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Seven Reasons Why You Should Accept American Express Cards

I’ve heard the arguments against accepting American Express in your store. They charge too much. They don’t deposit as fast as other cc’s. Everyone has another form of payment. I’ve never lost a sale…

All valid (kinda).

Here are seven reasons why you should still accept it.

  1. The average Amex transaction is three times higher than the average Visa transaction. Yes, Amex users spend more. You need those big-spenders.
  2. Your competitors take it. Why would you give them that unnecessary advantage?
  3. Not accepting it makes you look cheap. If you would cut corners and inconvenience customers just to save pennies there, your customers are wondering where else are you cutting corners?
  4. American Express focuses on more affluent customers. Amex is already reaching your preferred customer. Fish where the fish are.
  5. Penny-wise, pound-foolish. The real difference between the costs to you for a Visa Rewards card and an Amex card is a lot less than you think. Do the math and you will see it isn’t costing you much more than the cards you already take.
  6. You look unprofessional. To attract the big fish, you have to look like you know what you’re doing. Exclusions and customer-unfriendly policies scare the big fish away. 
  7. Saying No turns customers off. Sure, they might have another card and you still won the transaction. But customers like these speak mostly with their feet. Saying No to something as simple as taking their money might be all it takes for them to not come back. You won the transaction but lost the war.

Your goal is to delight your customers, to become the expert they trust, to win their hearts. Although you can do those things without taking Amex cards, you make it that much harder and you exclude a huge group of high-spending, affluent people in the process.

Is that worth the pennies?

-Phil Wrzesinski
www.PhilsForum.com

PS I do not work for or get any cut for promoting American Express.I only write this because of my deep desire to help you make MORE money. Yes, you will make MORE money by accepting Amex. How would your business change if you had higher transactions, more affluent customers, more delighted customers, and a greater feeling of trust between you and your customer? How much would you pay to get that?

The Perfect Sale

I was just at Bob & Sue Negen’s Whizbang Training Retail Success Summit and Bob talked about trying to achieve the Perfect Sale.

There are two Perfect Sales out there. From your point of view and from the customer’s point of view.

From your point of view…
You sold them everything you possibly could, including a bunch of old merchandise you were dying to get rid of, all at full price, with tons of add-ons, and plenty of extra features and warranties.

From the customer’s point of view…
She got everything she needed at a fair price. She won’t have to make any extra trips. She stayed within reason of her budget and has absolutely zero buyers’ remorse. She is thrilled with everything she purchased. She can’t wait to tell her friends.

When the two are one and the same – you’ve hit the grand slam of retail sales. But when you have to sacrifice one for the other, you can probably guess which one is better for you in the long run.

As Bob reminded us… Always, always, always go for the Perfect Sale from the customer’s point of view. Always. Period. Every. Single. Time.

Are we clear?

Grand slams are nice, but the goal of this game is to be able to keep playing. Perfectly happy customers keep you in the game for a very long time.

-Phil Wrzesinski
www.PhilsForum.com

PS I talk to my staff about completing the sale. You never want a customer to go home and then realize she needs one more item to make the other stuff she bought work. Chances are she won’t go back to you for that item, and she might never come back if you weren’t smart enough to make sure she had everything she needed in the first place.

PPS There are some sure-fire ways to make sure your customer is perfectly happy with her purchases. Check out the Closing the Sale section of my FREE eBook Customer Service: From Weak to WOW!

Dollars Left on the Table

You have a front line staff. You pay them to work with the customers and sell your products. Sometimes they get it right and make more money for the business. Sometimes they leave dollars on the table.

All this year I have worked with my staff on how to raise the average ticket, how to get more from every sale. We reached the pinnacle of that training this past Monday as we talked about tips to close the sale and make it stick.

Then we played a game, something to reinforce everything we had been working on all year.

