So I did my Christmas shopping yesterday and I experienced a mixed retail shopping experience.

A week ago my wife Donna and I had already completed all of our shopping for our little 15 month old Daughter, Holly and all of our friends and family but now it was the dreaded “Shopping for my wife’s presents” time!

Let me tell you about just one of the experiences I had:

STORE 1 - H SAMUELS
MISSION: A locket and also a necklace

Everything was ok until the shop assistant asked me whether I wanted a 16 or 18 inch chain! Keh? Then he just left me to my own devices to choose - no advice whatsoever. He should have been asking the height of my wife, length and width of neck etc. Along those lines. Then, I asked them to be gift wrapped and he had to physically construct the boxes in front of me - this looked awful especially as they were very expensive items. By this time, all of the 8 staff in the store were with customers and another 6 customers needed help. The thing with jewellers, especially at Christmas time is that jewellery is very much a “see” and “touch” sale.

What I mean about this is that a customer almost always needs help from the shop assistant. They either want to see the product or touch it before making a buying decision so to be short staffed is a cardinal sin.

I can tell you that there were a lot of “tuts” and “comments” from the customers waiting around and a few of them left as I was walking out the door mumbling “bloomin ridiculous”

Just think how much money is walking out the door!

On a Saturday, especially at Christmas time you should be overstaffed if anything to make the customer experience that bit special. Why would you scripm and save during a month that makes you around 20% of your whole year’s turnover? It’s just crazy!

Think about the type of sell you have to make? If you are in retail, do your customers rely on you for guidance and help? Do they need to “see” and “experience” your merchandise? Or can they be left to their own devices as in a bookstore?

Think about this, your staff levels at times of the year and of the day and act accordingly.

DON’T LET MONEY WALK OUT THE DOOR WHEN IT IS READY TO BE PUT IN YOUR TILL!

Sean Mc

PS Click here for a free sales training course

If you run a shop or are a manager in a retail store then listen up as I’ve got a really good tip for you!

We’ve just completed some retail sales training for a retail store and as part of the training we also looked at their sales processes too.

Now I’m not saying that this sales technique will work for your retail outlet but the results we have had with just one technique has added £13,000 to the turnover of each store!

Within this particular business it was sometimes hard to find what you were looking for so I recommend that everytime someone purchases an item that the person serving should ask “Did you find everything that you were looking for today?”

Want to know the results?

Well, it generated on average an additional 5 sales per day. Now it doesn’t sound a lot as the average additional sales amount came to £7.25 per item but it generated an additional £36.25 per day when annualised came to around £13k! The fact that they have over 30 stores as well means that they were adding an additional £400k turnover just by asking a question at the point of purchase!

Making sales in retail is about working smarter not harder!

Make an enquiry today to see how we can help you improve your sales performance!

Sean Mc

Retail sales training is a real joy because of the nature of the sale. There you have people coming in to your store and if someone doesn’t buy, another prospect comes along very quickly!

Do you work in retail sales?

If you do then the “Oh, I’m just looking response” must frustrate the hell out of you.

But let me tell you this - it’s all your fault!

You allow your browsers to come back with that line because of the question you ask them!

Now you know that 80% of people will say “Oh, I’m just looking” to your opening question of “Can I help you?” so guess what you should do?

You should just help them to look!

You should say:

“Hi there, is there anything I can help you get a look at? “

Or

“Hi there, is there anything in particular that you wanted to look at?”

Can they come back and say, NO, I’m just looking?

Acknowledge the fact that they may want to look and help them do it.

Happy selling

Sean Mc

PS
We train, consult and advise many retail stores on how to improve their sales through effective retail sales training and sales consulting. Often after we have conducted some sales training, we will get members of staff to mystery shop the store! We have even got a dedicated MTD Mystery Shopping team in place to ensure that the standards of selling are top notch!

PPS
Have you got any retail sales training requirements in mind? If so, please make an enquiry at: http://www.mtdsalestraining.com/enquiry.html