise organizations across a variety of industries in attendance, this event emphasizes the importance of evolving the way sales leaders, reps and executives conduct selling activities. Past speakers, Nick Toman, Barry Schwartz, and Brent Adamson, will be returning as keynotes for the 2016 conference.

What sales conferences will you attend in 2016? Are there any that we didn’t list that deserve a mention? Let us know in the comments.