By
Bob Phibbs
The retail sales team is the public face of your company, the front line of customer relations, and defines the company with everyone it encounters.
The retail sales training techniques used determine how a retailer is viewed.
The limits of these instructional programs create a front-line sales force that is poorly informed, inconsistent, and, most importantly, lacking in confidence.
That’s why you see so many associates stacking merchandise and staying behind the counter - away from customer service.
Searching for sales solutions for better customer
For a retail sales training program to be effective, it must be part of an ongoing process of improvement. A once-and-done instruction period leaves plenty of time for your sales staff to fall into bad habits on the sales floor.
A sales training program that is coupled with performance monitoring can stop bad habits before they form or, worse yet, get passed on to other employees.
Professional athletes work out constantly under the guidance of experts and have their performance monitored. This isn’t done to punish the athlete; it’s done to promote their absolute best performance.
The same type of regimen can be applied to sales professionals, encouraging salespeople to apply the following techniques for reinventing the customer experience and increasing revenue.
When evaluating training courses for your company, you should make sure that the following techniques are employed and emphasized.
While some customization may be necessary, the following four items will provide a rock-solid foundation for a high-quality learning experience.
Built upon these fundamentals, you can be sure that your salespeople are getting the information and skills they need to succeed.
See also: Is SalesRX Online Retail Sales Training Right For My Stores?
Here are four key sales training techniques you want to master
1. Building rapport
Disconnected sales associates will create customers who are connected…but to the internet. Most shoppers carry smartphones and can shop for better deals while standing on the sales floor. More and more mobile apps let customers scan barcodes to find better prices on merchandise.
If salespeople aren’t giving those customers a reason to make an in-store purchase, the customer is just a few taps from making the purchase elsewhere...without having to leave the store.
To avoid this, salespeople must engage with shoppers within fifteen seconds. They must be attentive and truly listen to the shopper's needs and concerns. Rapport building takes time and a willingness to listen.
Once that rapport is built, trust naturally follows. Once a shopper trusts a sales associate, a great experience is born, and loyalty is created. Most people can understand that concept, but the devil is in the details.
Your training program has to tell your employees exactly how to accomplish that engagement rather than just state, we value every guest.
2. Emphasize the value
If a shopper can’t see the value of a product, they’ll be hard-pressed to pay full price for it. They’ll ask for discounts, wait for the item to be marked down, or buy it somewhere that sells it cheaper. Either way, your business ends up losing money and, perhaps, a loyal customer.
Your sales team needs to understand the importance of selling value over price. Having built a relationship with the shopper, the salesperson should know enough to begin connecting the customer to the item, not to its price.
3. Honesty is the only policy
A false claim or exaggeration by a salesperson about a product they are unfamiliar with can be quickly found wrong in the time it takes to do a Google search on a smartphone.
This could happen right in front of your salesperson, leading to embarrassment for your store and its staff. A properly schooled salesperson has product knowledge and is aware of the value inherent in the product.
They know how to connect with customers first so they can convey the value of the products. If they’re properly trained, they do not need to lie or exaggerate to close the sale.
4. Adding on
Low per-ticket averages due to an abundance of single-item purchases point to a failure at upselling or cross-selling.
If the salesperson has already put in the effort to build a rapport with the customer, that rapport should translate into additional purchases. Once again, this relates directly to the salesperson’s ability to engage with the shopper and understand their needs.
Knowing the value the product holds for the customer, the premium value, the salesperson should also use that information to sell additional items that will enhance the experience of the product for the customer.
Proper sales training will teach your team how to add value and raise the average number of items per customer.
The quality of training is proportional to sales performance
These sales training techniques will help your managers transform unproductive and underperforming staff into master salespeople who own the floor and create exceptional customer experiences.
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