Every single bill on that table had a statement on the back that either started with “I Earned This Dollar…” or “I Left This Dollar on the Table…”

The staff took turns picking a dollar and reading it out loud to the rest of the team. If it was an Earned dollar they got to keep it, but if it was a Left dollar they had to put it back. We played until all the Earned dollars were gone. The fun part was when the staff started cheering all the Earned dollars and booing all the Left dollars.

Three days later, most of the staff have their Earned dollars still in their pocket with the statement still taped to the back. My office gal has hers pinned to the bulletin board above her desk.

You have to spell out the behavior you want and also the behavior you don’t want. There is power behind putting it all in writing and having the staff read it aloud to each other.

Phil Wrzesinski
www.PhilsForum.com

PS The first question from the staff after we finished the game was, “Can you post all the statements somewhere so that I can read them again?” Of course. If you would like to see the list, send me an email.

Self Service is NOT Customer Service

The email read…

Hi Phil,

I noticed you missed our free webinar on Wednesday, How to Make Your Customers Fall in Love With Self-Service. No worries — I know how busy this time of year can be!

Gee, sorry I missed that. NOT.
Why would I want to make my customers fall in love with self-service? Why would I want to train my customers to love what my competitors are already doing and have far deeper pockets to do it? Why would I want my customers to love NOT interacting with my highly-trained sales staff?
No one has ever gone out and bragged to their friends about how wonderful the self-service is at XYZ store. No one has ever said, “Boy, I can’t wait to go back to that store. They have the best self-service.”
You cannot create word-of-mouth advertising with self-service. You cannot win customer loyalty with self-service. You cannot grow your business through self-service. At its best, self-service is neutral. At its worst, a deterrent to sales.
So with all that said, if you really want to grow, sink some serious time and money into creating the best Full-Service shop you can. Take it two or three steps above the gum-chewing clerks at Wally-World. Take it to the Nordstrom’s and Ritz-Carlton level. Do things that surprise and delight your customers. Go above and beyond their expectations.
Making your customers love Full-Service is a heck of a lot easier, more profitable, and more fun than trying to get them to love self-service.
-Phil Wrzesinski
PS Yes, there are times when self-service is good. But usually only when you’re in a big discount store buying cheap commodity goods and don’t want to wait for that the-world-sucks-and-I’m-underpaid-too-much-to-care cashier to ring you up. That’s not your store, not your market. You don’t even want to consider playing in that sandbox.

The Kind of Reviews You Want Your Customers to Write

Yesterday’s blog was an example of what not to do. Today is the kind of review you get when the front line staff knows how to make an experience wonderful…

“We’re always impressed with customer service at the Toy House, but yesterday was over the top. Our family was there because our son was picking out a gift for our daughter’s birthday. He asked me about a ride-along horse which I told him was fine, and he raced off, I assumed, to tell my husband. The next thing I knew a Toy House employee was asking me if I was Ruby’s mom. I said, yes, and she said that my son was asking if they could wrap the toy for his sister’s birthday. She wanted to know if it was okay, and they would go ahead, remove the tag, and wrap it for him, and we could pay when we were ready to go. I appreciated them taking the time to interact with my son (and tracking me down) instead of just brushing off his desires to get something for his sister. Thanks again, Toy House, for the continued hard work and great customer service!”   -Jen, Dec 2, 2013 (Toy House Facebook Page)

Every customer, no matter how big or small, deserves your utmost attention. When you learn to treat everyone as though they are world’s best customer, you will find you have a lot more of the world’s best customers in your store.
Your customers will get better when you do.
-Phil Wrzesinski
PS Work with your staff on this idea… How would you treat the next customer if you knew she had a credit card with no limit and eleven siblings? 

Your Front Line Staff is Selling You Short

I got this story from a fellow toy store owner who took her son to a different toy store and gave me permission to share her experience…

“My son had a doctor appointment yesterday that was really hard for him. I told him that we passed a toy store along the way and if he braved it, we would go there afterwards and pick up ANYTHING HE WANTED. Little sister could get a little something too, if she cheered him on and helped make him feel better.

