MANY TIMES, A store owner will hire a salesperson who has worked in the industry or someone with no experience but “they seem to be the type who could sell.” Just because a person was in sales in another store doesn’t mean they can really sell. Maybe their selling expertise is far from good and the green person you hired needs lots of training.
I speak to many store owners and find the word “training” usually is followed by “occasionally’ or “whenever we have time.” To have a great staff who can sell, handle the POS screen, take in repairs and do other jobs as needed takes consistent and regular store meetings.
When I was running our store, our staff came in at 9 and had an hour to set up the cases before we opened at 10. Our meetings were every other Friday.
On those days, the staff came in at 8:30 to get set up by 8:59, and the store meeting was from 9 until 10 a.m.
We divided the hour into four 15-minute training segments:
- Product knowledge
- Training on taking in repairs and custom jobs
- Salesmanship
- General store news
You’ll find that if you do all of the talking and training, they will lose interest. Instead of me teaching the first segment on product knowledge, I let the staff sign up weeks in advance for something they wanted to teach.
Let’s say Suzy likes aquamarine. If we didn’t have enough nice aquamarines to show, she could order some on memo. Then she’d have some handouts on aquamarines: where they are mined, how they are cut, what makes some more expensive than others, any “lore” or stories about them.
The second 15 minutes was on the Geller Blue Book on repairs and custom. I or a bench jeweler would go over the book page by page as to why we charge what we do and how to overcome objections on price.
For the third segment, I bought the staff a book on selling by Harry Friedman called No Thanks, I’m Just Looking. then we would go over a particular section of the book for 15 minutes.
For store news, we might go over a new vendor line, the latest advertising efforts, upcoming store events, etc.
After six months of twice-a-month learning, my staff could for sure outsell your store in selling and taking in repairs and custom! So, tell me, how do you train your staff to be the best they can be?
