During this time of year, retailers are pulling out all the stops to ensure a successful start to the holiday shopping season. Just after Thanksgiving and up through the Christmas holidays, most retail stores do more business than any other period of time during the entire year. What are some of the strategies they use to encourage more retail sales?

At the top of the list is advertising. Most stores will have an advertising budget allocated to a specific period (like the holiday sesason) and spend large amounts of money and time trying to come up with the most effective ads that will translate in to an increase in retail sales.

They may use television, radio, magazines, newspapers and a host of other channels to promote their products. The internet plays a large part in many of today’s most successful advertising campaigns. Stores may also give away promotional items as part of their advertising strategy. Those companies who can best target their customers and get them to buy, buy and buy some more, will do very well.

Introducing new products that everyone just must have is another strategy that retailers use to boost sales. This is particularly true of stores that specialize in technology related products that are always changing. Building up the hype for the latest gadget is a tried and true strategy for many retailers.

Pricing is another strategy that can certainly help to increase retail sales. Special prices, sometimes called loss leaders, on a few select items can draw the customer in and hopefully they will also purchase some regularly priced items while they are there.

A store must be careful not to cut their price too low on too many items or they will wind up making lots of sales, but little profit. Price times the number of sales will determine profit. You can sell 10 items for $1,000 each or 50 of the same items for $200 each and even though you sold the same dollar amount, your profit will be so much better if the first scenario (10 @ $1,000) applied.

Gift cards are yet another way retail sales can be increased. They are basically salesmade without having to handle any product until a future time. People seem to really love getting gift cards to specific stores and those giving them as gifts like them as well. I suppose gift cards show a little more thought than simply giving cash.

It is very easy to tell a company that has an excellent sales training program. Sales are the key to any business. Without enough sales, you have no business. Some sales are easy. The customer comes in and knows what they want and the salesperson becomes little more than an order taker. Other sales require building a longer relationship.

A car salesman might spend hours with a potential car buyer, developing a friendly relationship and convincing them that they are getting a deal. Look for successful companies and you will see that they are amongst the best of all companies in training their sales force.`

Sales training starts with each salesman learning the product or products that they will be selling. It could be a physical item like furniture or it could be a less tangible item like life insurance. In any case, the salesman must know the item inside and out and backward and forward in order to be able to talk about it intelligently. With good training, a salesman will be able to handle most any question a customer throws their way without hesitation.

The knowledge of a salesman is a crucial part of their success. If a salesman is making a call to a potential client, they will have a much better chance of closing the sale if they can present the product in a clear and desirable manner. Companies that devote a lot of time to educating their sales people on the fine points of their products are usually very successful. Ongoing training is also important so the sales person can be up to date on the latest sales techniques.

Knowing what the competition is doing is another important aspect of a good sales training program. You may have a very good product, but, if the sales person can not adequately differentiate it from 20 other competitors, sales may suffer. There may be differences in quality, price, time to deliver and so forth. A company that can identify these differences and pass that knowledge on to its sales force will tend to be a successful company.

Finally, an example of some real companies that have an excellent sales training program. Pharmaceutical companies such as Bristol Myers-Squibb and Merck do an excellent job of training their sales people. Omaha Steaks has a sales force that gently, but aggressively tries to get you to order steaks. Smaller hardware stores like Ace Hardware compete against the big home improvement stores like Lowes and Home Depot by having sales people who give each customer individual attention.

Training is the key to build a motivated sales team. A high quality product may go nowhere with a clumsy sales force, and a mediocre product may have huge sales with a dazzling sales team. Before you start training, look at your resources. Good sales people are motivated by money, self-confident, eager to learn and love a good challenge, competitive, persistent, can handle rejection, have lots of physical and mental energy and above all are good listeners.

Now that you have a good team, tell them exactly what you expect. Let the sales goals be clear. Also, tell them what the company will do for them including support and perks.

A sales training program should equip your team with:

• Detailed knowledge of the product
• Detailed knowledge of the competitor’s product
• Knowledge of the market place for these products
• Knowledge of the customers’ concerns, needs and practices

Once the knowledge become second nature, the sales team needs to be encouraged to sell from the heart. The best sales training leader will love his or her work and be authentic to communicate that enthusiasm for sales. If you want your sales team to be forthright and honest, you need to create that environment, so they feel comfortable opening up their hopes and fears to you to become better at what they do.

