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Angela Perry Phone Smart Trainer illustrates the rule of thirds

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1 out of 3, 33.33% or the rule of thirds

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“Wait a minute!”

You know you’ve reached a good, solid rep who truly knows what they’re doing when there aren’t any unanswered questions or at least there is a good response for an unanswered question. If you ask a question, and the rep can’t answer you, then he should include 3 components in the response to you.

 Honesty! It’s always the best policy. If he doesn’t know then he needs to tell you so.
 Sincerity! You shouldn’t have to guess at what the next step is.
 Urgency! Confirm that there will be an answer.

Something like… “Well, I’m not sure but I can certainly find out for you and give you a call back shortly to let you know”.

It still doesn’t cease to amaze me… the things that come out of some people’s mouths. They can have a great attitude, be polite and professional and then you get something that makes you say “Wait a minute”!

Example:
Just the other day I called the toll free customer service number of a company that I deal with. Although the man I talked to could not answer my question with a solution or even a hint to what might have happened, he didn’t have to lie. I’m sure you’ve caught someone in a bold faced lie before and it just makes you scratch your head and wonder what ever possessed them to do that.

In this case, when I spoke to this rep at a call center for a company in which I deal with, he could not answer my question with a solution or even a hint or possibility of a solution. So I asked to speak with the manager to see if they could give me a clue as to what happened and possibly straighten it out that day as it was an urgent situation..

He said “Sure, please hold one moment while I get the manager”. The next man who got on the phone had the same accent, just as pleasant, but a little more enthusiastic then the first man I spoke to. He basically gave me the same response. “O.K. wait a minute”, I thought. (He’s the manager, giving me the exact same response, same accent with an extremely similar inflection and tone in his voice as the first guy)

I jumped in and said… “Wait a minute!!! You’re the same guy I just spoke to the first time, aren’t you!?” “Yes”, he replied… Some people don’t cease to amaze me.

O.K., overlooking the bold faced lie, I voluntarily started to give him information that I thought would be of help in order to track down the information and the solution that I needed. I wasn’t in the mood for games. While doing so, he put me on hold… again. While on hold, I called the company that I dealt with here in town, who deals with them but are not affiliated with them. If there’s a problem with the service/product, you’re supposed to contact the toll free number that I called.

But when that wasn’t sufficient for me, I called the place in town and explained the situation. They immediately included the 3 components… “I’m not sure what happened, but just come down here and we’ll go ahead and take care of you, today, o.k.!”
And they did exactly that. They had it figured out in 10 minutes! I never did stay on hold. Instead I went right to the other company.
Are you losing your customers’ trust in you?

Robin

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Hiring a sales savvy staff

By Tron Jordheim

Most of us would agree that it is better to have a sales savvy staff than not. Our business requires some intense customer interaction. The person at the front desk wearing your logo shirt is the reason people choose to store with you or with your competitor. When a tenant has a problem, it is your staff person’s ability to handle the problem that makes the difference.

So how do you attract sales savvy people? You have to build the culture first. A lot of lip service is paid to the whole idea of a company culture. The fact is though that every workplace has its own feel and its own unwritten rules. This is your culture. A culture revolves around language, shared stories and myths, legends of heroes, rituals and all those unwritten rules. When your culture encourages selling and the development of selling skills you have created a workplace where sales savvy people are comfortable and can excel.

Start talking the language of sales. Speak of qualifying questions, alternate choice closes, concerns and assurances, assumptive statements, closing percentages and missed opportunities. Learn the keywords and code words that help your staff keep “Sales” at the front of their minds.

