Approach Customers
Approaching customers is something all sales associates involved in retail have to be able to do and be a ease with. A smile and a greeting, good morning or afternoon is usually offered, followed with a how may I help you? The next step is a crucial one in the customers buying decision process. The customer will either ask for assistance or ask to be left alone as he/she is only browsing. Actually saying “just looking” is an automated response from the customer to get you off her/his back. The customer may have been through a string of stores and your greeting could be the fifteenth given to him today. By following this monotonous process of first contact the sales assistant is actually setting himself up for being brushed off.
Try alternative approaches, using humour, complementing the customer as he walks in, commenting on the items the customer is looking at, followed by an introduction of yourself. People tend to buy from people the know and trust, so putting the customer at ease but still standing out a little from all the others may very well be worth your while.
Assist browsers
“Just browsers” are a stores biggest potential for higher conversion rates and more profits. Customers asking for assistance are already likely to purchase and Although the customer may say she’s only looking, she is most definitely looking for something special, a shirt, a skirt, something for work, something for date night on Thursday. The trick is to overcome the just looking brush off. Instead of stepping quietly away uttering a let me know if you need anything, try asking if the customer is looking for anything in particular and perhaps use a little humour to keep the conversation going. Keeping a polite, positive conversation while trying to focus in on what the customer is looking for is your best bet of changing a browser into a buyer and Peocon research has shown that browser conversion rates improve when value added service is provided. Often customers feel obliged to purchase something from sales associates that go that extra mile
Add value
What value added service really means is adding something to the customers shopping experience. This may be suggesting and running to find alternative items and different sizes. Make your customer feel a bit special, after all shopping is more about fulfilling emotional needs than tangible measurable needs. This is true in almost all commerce and the sales associates job is to make the whole shopping experience a part of this emotional fulfilment.
Offer personal experiences
Offering personal experiences from using products or items can be part of enhancing the customers shopping experience and helps the sales associate advocate the products.
Get them to try it out
By getting the customer to try the item their dwelling time in the store is increased and thereby they become more likely to make a purchase. Trying the product out also increases the sales associates exposure to the customer as he now has more openings to suggest alternatives or accessories to complement the item in question.
Learn from failures
Follow your progress. If your new sales strategies or services are note raising the conversion rate or it is falling they are not working and need adjustment. The only way to know your conversion rate is to actively and accurately count the number of customers entering the store. Retailers that analyse and monitor their conversion rates and the factors that affect it are better positioned to learn from mistakes and steer their sales associates in the right direction. By constantly counting customers while using different sales and promotion tactics and following the effects on customer traffic and the conversion rate a store can learn from both failures and successes.