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How Do I Increase Retail Sales

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​You could say that retail stores have a finite number of customers. Realistically a store can only be visited by so many people that day.

Marketing can definitely bring in more people but you should focus more on just doing that. In fact you’re making a very big mistake if your sole focus is to bring more people in to the store? Do you know why?

It’s because you aren’t getting everything you can out of the customers who do come in to the store.

Not everyone who comes in to browse will leave a customer who purchased something. You may also be failing to show customers the items they really want by placing things properly to casually suggest they buy something.

The staff in your store are now part of a price selling culture. They focus on what is on sale, or what is cheapest, or try to act like they aren’t selling something.

If someone leaves your store with only one item and they miss out on something else they need then one of your rivals will take their business. They may even turn a customer that should, by all rights, be yours in to one of theirs.

Don’t try and underplay what is at stake when a customer leaves your store empty handed or after only buying one thing. Both you and your customer are basically settling for crumbs in that situation.

The best way to increase your sales is to focus on the customers that do enter your store. It doesn’t matter if it’s one customer or one hundred customers. What matters is turning them in to spending customers.

If you end up with fewer shoppers in your store you can still meet sales goals as long as they all spend something. Plus when you have more customers than usual you get a lot more profit than usual.

Now though the question becomes how do you increase your retail sales. Luckily we have the answer.

The best method to improving sales is to move from a price selling culture to a value selling one. Don’t focus on the price and just let the customers know that the best value is theirs if they want it without worrying about the amount of money they have.

Your staff should understand the value of a product and how to sell that more than selling the price of the product. They should also be aware of ways to improve the value by using additional products.

This increases your sales and add-on sales and also gets rid of running markdown offers to get rid of high value products.

These top three tips will help boost your sales

  1. Build a Rapport
    Customers enjoying their shopping trips begins with enjoying the times they interact with staff. Your staff need to understand how to connect with people on a genuine level. They should get out from behind the counter because they want to, not because they’ve been made to. Your employees have to understand why a customer entered your shop, why they are buying something, and then connect all the products they need in a way that gets them to buy them. Building a rapport with customers means that they don’t spend all their time looking for better deals while they’re right there in your store. It also helps build the relationships between your customers and staff. This relationship makes it easier for your staff to suggest items and add-ons to customers because they are seen as trusted advisors rather than faceless cogs in the machine.
  2. Use Value Selling over Price SellingValue selling is a fundamental part of improving retail sales. Anyone can knock down a price and make a customer pick the cheapest option. This is the majority of retail these days. But marking prices down hurts profit and what is cheap isn’t always good. When your staff understanding the value of the product they sell they can convey this long-term value to customers. When customers understand the differences between qualities they will be more willing to pay more for better quality products. A good tip is called the Feel, Felt, Foundmethod. This involves saying something like you used to feel the same as they did. You felt the price was too high. You felt that way until you found how something was better than the others. When you convey the value of a product to a customer it becomes easier to move the conversation towards selling add-ons.
  3. Add-ons
    When your retail staff have an understanding of the products they sell they also gain an insight in to products that would go well together. If they work in electronics for example then they know that even the best 4K televisions have limited sound quality. When they sell a 4K TV they can also offer a surround sound system that complements. People who work in a clothing store know that a dress is not an outfit. Good staff know a camera needs a little more to create art. Customers leave with a better product than they bargained for and leave the salespeople with more profit than before. In order to effectively sell add-ons a staff member needs to understand the big picture of product lines more-so than with the individual product. Even if a staff member doesn’t fully understand everything the add-on does, it’s enough to know about it. They can create extra value and bring in extra sales.

One more quick tip is that when you don’t offer credit you’re losing out on customers. More customers than ever these days are having trouble with their credit and finding it difficult to qualify for financing. In fact four out of every ten good customers would like to buy but they don’t quality for the finance they need. Two more of those ten don’t have the credit left they need. When you use a “no credit needed” or lease-purchase program then 9 out of every 10 customers are approved for $2,500 they can spend straight away. This means they get instant money and they usually spend it on you.

When your customers know they can enjoy the value your store offers using a fair and comprehensive financing program it boosts your sales. So make sure you turn every shopper that walks in to your store into a customer today!

“Financial consulting is not just about solving problems; it’s about identifying opportunities and unlocking the potential for growth, because financial is not just about numbers.”

Mason Adams

CEO ZipLoan