Share stories and myths about selling. There is a great story about a young kid straight out of high school who went to work for a department store that sold everything you could imagine in one location. At the end of the day, the owner of the store went to check on the “new kid” and asked how many customers the new hire had helped in his first day. The owner was shocked and dismayed to hear that the kid had only helped one customer that day. The owner asked the kid to explain. He told how he had offered a man a fishing hook, only to find that the man had no rod, no reel and no tackle. After getting all the fishing gear picked out, the kid found that the man had no fishing boots or outdoor clothes. After helping the man find the right boots, pants, jacket and hat, the man realized he had no boat. So the kid took his customer to the boat department and helped him select a boat and an appropriate trailer. When the man mentioned he would have trouble hauling the boat with his Volkswagen, the young sales clerk took the customer to the truck department and helped him pick out a new pickup truck with not only a towing package , but also with a CD and DVD player. Finally at 4:45 in the afternoon, the customer who had been with the young salesman since 10:30 am had everything he could possibly need for a weekend of fishing. The owner of the store was amazed. He asked, “You sold all this merchandise to a man who came in to buy a fishing hook?” The kid replied, “Well actually I started the day in the pharmacy and the customer asked me where the tampons were. I took him to them and happened to say, ‘Looks like it a good weekend to go fishing’”

There are all kinds of fun stories about sales people. There are some great cartoons, too. Have you ever seen the Far Side cartoon featuring the King of Salesmen? He is waving good-bye from a boat as he pulls away from a shore-side Eskimo village. The Eskimos are standing proudly by their new refrigerators waving back. You can tell their fondness for the salesman in the sad expression on their faces.

There are sales stories like the Rule of Thirds that says one group of potential renters will rent from you anyway, as long as you don’t chase them off, because they already like your location or they know someone who has rented from you. Your job is to not talk yourself out of this sale. Another group isn’t going to rent no matter what because their needs will change or their needs are too far in the future. If you are nice to these folks, they will remember you when it is time to rent. Then there is a large group, the third group, which could go either way. These are the people you need to use your best sales and listening skills with.

Talk about the legends of great sales feats that have happened in your business. You can talk about the time one of your staff had a record rental day. Talk bout the funny and different ways your staff has asked for the rental and gotten it. At PhoneSmart, we still talk about the day that one of our reps, Dana, reserved 7 10x 20s for one caller. We still try to beat Paula’s eight hour record of 23 credit card reservations.

You can establish rituals, like the manner in which you make notes on your call logs, the way you stand up to greet a customer walking through your front door, the way you turn the lease toward new tenants, so they can see where to initial and sign. Look at the things you do in your selling routine and allow some of these to become your rituals.

Then there are the unwritten rules. The rule that you end no rental inquiry without asking which day the person would like to move in; the rule that says, no eating at the front counter; the rule that says look everyone in the eye when you greet them. You probably have many rules that work in selling your facility to new tenants and re-selling your facility to current tenants. Let everyone know what the rules are so they can use them.

Now that you have created a selling culture, go about attracting people who are sales savvy. Start with some qualifying hoops. We hire telesales reps at PhoneSmart. The first hoop a potential new hire jumps through is the recorded audition. When someone calls the “Employment hotline” they are invited to talk about themselves and their experience on a voicemail message. We listen to the messages and only call back the people who sound great on the phone, use visuals in their story and sell themselves well. You can do the same thing. Many people call your stores before they come to see it. Your telephone impression is essential to getting the rental. Why not hire only people who sound great on the phone?

How do you get people to inquire about your positions? What do you call your positions? Do you look for managers, sales assistants, marketing reps, retail sale people? Think this issue before advertising or promoting an opening. You will generally get what you ask for in an ad.

Why not secret shop any potential new hires? Do a telephone interview with them if they pass your recorded audition. If you like how the person deals with you on the phone and sells himself on the phone, find out where he is currently employed. Wait a day and call his place of work and secret shop the person. Pretend to be a prospective or current customer of that business and see how you are treated. This will tell you a lot. Did your potential hire ask for your business, try to fix your problem, attempt to cross-sell or up-sell?