After lots of tears and pain, I took him to the toy store as I promised. The one staff person working was very nice and greeted us. No other shoppers in the store. We had her full attention. I told her why we were there and what I had promised. Anything son wanted and “a little something” for daughter. When little sister kept bouncing a Crocodile Creek small ball, I suggested to her that maybe that could be her little something. The employee kindly interjected that it’s $9, basically wanting me to know that it’s not cheap. I told her that it was just fine. Then little sister went to a Melissa & Doug watering can and the employee said, “That one is 12.99.” The employee kept asking me and my son what we were looking for as well. The thing is we weren’t looking for anything. What we wanted was a magical/nice experience after a traumatic hard event, which is a very common reason for people to come to a toy store. I dropped 60 bucks but I really wasn’t paying attention to money. I would have spent more but I feel like the employee was trying to save me money. That was nice but not so for the storeowner/business — and it also did a disservice to me, in terms of the experience I wanted to provide my child.”

How often do you think your own front line staff is selling from their own pocket book and making decisions about what a customer may or may not be able to afford?

How often do you think your own front line staff is more interested in getting the transaction over instead of making the trip magical and helping it last forever?

Here are some of the lessons in her own words that my friend is taking away for her own staff…

  1. “Little” means a lot of different things to different customers. When unsure, ask the customer what something little means when they say that.
  2. Customers aren’t always “looking for something”. Switch gears when they say they are not and LISTEN to why they are there.
  3. Get down to the level of the child when caregiver says “anything they want” and start showing them some cool stuff. Interact with them. You know what I wanted for my traumatized son? I wanted that experience like Julia Roberts got in “Pretty Woman” when Richard Gere brought her to the clothing store. I wanted to be able to remind him about that time he got to go to the toy store after the Doctor visit for the next time we have to do something really hard. 
  4. Join the team. “Hooray you did that brave thing. I’m so happy for you.” “Wow did you really conquer that potty?”
Those are some mighty powerful lessons. I know her staff is going to rock it! Thanks, Katherine, for sharing.
-Phil Wrzesinski
PS You need to repeat this over and over and over to your front line people… ALWAYS assume your customer can afford anything she wants, until she tells you otherwise. Show her the Filet Mignon first.

Creating a Shareworthy Customer Service Culture

We all know Customer Service is our calling card. It is our path to success. It is the one thing where we can excel far greater than our competitors and kick their asses to the curb.

But how do you change the culture of your store to make Shareworthy Customer Service an every day event?

Tim Miles has a good starting point over on his blog. Make note of the Shareworthy events when they happen then try to deconstruct and learn from those events.

I want to take it a step further.

What gets measured and rewarded, improves.

Our Customer Service goal is smiley, happy people. Our marketing tag is, “We’re here to make you smile!”

At every meeting we start with what I call the Smile Stories – the Shareworthy Customer Service events. By sharing those moments with each other and making a big deal of them, we make a point of reinforcing what is important to the business.

You can even take it a step further and offer fun prizes such as gift cards to local restaurants and gas cards to the staff who has the best story. Not only will you get more stories each month, you’ll get a friendly competition of the staff each trying to out-shareworthy the other.

My staff keep notes for their smile stories. Some even keep notes for each other’s smile stories and remind each other of stories they may have forgotten. The culture is all about smiles – making them and sharing them.

-Phil Wrzesinski
www.PhilsForum.com

PS There is another huge benefit to starting your meeting off like that. Sharing your triumphs and victories first puts the staff into a much better frame of mind – less defensive and shutdown, much more open and listening – than the typical public flogging that most managers use to open meetings.

You are in the Job of Persuasion

Your job is simple – to persuade.

