News: Articles of Interest

Increase your sales by a simple Hi!

By Thomas Kascha

Internet marketing has taught us many new terms, one of which is conversion rate. Wikipedia states that that this is the "ratio of visitors who convert casual content views or website visits into desired actions based on subtle or direct requests from marketers, advertisers, and content creators". In easy retail marketing language this signifies the percentage of customers that enter a store and actually make a purchase. The subtle or direct request corresponds to a simple greeting, a smile or any other sign of noticing the customer.

Nowadays, if a business owner asks his salespeople what kind of day they had in the store, the regular response is calm and/or quiet. In their eyes, there is no immediate self cause for the empty order books. The big originator of poor sales performances is caused by the current economic crisis. Or isn't it?

Mystery shopping results show that even during these hard times, sometimes not every customer who enters a store is greeted or noticed. Of course the numbers vary per type of business, but the most remarkable point is that the greeting percentages are not increasing even though fewer customers are entering the stores, thus less busy.

The customer of today is self-informed, price conscious and over-sensitive for arrogant or "not listening" salespeople. This type of customer will not wait patiently unlike yesterday's customer. Relatively more today customers enter a store with the intention to buy. However, if the customer is not greeted or noticed by a salesperson, their intention to buy remains present but they will be more likely to make the actual purchase online or at a competitor. With this knowledge it is beyond belief that not more efforts are made to at least notice or greet every customer who enters the store.

Of course it is not always unwillingness by the salespeople. In the past, during busy times, salespeople still had plenty of time to go to a quiet office room outside the show room and finish any outstanding orders while their colleagues would handle new customers. Now-a-days there are less colleagues who can assist , which means that they should immediately move from behind desk to the show room and show their presence. Another solution is hiring hosts who welcome all customers and provide them with a drink to make the waiting more pleasant. There are many good and easy solutions which allow customers to feel welcome and acknowledged.

In old sales manuals it was forbidden under any circumstance for an employee to stop and acknowledge another customer in the middle of a sales conversation. Times have changed and if there is no colleague available to assist a waiting customer, a simple "Hi, I will be right with you" or a "sign of notice" will provide just a little bit more time and prevent walkouts.

Truth be told that even a simple "Hi" is too much for some employees. Mystery shopping can be the perfect valuable tool to increase the conversion rate and help employees understand the importance of greeting ALL customers. It makes the actual sale one step closer, more about that in my next column.

 

Article courtesy of MysteryShoppingLive.com

 

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