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How to Training: Retail Sales Program for Store Meetings

Training your retail crew is a bit like hosting a barbeque.

Remember the last time you barbequed?

You prepared the food items carefully, lit the fire then added the food. You had to continue to check-in several times or you lost your dinner.

Likewise your retail sales crew has to be trained before they ever talk to a customer but you must continually check on them or you lose customers.

That’s why I created the HUDDLE program. It stands for Help, Understand, Develop, Direct and Lead Everyone.

So many times we know we should be helping our crew sell more but don’t know what to do. This program takes all the guess work out. Each self-contained lesson begins with learning fundamentals and what is required for the 5-10 minute lesson.

Here’s a listing of each of the 12 HUDDLES:

What words to use instead of, “Can I help you find anything?” and how to get your crew to greet everyone in a personable manner.
How to use a prop to make customers relax around you.
How to create the expectation of succeeding and challenging how we predetermine if a person will like us or not.
How soon to greet everyone and how to get it accomplished.
What to say when you follow-up with the browser instead of “Finding everything ok?”
How to find one thing you can comment on
How to look inside at something you have in common
How to be comfortable sharing yourself with others
What kinds of questions to ask to help funnel customer choices down to a few.
What is a feature and how do you find them
The link to features is easy, once you know what it is and make it relevant to the customer.
How to paint a picture so well, the customer sees the benefits of the add-on you suggest.

For the cost of about $11 a lesson, you get actionable and proven retail sales techniques that break down the mystery of selling your merch.

If you need more information about the program, you can go here or if you are ready to change direction and grow your sales immediately, click the add to cart button below to get your first lesson.

How To Handle Customer Complaints in Four Easy Steps

Sometimes it may seem like they’re looking for trouble, but complaining customers are probably just looking for a solution to a frustrating problem.

If you provide excellent customer service and follow procedures, complaints should be rare. When they do occur however, stay calm. Breathe.

I know, staying calm is tough when your patience is challenged by complaining customers! Continue reading How To Handle Customer Complaints in Four Easy Steps »

Silence is Golden! The Customer Service Debacle of Netflix

I was one of the first in my neighborhood to get Netflix. It was so civilized! Select the movies you wanted and they arrived in the mail! I would get an e-mail saying which movie just shipped and when I could expect it.

It was all easy, simple, and drama-free. Continue reading Silence is Golden! The Customer Service Debacle of Netflix »

Lousy Customer Service – It’s Our Own Fault

We’ve settled for too long in this country.

Settled as customers to accept inferior customer service.

Settled for employees who couldn’t give a damn about our business.

Settled for products that are just rehashes of other products – made on the cheap for a price point.

We kid ourselves into making an excuse, “You can’t find a good (name of widget) anymore when we chose one for $20 and avoided the one for forty. We make the excuse, “Good help is so hard to find and she’s the only one who I could get.” And the worst, we accept poor service as the norm and make the excuse to ourselves, “It doesn’t matter.”

We’ve got to stop settling because it breeds more of the same!

All this settling has allowed us the luxury to settle for despair. I mean, here we are in the 21st century being told that the worst is still ahead for kids, states, pensioners, unions, taxpayers, governments, stocks, neighborhoods, you name. Almost as if to make us lose hope. And many have.

But if you are in business, you don’t have the luxury of a disparaging thought.

Why are we settling?

Because we’ve forgotten what got us here. Innovation, hard work, drive.

The cause of lousy customer service starts well before we meet the bored employee.

Why are employees bored and allowed to still work? Because we as leaders aren’t excited enough to lead. We’ve settled into routine and settled for third or fourth best when the best is out there.

Why are so many customers and employees’ lives boring? Because we love to whine and feel bad?

No, I think human beings are innately drawn to the positive. But when they are surrounded by hopelessness they begin to think that hopelessness, fear and being anxious are the norm. They settle.

It’s like Superman believing he’s Clark Kent, Spiderman believing he’s Peter Parker, or Susan Boyle believing she could never sing.

It’s up to you readers to demand more. Of the stores we shop in. Of the employees we hire. Of the products we purchase.

But that all starts with demanding more of ourselves. Your employees are desperately hoping someone will lead them to a better way. If you are challenged how to do that, bring me in and let’s get going. Life is too short to settle.

Please comment below how you’ve settled or how you aren’t going to anymore.