Persuade the best people to work for you.
Persuade those people to do more for you than they thought possible.
Persuade your vendors to give you good terms for the best products.
Persuade your customers to visit you in droves.
Persuade them to part with their hard-earned dollars.
Persuade them to bring their friends back.
Persuade your banker to give you a loan.
Persuade your local media to give you a plug.
Persuade your city council to pass laws and ordinances in your favor.

My friend, and one of the most amazingly persuasive writers I know, Jeff Sexton, posted this video that he got from another friend, Tim Miles (who you all know coined the term Shareworthy and is the smartest man I’ve ever met when it comes to Customer Service.)

This will be 11 minutes and 50 seconds you will start and stop often to take notes and watch over and over again. You’ll probably be using this at your next sales staff meeting (I am).

A couple million of your friends, colleagues and competitors have already seen it. You should, too.

-Phil Wrzesinski
www.PhilsForum.com

PS See if you can tell me which of the 6 techniques I attempted to use to persuade you to watch the above video. Yes, this applies to Sales & Customer Service. It also applies to Marketing & Advertising. It also applies to Hiring & Training. It also applies to Word of Mouth. You’re always persuading. You might as well get good at it.

For the Win – Best Customer Service Stories!

You’ve heard me talk about Over-the-Top Customer Service. See it in action in this article from Mental Floss.

http://mentalfloss.com/article/30198/11-best-customer-service-stories-ever

-Phil Wrzesinski
www.PhilsForum.com

PS Bring a tissue. A couple are real heart-string tuggers.

PPS If you aren’t willing to bend over backwards like these companies did, don’t go complaining that no one ever brags about your “great” customer service, because it isn’t all that good.

The Sales Process Broken Down

This year I am leading my sales staff to water. Fortunately, they are not horses. They are drinking it up.

At our monthly team meeting I am breaking down the sales process into small, drinkable chunks.

In February we talked about Being Accessible. Customers don’t like to approach a crowd of employees, especially ones engaged in chatter. We talked about positioning, where to stand to be most approachable, how not to congregate. We walked around the store with a clipboard in hand. Customers would rather approach a sales associate who seems engaged in other activities, than one who seems poised to pounce. The goal for the staff was to practice being more accessible.

In March we Listened. Too many people listen, not to hear, but to find a moment to break into the conversation. We did activities centered around Listening skills including repeating back what the other person said. The staff separated into pairs and shared with each other their favorite reasons for working here. Then the other person had to repeat it back to them and present it to the group. (Note: this is also a great way to boost morale. I have twelve team members and each one had someone else tell the group why they like working here.) Our customers do not come in for a product so much as for a solution. If you don’t listen to the whole problem, you might sell them a product, but not the best solution. The goal for the month was to practice repeating back to the customer what she said.

Tomorrow we go inside Our Customer’s Mind. We’ll be exploring all the thoughts that may be going through a customer’s mind while she is in our store. Empathy is one of the strongest tools for creating long-term relationships. The purpose is to get an understanding of where she is so that we can relate to her on her terms. Each customer is unique and is coming from a unique point of view. Knowing this helps my staff understand the importance of Listening even more, and helps them fashion better questions. Our goal will be to empathize more with our customers and continue improving our listening (and questioning) skills.

I’m already working on May (Suggestive Selling) and June (Closing the Sale), too.

Too many companies look at training as a One-and-Done thing. Train the new person. Send them out. They’re good to go. I think we have to constantly be training. We have to constantly be trying to learn and improve. And we don’t have to be in a hurry. One step at at time.

Roy H. Williams once told me that what successful individuals and companies have in common is a long horizon. They look well beyond this week, month or even year. Not only am I planning out the training for this year, I’m already formulating my thoughts for next year’s theme.

If you’re in this for the long run, you need to make sure you’re planning out your training for the long run, too.

-Phil Wrzesinski
www.PhilsForum.com

PS Send me an email and I’d be happy to share the activities we are doing to get these lessons across. If you want to plan your own meetings, I suggest you read Staff Meetings Everyone Wants to Attend (free download) and use the Staff Meetings Worksheet.