How to Increase Sales – Part Two - How to upsell and the importance of teaching your employees to upsell.
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You are here: DIME Home > Business > How to Increase Sales – Part Two
How to upsell and the importance of teaching your employees to upsell.
Author: Suzanne Doyle-Ingram
Date: Jul 30, 2010 - 10:25:39 AM
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When it comes to how to increase sales, there are many important factors to implement. In fact there are too many to adequately deliver them in one article. Therefore, this series of articles on how to increase sales is comprised of five parts.
The first lesson on how to increase sales discussed how to deliver exceptional customer service.
Today’s lesson discusses how to upsell and the importance of teaching your employees to upsell.
As you know, it’s much more cost effective to sell more to a current client than to acquire a new customer. (In fact, it’s 8 times cheaper!) And it’s so easy to do once you have a few basic tools.
This lesson is aimed towards retail business owners, but independent salespeople can benefit as well as long as you have more than one product. (Come to think of it, if you don’t have another product or service to upsell, we need to work on that!)
Often, people have a fear of upselling. They are afraid of offending the customer. They are afraid of the word “No”. And often they figure that getting one sale out of the customer is good enough and they could risk the entire sale if they push for more.
The first step is to understand that upselling should not be thought of as selling. If you know your customer, and care about your customer, it’s easy to suggest other items or services that would be of benefit to them. Frankly, it’s a disservice not to!
So the key is to get to know your customer.
Upselling is about reminding customers about other things that you have that either they don’t know about or have forgotten about. It’s not about trying to get more money out of them; it shows the customer you care about them and their well being.
You can’t assume that your customers know what you have just because you have a sign in your store or a page on your website. Most people are creatures of habits and will regularly buy the same thing over and over (that is, if you have exceptional customer service and excellent follow up!). Educating your customers about some of the other items you have actually creates a stronger relationship with your customers and builds loyalty.
Upselling is about a conversation - and finding out what else your customers like so you can match them up with the right products. Say for example, you have a customer who you have seen cycling to your store. You can say, “Hey Sarah, we have this cool water bottle that might work well for your bike, have you seen it?” Even if she says, No thanks, at least your heart was in the right place and she will remember that. She is not saying, “No, I hate you”, she is simply saying, “No, I’m not interested right now”.
I am not a big fan of aggressive sales techniques. I find that the best phrase to use for upselling is “Did you know…?”
For example:
Did you know that we now have Thank you cards in seventeen colors?
Did you know we now have lemon cranberry muffins?
Did you know that if you buy a travel mug you will get 10% off every coffee every time you bring your cup in? (That’s an easy sale – it pays for itself!)
And you can follow “Did you know…?” with “Would you like one?” or modify that depending on the situation.
I was at a local coffee shop today and was delighted when the clerk asked me, “Would you like a snack today? How about a nice piece of lemon loaf?” It was especially pleasing to me since her manager has been through my sales training and has obviously trained her employees well.
What if you or your employees could increase twenty sales a day by $10? That’s $200 a day and $6,000 per month! Every single person that comes through your cash register should be asked at least one question in an effort to upsell. If not, you are absolutely 100% leaving money on the table.
Remember, it’s just about having a conversation and getting to know your customers. If your heart is in the right place, you won’t come across as a pushy salesperson. You will actually build more customer loyalty and make more money in the process.
As an Accelerated Revenues Specialist, and also referred to as the “Revenue Rescuer”, Suzanne Doyle-Ingram has a knack for seeing hidden sales opportunities for small businesses as well as the experience and wisdom to convert them into instant revenues! At www.suzannedoyleingram.com, Suzanne delivers low cost, high impact sales strategies to boost your small business revenues using innovative, cutting edge sales techniques and sales systems.
View all articles by Suzanne Doyle-Ingram
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