This greater communication and lack of fear will enable them to be far more competitive and innovative in their sales approach than if they were bound by office politics and angry superiors.

The most important thing you can do in a sales training program is to train salespeople to actively listen. More than the right product, closing technique or presentation tools, listening is the key to higher sales.

Training to actively listen includes conscious emotional and intellectual effort for:

• the ability to interpret other’s ideas
• the ability to identify non-verbal communication

Some techniques that can be learned to become a better listener are:

• Never interrupt the client
• Wait two seconds as a courtesy when the client is finish talking before responding
• Listen to what is actually being said, not what you think is being said
• Ask the client for clarification of what they are saying during the conversation
• Be clear about what the client is communicating: values, concerns, what they want, what they don’t say
• Hold rebuttal for later

In your sales training program, along with listening, make sure the salespeople understand, how to avoid overselling, how to be prepared and how to stay on topic. They should also not jump to the sale but establish a relationship first, research the customer, not prejudge the customer, follow-up on every lead as well as find more leads.

Walk in to any well run retail store and you will notice that the retail staff is always nearby to assist the customer. That is the main job of the staff, but, they also have many other responsibilities such as stocking the shelves, pricing items, fixing displays and keeping the store neat and orderly. None of this happens by accident. A whole process of training and teaching employees the best methods of running the store is key to the success of any retail extablishment.

There may be many variations in techniques for training a retail staff depending upon the type of store. As a quick example, technical knowledge is key in a hardware or home improvement store, while an outgoing and extra friendly personality might be more important in a clothing boutique. In any event, there are many qualities that translate equally well in any retail situation.

Personality is very important. There is nothing that will turn off a customer faster than a surly employee. Retail means dealing with the public and a friendly smile and a simple hello can go a long way toward making the customer feel welcomed and wanting to come back again. Most training will encourage certain behavior toward the customer, but generally, the employee takes the lead when interacting with the customer. One can be trained to greet each customer, but the individual employee’s personality is most important.

Organization matters. A retail staff needs to merchandise the product (s) being sold. That means training them how to properly place items on shelves, racks or any other display. A grocery store, for instance, follows a carefully designed planogram.

Each of the thousands of food items has a particular designated spot on the shelf. The soup cans, cereal boxes and everything else must always be fronted (brought to the front edge of the shelf) to present the item at its best. In other situations, clothes must be neatly folded, hardware must be stored for easy access and food must be prepped for the day. There are many tasks involved in running a retail operation and the better organized you are, the smoother things will go.

Knowledge about what you are selling is also quite essential. A well trained staff will be able to assist a customer who is looking for a certain item or needs some extra help in making a purchasing decision. The staff represents the store and plays a major role in just how successful a retail establishment can be.

One of the biggest problems retailers face is the loss from theft. Shoplifters cost the industry hundreds of millions and maybe even billions of dollars every year. Taking preventative steps to limit the losses is an important part of most retail operations.

There are employees that are hired by large retailers to do nothing but provide security. They may or may not be in uniform as they wander around the floor. Much of their surveillance is done through the lense of a video camera. From a back room, one dedicated employee can monitor the whole store. In addition to spotting potential pilferers, the video provides excellent evidence if the store chooses to prosecute the offenders.

Training retail employees in security is a little different than training professional security guards. In the case of the general retail employee, a store can incorporate a number of techniques to aid in security.

The first and most obvious thing to stress to retail employees is to always keep your eyes open and watch for any suspicious activity. If you see someone with a large shopping bag, they could possibly stash some unpaid for items and leave the store. It is true that there are many electronic devices that will ring or buzz if you try to walk out without paying. However, nothing beats the watchful eyes of a retail employee when it comes to theft deterrence.

Another trick that some devious customers like to try is to walk out wearing the clothes on their back. If they slip in to the dressing room and don’t have the new clothes in hand, they might be wearing it. Not to accuse everyone who shops at a retail store of being dishonest, but, retail stores know from experience, if you give someone the opportunity to get away with stealing, then, they are going to steal.

Thus, the answer to training retail employees in good security procedures is two-fold. As discussed earlier, employees must be constantly aware of their surroundings and keep watch on the customers. Second, and perhaps almost as important is the enforcement of security measures set up by the store.

Retail employees need to know what to do in the event of an armed robbery. They need to know what to do if a fight or dispute breaks out. Mostly, training a retail employee in security means making sure they have a good awareness of everything that is happening on the sales floor.