When you call your potential hire in for a personal interview, create a test that will weed out the “wrong” people for the job. It can be frustrating when a person interviews very well and then turns out to be totally wrong for the position. I hired someone for a PhoneSmart position with a good resume and appropriate work history who interviewed very well. As soon as the other team members found out I hired this person, I had several of them ask me if I was nuts. Apparently this person had been rude and even somewhat hostile to three or four people while waiting in the break room for me to start the interview. So now we do “The break room test “. We intentionally leave a person waiting for the interview in the break room for five or ten minutes. We have a team member pass through and say “hello” on the way through to see the person’s reaction. Then another team member comes in and apologizes that the interviewer will be right there and says sorry about the wait. If the person does not have a natural, friendly reply for the person saying hello, and if the person is not cordial and patient when asked to wait a little longer, that is a short interview and a “No hire”. I honestly believe that this break room test has almost entirely eliminated unsuitable people and has cut our turnover in initial trainees dramatically. Create your own version of this “Break room test”. You will be very pleased with the result.

Another great t

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Sometimes sale people are the best to sell to, because if you are pretty good, they like you and buy from you. Sometimes sales people are the worst to sell to, because if your approach stinks, they will shut you down.

I was in my front yard one afternoon this weekend. I was messing around and doing a little yard work. My kids were playing in the yard and enjoying themselves. A white van rolled slowly up our cul-de-sac. My first instinct whenever someone I don’t recognize rolls up our circle like that is to let my Rottweiler out of the back yard. I could see from the decals on the van that it was a direct sales meat supply company. I imagine that the direct sales meat suppliers can build up some pretty nice route sales.

The driver rolled down his window and yelled out to me. “Hey do you eat steaks?” I said “No”. He yelled back, “You don’t?” I said “No”. He replied, “How about seafood or fish?” I said, NO”. He yelled back, “Well I know you aren’t a vegetarian, are you?” I replied, “I have no interest in talking to you today.” He said “O.k.” and rolled out the way he came in.

My daughter said to me, “Daddy, why didn’t you tell him you are a vegetarian?” A sensible question coming from a kid.

I explained to her that it was not his business in the first place and that if he was too lazy a sales person to even get out of the van and have good manners about introducing himself, I didn’t need to tell him anything. When sales people start their process in a flippant and impolite manner, they cannot expect to get anything but rejection.

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Today’s blog is from PhoneSmart secret shopper and sales rep, Angela.

‘Tis the season to be Jolly or is it?

I ask this question in good faith that the answer should be rhetorical but it is not. As the Christmas season is approaching, the stores are ready in every way imaginable except for the associates that either have missed the memo on friendly customer service or had an over dosage on “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”

It is a shame that you can go in to a store and smell the pine from the trees and the Christmas melody soothes your mind and leads you directly to the Holiday aisle. As your mind gets lost in the music and you ignore the over priced items as your hand continues tossing items into your cart, thoughts flutter around aimlessly. These thought expand into elaborate decorations and scenery that will look appropriate for the lawn, garage, the roof tops, the edging, the fence, etc. And as planned, more decorations go into the cart. As you go to the other aisles that are filled with big red signs with white letters that make up the word CLEARANCE and the “50% off “adds attraction to our eyes, so here we go racing to the sign; ignoring the two small words “up to” before 50%.

To get through the crowded aisles and ignoring the bumps you repeated “excuse me”, “pardon me”, “I’m sorry” as you make your way to that particular section for that specific item, to only discovered that the item is not there and so with some disappointment you proceed with your shopping list. On your way to the next item on your list you spot a sales associate. Your disappointment turns into relief, your prayers have been answered and here is a chance to redeem your faith and find that particular item that you felt did not exist.

