To increase sales and profits, spend time preparing and monitoring the phone opportunities as you would walk-in traffic. A typical retail business has as many phone sales opportunities as it has walk-in traffic.
An effective system has the following:
• Training for the receptionist
• Training for the sales people and management
• A uniform and cohesive way to handle incoming phone opportunities
• A log that treats phone opportunities as serious as walk-ins
• A phone prompt card or other device that gives direction to the sales person during an incoming phone call
• A management review system of all incoming phone opportunities
• A formal call-back system
When you’re not scheduled on the floor, make some calls, and mystery-shop other retail businesses in the surrounding area and listen to your competitors. What you’ll hear in those phone calls is so poor, that you will be shocked. Shocked not only by what you hear, but also by the fact that you may be just as poor in your phone skills.
There are basically eight different types of incoming calls:
• Information
• Finance, Lease and Terms
• Trade In Information
• Bad credit
• Advertisement
• Price
• Best price
Find a partner and role play each one of the seven types of incoming calls. Do a typical sales call involving any of the seven types of phone calls as you would normally handle. Personally mystery-shop your own business and listen to what the receptionist, other sales people and managers are saying and doing.
The Internet has increased phone opportunities. Effective Internet sales people know that to increase sales from the Internet you must move the customer from the Internet and e-mail to the phone and then an appointment.
Here are some simple phone tips that can increase your phone effectiveness immediately.
1. Respect the phone customer. The first step to increasing your phone effectiveness is to decide to treat your phone opportunities with the same respect as your walk-in opportunities. Phone customers tend to be even better prospects. When someone has had dialogue with you and begins a sales process that creates trust, your chances of closing the sale and making a higher commission go up.
2. Stand up while taking or making a phone call, because you increase your ability to breathe and to use your legs and upper body to create body language. Why does body language matter if they can’t see you? When people can’t see you and they lose one of the most effective forms of communicating, they need to be able to see you in their mind’s eyes. When you stand up, you will gesture more, use more voice inflection and voice tone and be a much better communicator than if you sit.
3. Smile before you dial or pick up the phone. Allow the customer to hear and see you through the phone. Give them the excitement that will allow you to stand apart from other sales people. Who do you think they will choose to see?
4. Think like a customer. Share an attitude of servitude with your customer. The origin of the word sell is to serve.
5. Ninety percent of sales opportunities are lost in the first 10 seconds because the sales person has not created a direction for the call by immediately asking questions. Ask questions about the vehicle he or she is buying and about the vehicle he or she is driving now. Use the answers you get to create dialogue and rapport with the customer.
6. Get the customer’s number, name and set an appointment. Do these next three things and you will accomplish what the majority of sales people never do. Ask the customer if he or she is calling from home or work and get that number. Ask the customer to spell his or her first and last name. Ask the customer if he or she will be available to come in and look at the vehicle and get some figures this afternoon or evening. Give the customer an assumptive, alternative choice.
The opportunity exists for you to increase your sales immediately through better phone techniques. E-mail me at the address below with the word phone in the subject line and I will send you five ways to handle the question of best price over the phone.