My Training Manual for sales (and design)

Creating a large, focused, supportive group of people in a company requires time, energy, and continual effort, which results in a rewarding employer, employee and customer experience.

I cannot say I subscribe to the content of any religious text (though I am sure there are valuable character ethics to follow). The bible interests me in it's ability to: direct a large number of people (~ 2 billion) to focus on similar values and agendas, infiltrate people's everyday lives, to change their views and lives, make followers dedicate their time, energy, minds and money to it's ideals. Most importantly I am interested in the bible's ability to create a desire in the converted to spread their knowledge on. The ideals in a company training manual need to do the same; they need to be utilised, supported, spread and surpassed every day through continuous use and training.

My Training Manual for sales (and design)

1. The Customer or target market

The ability to understand, communicate with, and effectively inform your customer or target market is the most important part of the sales (and product design) process. A strong knowledge of the target market's needs, wants and desires are key to developing an effective sales pitch (and product). In a competitive market it will be the company who understands and surpasses the customer's needs, wants and desires which will succeed.

I have used various sales techniques, in luxury retail to door to door cold calling, in each case, understanding the type of customer and their 'buying culture' are most important; some want to be informed of what to buy, others like to make considered decisions over a period of time. One approach I know that works is making the customer feel that their needs are of the highest importance .

Much has been written on sales techniques, I particularly like the ideas in 'How to Win Friends and Influence People' by Dale Carnegie, an overriding theme in this book is 'understand the other person' – their point of view, their motivation, their needs. Apple Inc is currently a market leader in retail which uses a very different yet successful retail sales and product development strategy.

"In 2009, when retail sales declined around 2%, Apple’s retail sales rose roughly 7%. In 2010, Apple’s retail sales, excluding online, jumped 70% to $11.7billion, or about 15% of its revenues of $76.3 billion, compared to the overall retail industry’s sales growth of 4.5%."

Apple's former CEO Steve Jobs had a different style of company hierarchy to the traditional 'top down' approach. Apple's interest is in the customer and their needs, so Apple's hierarchy is 'outside in', meaning the customer's needs guide the development of products and the sales approach.

In production:

“...you have to start with the customer experience and work backwards to the technology, you can't start with the technology and work out where you're going to try to sell it... As we have come up with a strategy and vision for Apple, it started with 'what incredible benefits can we give to the customer?', 'where can we take the customer?' not sitting down with the engineers, figuring out what awesome technology we have, and then figuring out 'how we're going to market that?'”

In sales:

“Instead of starting with what Apple has to sell, the sales staff at Apple start from where the customer is and what the customers' problems might be.”

Modern sales techniques aim to 'help and facilitate' an outcome for the customer's problem rather than the traditional 'persuading' or 'influencing' the customer to your outcome. Therefor an augmented 'steps of sale' is necessary to flip the sales person's agenda from fitting 'the product to the customer', to fitting 'the customer to the product'.

1.2. The Product

Being the facilitator between customer and product demands an equally strong knowledge of the customer's needs and your product's features and capabilities.

Detailed product training needs to be done with every new employee and with every new product, to understand what advantages it has: for specific customer needs, compared with similar products in store and on the market, and how it can be sold using this detailed product knowledge.

It is the sales person's ability to thoroughly inform the customer about the advantages of a product, and relate these advantages truthfully to the customers needs; even if the product is not the 'best' on the market, the sales person can make a satisfied customer through solving the customer's problem (needs), through passionate applied knowledge of a product's features and capabilities.

2. How to Sell

The salesperson must associate with the customer, their needs and problems, just as much as the customer needs to associate with the sales person, their presentation and the product.

The sales person must be an 'immaculate member' of their brand and target market i.e. models and creatives in fashion retail, golf pros in club stores etc. The sales person is there to inspire the customer to be part of their brand and product; a great example is Apple Inc's aim in retail - 'to delight customers' by listening to a customer's problems and desires, and solving these with 'solutions'. Apple's marketing team (Guy Kawasaki) coined the term 'brand evangelism', referring to the sellers and consumers of a brand culture and product. Apple's sales and marketing people created so much belief and passion around the brand and product they could recreate that belief in customers, who in turn freely try to convince others to buy and use a product.

Traditional sales techniques influence and persuade the customer that “our product is great” (product to customer). Today's sales people use techniques to facilitate, enable and problem solve a customer's needs, queries, problems with their product “your needs are great” (customer to product).

The (seven) steps of the sale augmented with 'facilitative' methods:

1. Planning and/or preparation including preparation of facilitative questions (research is also useful to avoid wasting time asking about things that can be researched first)
2. Introduction or opening, using facilitative questions
3. Questioning listen to the customers needs and ask questions about 'who, what, where'... the product is needed for, this creates a basic 'picture' in the customers mind about the end result, and gives the facilitator an outline of the customer's needs which they can then relate their product to, and complete the 'picture' for the customer using various product details in the presentation.
4. Presentation or proposition 
   
   

   Fit, cut, sizing - to their body, should be done as quickly as possible (by eye).

   Choose the most ideal item which you can relate to the customers needs, occasion, personal style, individuality, and how it can create an outfit (extend the sale).

   Choose colours, details, features, fabrics etc., which you can relate to the customers needs, occasion, personal style, individuality, and how it can create an outfit (extend the sale).

5. Overcoming objections/negotiating - more appropriately these days using facilitative questioning and assistance to shape the product, and the prospect's ability to assess, agree and integrate the product- if you are trying to overcome objections and persuade and influence at this stage then something's wrong
6. Close or closing - not old style persuasive 'closing' - this should be modern collaborative cooperative agreement - using facilitative help where appropriate - complex systems need help in arriving at good decisions
7. After-sales follow-up - facilitating supplier fulfillment and client adoption of proposition or solution - involves plenty of internal selling and ideally good project management skills - good sales-people should continue to take responsibility for checking and ensuring proper sales follow-through
   

   Source: www.businessballs.com

The above is an idealised interaction; where the customer gives information of their needs freely. Often a potential customer will not give you their needs, they are 'browsing' the stores for basic ideas, or an advanced browser will be comparing one or two products from store to store. Today browsing is often done on the internet, so the retail store needs to accentuate its advantages as a multi-sensory and dimensional guided experience, where one can instantly 'feel' the product and brand culture. If a genuine browser comes in, this is an opportunity to give them a great experience of your brand, product and service - it's competitive advantages in the market, new features, after sales service etc. This is 'facilitated browsing' or as Apple terms it - 'Delighting the customer'.

Apple's “steps of service”:

• Approach customers with a personalized warm welcome;
• Probe politely to understand all the customer’s needs;
• Present a solution for the customer to take home today;
• Listen for and resolve any issues or concerns;
• End with a fond farewell and an invitation to return.

3. The Business

- History

- Identity, values, mission statement:

e.g.“A passion for customers and their desires, and an ability to efficiently and effectively connect customers with our excellent product”

- The product, and the future of the product.

- The product's competition and advantages in the market.

- The target market.

- Online presence.

- 5-10 year plan, how the customers / employees relate to the plan.

- Hierarchy, management style.

- The employee's role and potential opportunities available with the business.

4. Procedures

Training in company specific procedures:

- Sales style, customer relations, CRM system

- Product information
- Discount information

- Website information

- Financial targets, KPI

- Stock and alterations management

- Personal and store presentation standards

- Arrival and departure times

- Returns, refunds, discount policies

- Computer and point of sale training

- Cleaning
- Communication - channels, directory, etiquette 

- Theft prevention / procedure

- Health and Safety prevention / procedure
- Holiday accrual / allowance / procedure