With all the confidence in the world you approach the sales associated with a smile and ask for the much-wanted item. Instead of the anticipated response with clarity you get a half smirk of a smile, a low toned demeanor; and the entire person, both body and verbal language, wreaks of frustration. To top this off you get an answer of “I don’t know” or “I think that it is down here”. When you alert the associate that you already looked “down here” they reply with the first response, “I don’t know.” How helpful is this one being? And can we add some personality to this person? Wouldn’t it be nice for the associate to add to the first response “I don’t know” with “but I will find someone who does”? This simple addition to the sentence would make life a lot easier and will still allow you to continue shopping and take your mind off of the cart that is filled with the items that you did not need in the beginning.

But once the “Grinch” comes out the cart is quickly noticed and the music becomes annoying and then you are irritated with the smell of pine and holly and spice all mixed together as one fragrance and then you are out of the store empty handed. All of this to go home and then realize that you must again face the stores that may or may not have the “Grinch” working for that day.

If anyone knows a sales associate, please let him or her know theses three things:

1. We too are frustrated
2. They are the ones that filled the application out to help and “I don’t know” is not helping, it is ignoring… and shoppers like myself we don’t go away.
3. This is the season to be jolly is not just “now” but the season is as long as they are employed with the establishment.

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Be careful about getting too specific.

I bought a new toaster last weekend.

The old toaster was about 20 years old and every time it would come out of the cabinet the back would fall off and the sides would bough out. It still worked once you got all the pieces together, but it looked like it had been through a war. Not to mention the lovely avocado green color. The main thing that the toaster has been toasting lately is my morning bagel. I like my bagel toasted with soft cream cheese and a slice of salami.

So, I decided that the old toaster was dumpster bound and a new one should take its place. I first checked online from some popular discount retailers, so I could get an idea of what they might have to offer. I ended up getting a dinner invitation that night so I decided to leave the apartment early and go by the store for a new toaster before dinner.

The “aisle of toasters” was bigger than I thought it would be. After I got to the specific toasters that I wanted to look at there were still several choices. Besides features, there were color choices, and price ranges. I was looking for something under $30 that was stainless with black or some combination of those choices. I decided on one and put it into my buggy.

The next morning I was excited to try out the new toaster. As I was unpacking it I noticed the large lettering that said; bagel toaster. Cool, I didn’t even know that was one of the features. My bagel was going to love the new toaster, but would I?

I got everything ready to make the bagel and started the toaster with the “bagel” button pushed. It seemed like it took forever to finish but it finally popped up. I assembled the bagel toppings and took the first bite. It wasn’t great. The top was a little toasty and the bottom was barely warm. AACK!!

The old toaster was already in the dumpster and I was not going diving. Maybe I was being too picky. Sometimes we get used to something and when it is gone we miss it. I would give it another try.

I tried it again without the bagel button pushed. My old toaster didn’t know the difference between a bagel and a bread slice, why would the new toaster? It was better.

Who decided that in bagel toasting the top would be toasty and the bottom lukewarm? Not me. No one asked me how I like my bagel toasted.

Is your business too specific? Have you modified your business plan to only include a specific niche? Is it working for you? Yes it is good to offer a service or product that no one else has but have you pigeon holed yourself unnecessarily? Take a look at what you offer and see if you have a “bagel button.”

Thanks,
Natalie

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Find the sales bottleneck

Even though some people scoff at factory management mentality, the fact remains that no one knows flow management and efficiency controls as well as people who run factories and distribution centers.

In many ways a secret shopper’s job is to make sure the sales and customer service chain moves smoothly. As in a factory, you are often hunting for the bottleneck. Once a bottleneck or log jam is found, you can free up the flow and let the enterprise move forward.

A bottleneck in the sales process leaves both the customer and the sales or service rep in an awkward position that can mean decreased enthusiasm for all. That means less purchases or no purchases from the customer and weak attempts or no attempts at stimulating business on the part of the employee.

So use your secret shopping to identify the bottleneck in the process and remove it. Then look for the next bottleneck; and then the next.

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Sometimes you may just need to switch out the pitcher.

