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Retail Sales Training Tips

This Retail Sales Training Tips guide is intended at giving you some retail sales training tips to improve your sales management retail skills. Good personal sales in retail stores is hard to find today. The retailer who works at building a good personal selling effort will develop a valuable competitive edge over larger competitors.

The basic elements for developing a program to improve retail sales in your store are discussed in this Guide. If you are willing to develop your own sales training program based on the framework and examples presented, your personal selling program will be a more effective and rewarding one.

Good personal selling in retail stores is getting harder and harder to find today. This is particularly true in the large multi-unit retail establishments that have increasingly stressed self service at the expense of good personal selling.

The deemphasis of personal selling by large scale retailers leaves a gap in customer service that the small retailer is in a good position to fill. By emphasizing good personal selling, the small retailer can gain a competitive edge not easily matched by the bigger stores. It is much easier for your larger competitors to dominate in such areas as merchandise assortments, pricing, and advertising, than to provide a well developed personal selling effort.

Good retail sales training, however, does not automatically occur simply because the retail store is small. Nor does high quality personal selling result merely by paying sales people more money. Rather, good personal selling results from a carefully developed program which accounts for the major elements necessary in all successful personal selling programs.

This Guide discusses a basic framework for Retail Sales Training program as it applies to personal selling in small retail stores. By patterning your own program for improving personal selling along the lines suggested in this Guide you are likely to improve the quality of personal selling in your store.

Good Sales Management Retail

Before discussing the framework for improving Sales Management Retail , lets define good personal selling at the retail level.

Personal selling in retailing is essentially a matching of the customer's needs with the retailer's merchandise and services. In general, the more skillfully this match is made the better the personal selling. If salespeople make a good match not only is a sale made but a satisfied customer is created (or maintained). Thus, a long term, profitable relationship can be established.

There are three basic skills needed by salespeople to make this match effectively:

Salespeople must be skilled at learning the needs of the customer.

They must have a thorough knowledge of the merchandise and service offered by the retailer.

They must have the ability to convince the customers that the merchandise and service offered by their store can satisfy the customer's needs better than that of their competitors.

A Program for Improving Personal Selling

Developing a program for improving these three basic selling skills in your salespeople is the essence of building a better personal selling effort for your store. The framework for the program consists of three basic elements:

Selecting people who are suitable for particular sales position,

Providing training, and

Devising an appropriate compensation plan.

Selection. Finding good salespeople is a problem for both large and small retailers. Both are frequently heard talking about how hard it is to find "good" people. What they fail to realize, however, is that much of the problem is of their own making because they do not define clearly what they mean by good sales people. In short, these retailers do not specify what qualities they want in the salespeople they are seeking. It is no wonder then that they are not satisfied with many of the people whom they hire.

An effective ways to help avoid this problem is to use job specifications. this device has been used successfully for many years by large industrial firms. And, it can be used with equal effectiveness by small retailers. A job specification is basically a written statement, typically no longer than one or two paragraphs, delineating the requirements for a particular job. For example, a job specification for a retail sales position in a sporting goods store might appear as follows:

An Example of a Job Specification for a Sales Position in a Retail Sporting Goods Store

Type of Job: Retail Sales for Sporting Goods

Requirements of the Job: This job involves mainly in-store sales of full line of sporting goods ranging from items of low unit value (such as golf balls) up to higher priced merchandise (such as complete sets of golf clubs and skiing equipment). The emphasis is on big ticket items. Telephone follow up selling is expected and there is occasional stock work.

The value of the job specification is that is forces the retailer to be more explicit about what the job requires and thereby provides a guide for appraising the capabilities of prospective employees. For example, since the job discussed above emphasizes the big ticket items, the retailer should look for people who have this kind of experience. There are many instances of salespeople who can do an excellent selling job on low unit value merchandise by have trouble closing sales on the big ticket items. Job specifications help to avoid such problems.

Training. When the word training is mentioned, the small retailer typically associates this with the formalized programs conducted by some large department stores and national chains. However, sales training by the small retailers does not have to be, nor should it be, a formal and structured program. Actually, any conscious effort the retailer makes aimed at improving the three basic skills needed for effective retail selling is a form of sales training.

To get you on the road to thinking about the kinds of approaches you might use, here are several examples of sales training methods used by some small retailers.

An excellent method for developing a salesperson's skills at learning customer needs is through role playing. Role playing consists of acting out the customer-salesperson relationship by the salespeople. One person plays the part of the customers, and the other plays the part of the salesperson. Next time around, they reverse the roles. Role playing enables salespeople to see various sales situations from the customers' point of view. The skill necessary to quickly "size up" customers (learn about their needs) is rapidly sharpened through role playing. A particularly good time for you to try out this method is during slow period when your salespeople are just "standing around" anyway.

