I held my tattered, smelly running shoe out in front of a hundred people this past month and with it we all sold a bunch of diamonds. How? Because I invited the conference attendees to ask me about my shoe, a shoe so important to me that I’ll hang it on my wall.
All that may sound odd, but it’s no less odd than the customers entering your jewelry store every day. They come to bring you their jewelry for repair or a desire to pick something out of your showcase. You sell the goods or services then they leave. The deal is done, and we count the dollars toward our monthly sales goal.
But why is their ring so important to them that they would spend hundreds of dollars to get it repaired? And why is the item they picked out of your showcase special to them? You, the jeweler, see shiny baubles so often that they become regular, unremarkable items. To the customer, though, these items are so much more.
It’s like my shoe. To you it’s a regular, unremarkable item. To me, it’s a trophy worth remembering. You will never know why these regular, unremarkable items are so meaningful to others until you ask why.
Training staff to close a sale is straightforward. However, that alone doesn’t help you understand the significance of an item. What if we could train ourselves and our team to go beyond the sale and discover the significance behind it – would that make a one-time buyer into a life-long fan?
I think it would and I know it’s trainable because our company trains people in this all the time. Here’s how we do it: develop active listening, learn mirroring, and ask emotionally intelligent questions.
After I set my shoe down in front of these crowds, we engage in an exercise that works all three of these skills at once. The exercise has shown to increase the closing rates of sales teams immediately after doing it because, I believe, it primes us for a deeper connection with strangers. Combined with basic sales training, it can turn an average salesperson into an exceptional representative of your company.
I hope that my smelly shoe leaves you with two big takeaways that can transform your sales team before the 4th quarter.
1) What truly separates you from corporate retailers is making significant relationships with customers.
2) If you aren’t practically training yourself or your team on how to do that – and celebrating it – it won’t happen naturally.
Of course (shameless plug) our company can help you do that and if you’d like the details of the exercise I mentioned for your own sales team training, contact me. It’s free to use!
But start today by taking the time with just one customer and asking them what is so significant about their purchase or piece. Let them talk. Celebrate their stories. It can make all the difference in your culture and with your customers!