For the last few days I’ve dedicated a portion of the day to calling through a long (LONG) list of prospects. I ask them a few questions about what methods they currently use, if any, to give sales training to their employees. And I work in our new Role Playing line.

Sometimes they let me know that time is their biggest obstacle in maintaining sales training. Others have said it’s just the large scale of the task itself and they aren’t ready to take it on. Whatever their, or your, concerns or hesitation may be to update or initiate your staff into the world of sales, our Role Playing Helpline can make things a lot less painful and definitely more effective.

Our other services, a training course, secret shopping, and call center, are always a great sales solution to offer to everyone too. I really believe that we have covered all the bases and have the complete answer for storage and apartment industries.

So far everyone I’ve talked to has either loved the idea, or been completely not interested. We also sent some postcards and letters to those on the list whose address we had. I’ve found that the ones who received the letter first were must more interested and even asked me some questions about the service. So, I stopped calling the prospects we haven’t mailed letters to, and we’re going to find their addresses!

I feel like lately we’ve gone mail crazy! We’ve been bombarding our clients, old and new, with postcards, letters, flyers, etc…But it’s working! They have become intrigued and are ready to ask questions when I call them. I think that sending out a little something that doesn’t quite let the cat out of the bag leads them to become curious.

Did anyone catch the latest commercial campaign for EBay? They began airing commercials that talked about “It”. They even gave a web address to go to. The commercials were so intriguing that my husband and I were wondering what “It” was for days. A few weeks later they aired part 2 of the commercials and revealed that “It” was whatever you wanted and EBay could get it for you. Genius! They had me wondering and now, when if I ever need to find that one item I just can’t get anywhere else I’ll know where to go.

I think that stirring up a little curiosity about your business will do you some good. Just get your name out there and people will call you, or be waiting for you to call them.

Sarah

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It is somewhat unbelievable how often it happens. You walk into a place of business and numerous staff people ignore you. They don’t say “Hi”. They don’t ask to help. You might as well be a ghost.

I was in a motorcycle dealership the other day and spent 15 minutes looking at neat two-wheel rides without a single staff person even batting an eyelash at me. And I saw lots of them. I finally gave up and walked out.

When people walk into your place of business, do they hear you saying, “I don’t need no stinking customers?”

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Welcome to the secret shopping blog, where we watch the world of secret shopping and mystery shopping.

Here are a few things to consider as you fine-tune your expectations and evaluatinos…

12 Powerful & Positive
Steps to Selling

 Listen to Prospect – you won’t have the right answers unless the client helps you w/it.
 Features are important, but stress benefits. (I know we repeat most of the same things a hundred times a day – but it’s the 1st time your client has heard this and some of it is not self-explanatory).
 Know all possible applications of your product – this shows them we can do the job. (Example; drive-up access as opposed to inside storage, how to take advantage of drop shipped delivery, etc).
 You must firmly believe that our company provides the best service, best value, and best customization and has a stellar reputation. (All of these things apply to our company).
 Don’t assume – ask all the questions (all the way to the credit card, no matter what negative feedback we think we’re getting).
 You cannot force a prospect to do anything. When you try to force, YOU LOSE! This is a good time to find all areas of agreement and highlight potential solutions.
 Verify your information – just because they sound interested doesn’t mean they are. (Same as getting agreement).
 When you’re verifying information, never sound the same twice. (Put a new twist on the benefits you previously mentioned).
 Don’t think a negative response is a MAJOR ROADBLOCK. This is the time to shower them with all of our benefits.
 Be their partner, not just another vendor.
 No one can guarantee success! You can only deserve it, and you deserve it by:
 Accurately identifying the opportunity to help the caller and take active steps to move the relationship closer to the point where we can be of help to them.
 Deserve it by focusing on finding situations where you honestly believe you can add value and then deliver on that value. (Remember we must close the sale to get the chance to produce).
 Closing sales means building relationships.

good luck and good selling, Tron

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