Sell More Services With Better Communication

Above all, selling services requires strong communication between you and the customer. It’s essential that you explain exactly what you’re going to do, why it needs to be done, and how much it’s going to cost. It’s even more important that you listen carefully to the customer to make sure that you’re both on the same page. Does he understand what you’re proposing? Is it what he wants? Does he have any unasked questions?

Establishing and maintaining open communication is especially important for a service job because you often encounter unexpected problems as the work proceeds, which can undermine the trust you’ve built up with the customer unless the news is delivered properly. No one wants to leave their car in your shop for a dash panel upgrade only to come back and learn that a major instrumentation repair has been added to their bill as well. The time to talk to the customer about unanticipated repairs is before they’re done, not afterwards.

Another source of customer dissatisfaction that can be eliminated with better communication is pricing. Some routine, straightforward jobs can be sold at a published flat price. Most of the work you do is probably not simple and routine, however, and you don’t really know how much time it’s going to take until you do it. Pricing tools like automotive flat rate manuals can help, but they’re far from the total solution, especially for complicated work that comes with high expectations.

Again, the solution is openly communicating with the customer at the beginning of the transaction.
Emphasize that the amount of labor, parts, and material required for the job is an estimate. It’s based on your experience with similar jobs so it should be pretty accurate, but it’s still just an estimate, not a guarantee. Explain that you’ll do everything you can to keep the amount of hours under the estimate and assure them that you’ll let them know as soon as possible if it looks like there’s going to be an overrun or if there are additional parts required due to an unforeseen complication.

Then do it! Make sure you have telephone numbers where the customer can be reached during the day while the work is being done and call whenever there’s the least question about any item beyond the estimate. It’s a great temptation to skip the call in the interest of time, but it’s a false economy if the customer blows up when he finds out about the work later. Even if the work is absolutely necessary, it’s going to leave a bad taste in the customer’s mouth and make them hesitant about trusting you in the future. And those kinds of grudges not only last a long time in the customer’s mind, they linger on the word-of-mouth grapevine forever.

Service is the heart of every business. With the growth of online retailers who can sell merchandise below the brick and mortar shop’s costs, selling those services is more important than ever. Following these simple guidelines can make the experience less painful for the customer and more profitable for the shop owner.

Dave Donelson distills the experiences of hundreds of entrepreneurs into practical advice for small business owners and managers in the Dynamic Manager's Guides, a series of how-to books about marketing and advertising, sales techniques, motivating personnel, financial management, and business strategy.

Powerful Retail Selling Environments

Having shelves full of merchandise is fine, but it’s almost impossible to up-sell a customer if you just rely on the quantity of SKUs you offer. Even worse, impulse purchases might seem to be more likely, but they are just about non-existent in a cluttered, claustrophobic environment. The most successful retail operations have showrooms that make both of these profitable events happen more often. Here are some tips for making the most of your selling space:

● Your front window is the first impression many customers get, so make sure it’s an appealing one. It should be clean (including the glass), well-lit, and arranged in an uncluttered, entertaining way. Choose the merchandise you’re displaying carefully and remember that it will fade in the sun. Most pros suggest cleaning the space and re-doing the arrangement about once every six weeks.

● Keep the entrance area free of clutter. Customers—especially new ones—generally stop when they come through the door to look around and get their bearings, so give them a little room—and the sight lines—to do that. Avoid big displays just inside the door that might block their view of whatever it is they’re really shopping for.

● Keep your space brightly lit, not just because it makes the merchandise look more appealing, but because it gives a sense of energy and motion to the shopping experience.

● Silence is deadly, so crank up your CD player or radio. Almost any kind of music is good, just as long as it’s not so loud that the customers and your sales staff can’t hear each other.

● Take a tip from the supermarket industry and arrange your merchandise on shelves or racks in ways that encourage impulse buying. Put related items like winter hats and gloves near each other and remember that the items that sell the best tend to be displayed just below eye-level. Generally, goods located above the customer’s head might as well be hidden in the back room for all the attention they’re going to get.

Finally, keep in mind that every interaction with a customer is a transaction whether they buy something or not. Both you and the customer get something from every conversation; you get a chance to qualify them for future business by finding out what kind of lifestyle they have, the size of their family, and other important details that affect their purchasing intentions. They learn (hopefully) that your staff is knowledgeable and eager to assist and that you carry the kind of products that can help them achieve their goals—information that will bring them back again. So, even if they don’t make a purchase, be sure to thank them for coming in and invite them to come back soon.

Dave Donelson distills the experiences of hundreds of entrepreneurs into practical advice for small business owners and managers in the Dynamic Manager's Guides, a series of how-to books about marketing and advertising, sales techniques, motivating personnel, financial management, and business strategy.

Retail Customer Service

We sometimes fool ourselves into thinking that people are so used to shopping unaided in the aisles of mass-market retailers that they don’t want to be bothered by pesky sales people, but nothing could be further from the truth. What customers don’t like is a clerk hanging around putting silent pressure on them to make a decision. While there may be a few independent souls who want to browse unaided through a plan-o-gram full of merchandise, most people appreciate the expert advice and guidance of a knowledgeable retail sales person, especially when they’re shopping for something more complicated than a bottle of shampoo.

A good retail salesperson does their best work when they help a customer figure out what they need in order to accomplish their goal or fix their problem. Which means, of course, that your staff has to know what they’re talking about. They need to know the lines you carry and what the products do—and don’t do. They need to be able to answer the prospect’s questions and even to suggest questions that the prospect should be asking. If they don’t know the answers, they should know where and how to get them—and make it clear to the customer that they’re willing to do the extra work cheerfully.

Helpful service like this means the sales person needs another set of tools, too: good communication skills. Sometimes, it’s not enough to just ask the customer what he wants. The sales person may need to do a little probing about the customer’s needs or desires before he or she can suggest a good solution. They need to know what kinds of questions to ask and—even more importantly—they need to listen to the answers. Some customers will be able to tell you exactly what they’re looking for, what size they want, and even where it’s located in your inventory. A far greater majority of them, though, are like patients in the doctor’s office; they need somebody to listen to their symptoms, to tell them why it hurts, and to prescribe something they can do about it.

Dave Donelson distills the experiences of hundreds of entrepreneurs into practical advice for small business owners and managers in the Dynamic Manager's Guides, a series of how-to books about marketing and advertising, sales techniques, motivating personnel, financial management, and business strategy.

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Dave Donelson distills the experiences of hundreds of entrepreneurs into practical advice for small business owners and managers in the Dynamic Manager's Guides, a series of how-to books about marketing and advertising, sales techniques, motivating personnel, financial management, and business strategy.