We’ve seen it time and time again, a shopping experience in a store that comes out the gate, at a great pace.

The sales rep nails their greeting with a "good morning" or "good afternoon" and smashes expectations, by demonstrating awesome product knowledge skills in the “Meeting Phase” with that customer.

Then everything falls off the train tracks…

The conversation teeters! The sales representative starts to waffle on. At the end of the day, after all that effort building rapport, the customer walks out of your store with no product in hand and a conversion is lost. 

This is all coming down to one of the biggest mistakes retailers make when it comes to the closing phase…They don’t ask for the sale. 

While your team might deliver a strong performance in the earlier stages of the customer's journey, they just can’t quite get through the perceived awkwardness of actually asking to take the sale. 

“So, would you like to keep looking around?”, or worse still the rep offers more options, “We also have this range over here.” There is a time and a place to upsell, but don’t try to upsell when you haven’t even closed the first sale yet. 

Introducing more options for the customer can also sometimes be helpful, but more often than not, if you’ve made strong recommendations in the “Meeting Phase”, more options when you’re trying to close, actually just introduces doubt for your customer and creates the environment for decision fatigue.

By now in your sales interaction you should know your customer well enough to know that the product you’ve shown them is exactly right for them in every way and that they need to walk out of the store with it today. 

• “Are you going to take this one today?”

• “Shall I pop this one / these ones up at the counter for you?”

• “Why don’t I start ringing this one up for you, while you keep looking around.”

In short, while the initial greeting and meeting phases of the customer journey are crucial, as a retail leader don’t compromise on your team's training when it comes to closing! This is where the magic happens, and what really counts towards your daily conversion target.

To build on this, when you see your team are starting to smash those conversion targets remember to encourage and congratulate them.

Everyone loves to hear their efforts are being noticed, and acknowledging your team’s great work will keep them doing a great job.