Are Your Staff Believers?

When I was a kid one of the first bands I was into was The Monkees. Yes, the Monkees. I never missed their show on television and knew all of their songs by heart. So while shopping yesterday I immediately noticed when the Muzak in the store was I'm a Believer.

If you're over 40 I'm sure you could sing along with me. "Then I saw her face, now I'm a believer, without a trace of doubt in my mind, I'm in love, I'm a believer, I couldn't leave her if I tried."

Naturally the song stayed stuck in my head for hours.  As I walked into different stores humming I'm a Believer I started wondering if the store staffs I encountered were Believers. Did they believe that customers were coming into the store to spend money? Did they believe they were going to be successful that day?

If I asked the employees those questions I'm sure they would say, "Of course I'm a Believer." But as we all know, actions speak louder than words.

Are your employees Believers? Do they believe that customers come into your store to spend money? Do your employees believe they have a good shot of achieving goal for the day?

Here are some quick tips to turn any staff into Believers:

1. Accentuate the positive. I can't emphasize this enough.  I don't believe in ignoring the negative but I do believe in highlighting the positive. If traffic is off 5% you still have 95% of the previous traffic. Many retailers would love to be able to say that.

2. Give achievable stretch goals. One of the biggest mistakes a retailer can make right now is to give the staff a daily goal that can't be reached. If a store is trending down 35% but the goals remain the same, even Mickey, Davy, Mike, and Peter couldn't turn those employees into Believers.

3. Give the staff three tips and tools Every Day to enable them to exceed goal.  This might include:
* A contest
* A selling tip
* A product of the day
* A spiff
* A drawing
* A roleplay
* A marketing activity
* And the list goes on and on.

People are Believers when a Believer leads them. And just like the staff, Believers demonstrate their commitment by their actions. If managers and/or owners are not doing the things they need to do to have a staff of Believers, then clearly they're just a Daydream Believer and there's no chance of them being retail homecoming queen. (Sorry, I couldn't resist.)

What do you need to do today to have a staff of Believers?

Comments

[Thomas Cornelius]

Yes...finally some truth to retail sales. Let's take the Apple stores - you walk in, you are asked what do you like, what do you want...WHAT DO YOU WANT TO PUCHASE TODAY...In the old world a consumer walks into a store like Walmart - and is upset and annoyed by the slow reacting clerk. How can retailers capture the coolness and direct pitch like you hear every day in an Apple store - very simple - just make it a house of sales. Sales are not evil, sales are driving customer service, when I am annoyed by a customer service person I press 1 for sales, because I know I get someone immediately that is willing to help! Make it a house of sales - those big box retail stores - what did Circuit City do to not beat the sales out of Best Buy - they created a warehosue and not a house of sales. Make it a sales experience - retailers unite and let the dollar rule!

[voproductions]

I agree, I run a small centre and customer service is all, especially as a lot of owners/tenants leave this to unsupervised staff. I see part of my role as ensuring that customer service is carried out in each unit, because a bad experience reflects on the mall as much as the store.

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