I posted the intro to Mike Tidmore’s 5 steps last week and here comes lesson 1. Great advice!! I will be posting all 5 Steps over the next week, so I hope it is helpful!!

The 5 Steps to Successful Retail Selling

The Approach

A.      What not to do:

 If you’ve been in the retail business for more than 3 days now, you’ve probably already heard that cardinal rule number 1 is that you never, ever, walk up to a prospective customer and ask the dreaded question; “May I help you”. If you have ever had any sort of sales training course in your life, you know that you are never supposed to ask a customer a question that they can conceivably answer “no” to. Why? Because the first time a customer says no to you, they are in control of the conversation and the flow of the sale in general.

People are automatically, genetically programmed to answer “No, thank you, just looking” to that question or any variation of that question. Some salespeople are under the mistaken impression that if they word it differently, such as, “How may I help you” or “May I be of service to you today” that they are setting themselves apart from the norm. Not hardly. As a matter of fact, I’ll go so far as to tell you that the 9 out of 10 prospective customers that you approach are not even going to listen to the first sentence that comes out of your mouth. They won’t hear a word! Why? Because they are already spitting out that pre-programmed phrase “No thank you, just looking” before you ever get the words “May I” out of your mouth. Test my theory if you are bold enough. Walk up to a customer, look them straight in the eye and say something like “Hello! You really don’t sweat much for a fat lady”. I bet that more often than not, she will answer “No thank you, just looking” to your rude question because she never heard a word you said. DISCLAIMER: If you do decide to test this, please don’t say you heard it from me .

The main reason I want to tell you what not to do on your approach is to drive home one Key Point: Be different! Do you want to be one of the average salespeople out there? Do you want to be one of the below average salespeople out there? If you use the phrase “May I help you”, or any variation of that question, then you are most likely destined to be in one of those two groups.

B.  Be Unique!

 In today’s high pressured social and economic setting in the United States, many things have changed dramatically over the last 10 to 20 years. People are in hurry, they’re stressed and they’re worried. Without getting into a huge discussion about the decay of morals and behavior in our society, I can tell you that one of the things I miss the most, is the fact that people in general these days just don’t have nice manners anymore. It is unfortunate that one of the things that can set you apart as a top salesperson is to use good manners. It’s pretty sad that you will be in the minority these days, if you use the words “please”, “excuse me”, “thank you” and “You’re welcome”. Just be nice, be friendly, be warm, but be professional.

 C.  The Approach Is For Gathering Information!

 Key Point: Ask a lot of questions. Every question you can get an answer to during the Approach phase makes you more efficient during the rest of selling process. The answers to those initial questions actually save time during the Presentation phase. Trust me, your potential customers are all in a hurry (or at least they think they are).

Ask enough questions to get a clear picture of the customer’s needs. During the course of determining their needs, you will also “accidentally” discover needs that they may not have even realized they had. This accomplishes what’s known as building a rapport with your customer. By asking questions, it is apparent to her that you are truly interested in fulfilling her needs. If you want someone to like you, you need to show that you are interested in them first! The more people like you, the better your product looks to them.

Ok, Ok I know, you need examples. First, please allow me to digress and give you an example of what not to do. The typical retail scenario goes something like this. A customer walks into the store and approaches a display and picks up a piece of merchandise. The typical salesperson walks up to her and asks “Hi, can I help you” of course she automatically says ‘No thanks, just looking”. The salesperson responds with “Ok, if you decide you need some help, I’ll be right over there, just yell for me”.

As I mentioned previously, there are so many things that are wrong with this approach, that I won’t even start describing them. Let’s just move forward and talk about the correct Approach.

How this scenario should unfold with a professional salesperson:

The same customer walks up to the display unit and picks up a shoe.

The salesperson makes the following mental notes as he approaches her:

      -The customer is a professionally dressed woman in her early thirties.

      -She looks physically fit.

      -She is standing next to a display that primarily has tailored pumps on it and that  is also the type of shoe she has in her hand.

The first words out of the Professional salesperson’s mouth are “Hello! It looks like you are looking for a new pair of shoes to wear to work.”

The customer responds with something like this, “Well, yes as a matter of fact, I’m about to get on a plane to go to a trade show in Las Vegas and I realized that my black shoes look terrible.”

 Salesperson: “The one that you have in your hand is a well made shoe and would be a good choice for you. If you’ll have a seat, I’ll bring another one out that is just as nice looking, but has twice as much cushioning in it. Trust me; you are going to need that as much as you’re going to be on your feet in Vegas”.

 Customer: “That’s a good idea; I’d like to see a few choices” 

SIDE NOTE: It may not be apparent, but there is a lot going on in what has happened so far. In this scenario, for the sake of example, our salesperson is on 10% commission. Being on commission, he knows that he actually writes his own paycheck every pay period by the amount of effort he puts into his job. Everyday when he comes to work, he focuses on 3 things when dealing with customers.

1. Giving the ultimate customer service so that this customer will return time and time again (and preferably ask for him as opposed to another salesperson).
2. Trying to upgrade the customer into a more expensive product than she had in mind when she came into the store (after all 10% commission for a $200 sale is much better than and $80 sale)
3. Trying to sell each customer multiple items. The more items sold to each customer means that the average $ per sale increases and you don’t have to worry as much about how long it might be before you have your next customer. 

The salesperson in the scenario above got some information about the fact that the customer is going to be wearing the shoes to a tradeshow in Vegas. By doing this he has just opened the door to make it easier to suggest other merchandise. The salesperson has been to Vegas himself. He knows how much walking there is to do out there and that most people that go there end up wishing they had more comfortable shoes. So here is his master plan:

1. She picked a Vincent Camuto pump up from the display so he is going to bring that one out in her size, but he is also going to bring out a pump by Taryn Rose that is traditionally a good fitting shoe and has extra cushioning in it. He hopes to upgrade her into this $200 shoe.
2. When he comes back out from the back with her pumps, he has also grabbed a few pair of the new flip flops the store just received that have the interchangeable bands. After all, its summer time and she may squeeze some pool time into her Vegas trip, right?
3. He also grabs a pair of athletic shoes (more to come about this later)

So you see; look at all the information that making that one statement “It looks like you need a new pair of shoes to wear to work” provided the salesperson! Now he knows her intended purpose for the purchase, now he is beginning to get to know her a little. That’s what he’s going for, to build a rapport with her. He wants to establish the fact that he is truly interested in making her happy with her purchases. Stay tuned to see what happens next.

 The Approach is just the first step in “The 5 Steps to Successful Retail Selling”. I can’t wait to share the rest with you. Whether you are a store owner, manager or salesperson, I’m hoping that this information is going to make you more successful. My goal is to help increase the number of profitable independent retailers out there!