This article offers managing your Company tips and manage business advice. However, you aren't prepared to begin your own company
until you have given any thought to handling it. A business is an ongoing activity that doesn't run itself. As the supervisor you
will have to set goals, determine how to reach those goals and also make all the necessary decisions. You will need to buy or make
your product, price it, advertise it and market it.

You will need to keep documents, and determine prices. You will have to Control stock, make the ideal buying decisions and keep
prices down. You'll need to hire, train and motivate employees now or as you develop.

Setting Business Management Goals. Great small business management Is the key to success and great management starts with
establishing goals. Set goals for yourself for the achievement of many tasks necessary in establishing and managing your business
successfully. Be specific. Write down the goals in measurable terms and conditions of functionality. Break big goals down to
sub-goals, demonstrating what you expect to attain in the next two to three months, the subsequent six months, another year, and
the next five years. Beside each goal and sub-goal set a particular date showing when it is to be attained.

Plan the action you must take to achieve the goals. While the effort Required to reach each sub-goal ought to be good enough to
challenge one, it should not be so great or foolish as to discourage you. Don't plan to achieve too many goals all too. Establish
priorities.

Plan in advance how to quantify results so you can know exactly how Well you're doing. This is what is meant by"measurable" goals.
If you can't keep score as you move along you are very likely to eliminate motivation. Re-work your plan of action to allow for
obstacles that might stand in your way. Attempt to foresee obstacles and plan strategies to stop or minimize them.

Buying. Skillful buying is an important essential of Managing a business enterprise. This is true whether you are a wholesaler or
retailer of merchandise, a manufacturer or a service company operator. Some retailers say it's by far the most significant single
factor. Merchandise that's carefully purchased is easy to market.

Determining what to buy means finding out the Kind, type, quality, Brand, size, color, style -whatever applies to a specific
inventory - which will sell the very best. This requires close attention to salespeople, trade journals, catalogs, and notably the
preferences of your regular clients. Assess your sales documents. The manufacturer should view the problem through the eyes of
customers before deciding what materials, parts, and supplies to purchase.

Know your regular clients, and also make a Fantastic evaluation of the People you expect will become your customers. In what
socioeconomic category are they? Are they homeowners or tenants? Are you currently looking for price, quality or style? What's the
predominant age category?

The age of your clients can be a prime consideration in Establishing a buying pattern. Young men and women buy more often than
most elderly folks. They want more, have fewer duties, and invest more on themselves. They are more aware of style trends whether
in sporting apparel, cars or electronic equipment. In case you decide to cater to the young trade because they seem dominate in
your area, your buying pattern will probably be wholly different than if the conservative middle-aged customers appear to be in
the majority.

Study trade journals, newspaper advertisements, catalogs, window Displays of companies like yours. Request advice of salespeople
offering you merchandise, but purchase sparingly from several suppliers instead of one, analyzing the water, so to speak, until
you understand what your best lines would be.

Locating suitable merchandise sources isn't simple. You will buy Directly from manufacturers or manufacturers, from wholesalers,
distributors or jobbers. Pick the providers who sell what you want and can provide it if you want it. (Distributors and jobbers
are used by the majority of business people for fast fill-ins between factory shipments.)

You may distribute purchases one of many providers to gain more Favorable prices and promotional material. Or you might
concentrate your purchases one of a few providers to reevaluate your credit issues. This will also allow you to become famous as
the seller of a particular brand or line of product, and to maintain a fixed standard in your goods, if you are buying stuff for
manufacturing purposes.

When to purchase is essential if your business will have seasonal Variations in sales volume. More inventory will be required
prior to the seasonal upturn in sales quantity. As earnings decrease, less product is necessary. This means purchases of goods for
resale and materials for processing must vary accordingly.

At the start, how much to purchase is insecure. The best policy is To be frugal till you have had sufficient expertise to judge
your wants. On the other hand, you cannot sell merchandise if you do not have it.

To help solve buying issues, you should begin to keep stock Control records at once. This will help you maintain the inventory in
equilibrium - neither too big nor too small - with a proper proportion and adequate assortment of products, sizes, colors, styles
and qualities.

Basically , there are two types of stock control - control in Bucks and control in physical components. Dollar controllers show
the amount of money spent in every product category. Unit controllers indicate the amount of individual items when and from whom
bought by class. A fantastic inventory control system is able to help you determine what, from whom, when, and how much to
purchase.

Pricing. A lot of your success manage a business will depend on The best way to price your services. If your prices are too low,
you will not pay Costs; too high and you'll lose sales volume. In both cases, you will not Earn a profit.

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