The following 26 stats should impress upon you the importance of developing a social media strategy for your business.

#1: There are now more than 800 million active Facebook users, with over 200 million added in 2011. Notice the growth trend traced by Ben Foster.

Facebook is growing rapidly. Which side of the wave are you on?

Nielsen found the following in their 3Q 2011 Social Media Report:

#2: Over 80% of all Americans use a social network.

#3: Americans spend more time on Facebook than any other U.S.website.

#4: Approximately 40% of social media users access their accounts through mobile devices.

#5: Nearly 23% of online time is spent on social networks.

#6: Facebook is the top destination among social networks and blogs:

Nielsen found U.S.users spend nearly 10x more time on Facebook than Twitter or LinkedIn.

#7: Social media users are more active and influential offline:

What Does Facebook Say About its Users?

At Facebook’s recent F8 Developer Conference, Facebook shared the following statistics:

#8: More than half of Facebook users log in every day – that’s more than 400 million people.

#9: The average user has 130 friends and is connected to 80 pages, events and groups.

#10: There are 900 million objects that people interact with (pages, groups, etc…).

#11: Facebook hosts over 7 million apps, and over 20 million apps are downloaded each day.

#12: Around 75% of Facebook users are outside of North America with accounts available in 70 languages.

#13: Comscore released a study earlier this year that showed how business brands that post at least once every day will reach 22% of their fans in a given week.

Comscore shows the impact of consistently posting to Facebook.

How Are People Using Social Media?

Experian recently released their 2011 Social Media Consumer Report. The following trends help paint a picture of how people are using social media.

#14: Experian estimates that 91% of online American adults (approx. 129 million)access some form of social media each month.

#15: And get this: 98% of 18- to 24-year-olds access social accounts monthly.

#16: This confirms their stat that college towns log on to Facebook the most.

#17: The average Facebook user spends 20 minutes on his or her account during each visit.

Note that Facebook users spend nearly twice as much time on the platform as Twitter users. The jury is still out on Google+, as data hasn’t been accumulated to show the effect of the public release.

#18: A majority of Facebook users log in 3-4 times per week.

Notice that Twitter users are nearly as likely to login once per week as they are three to four times per week.

#19: One out of 5 social network users is likely to visit another social site after leaving one.

After visiting a social network, 45% of users will visit another social site, a multimedia site like YouTube or use a search engine.

Small Businesses Moving Toward Social Media

So what are business leaders doing in light of the obvious shift toward social media in online behavior?

Zoomerang interviewed 1,180 small- to mid-sized business (SMB) decision-makers and 500 consumers in September to release this study in an attempt to answer that question.

#20: The 3 most important reasons small businesses leverage social media are:

• Connecting with customers
• Visibility
• Self-promotion

81% of small business leaders use social media to get in front of customers and find new customers.

#21: 44% of SMB decision-makers use social media.

This graphic highlights how important it is to integrate social media with your website, email and direct mail efforts.

#22: Of those SMB decision-makers who use social media, 86% use Facebook vs. 41% LinkedIn and 33% Twitter:

Small- and medium-sized businesses are investing the most effort in Facebook.

Small Businesses Getting Results Without Spending Much

Social media is good for business, not just relationships. Mediabistro published aninfographic produced by Crowdspring that reveals the following findings:

#23: 50% of small business owners reported gaining new customers through social media – most notably through Facebook and LinkedIn.

#24: 51% of Facebook users and 64% of Twitter users are more likely to buy from the brands they follow.

Twitter fans are more likely to buy from a brand they follow (Crowdspring).

#25: Small businesses don’t have to spend much to get results: Zoomerangfound that nearly 60% of all small business decision-makers spend less than $100 on social media and 74% of businesses don’t employ anyone to manage their social media marketing.

Small business owners can get results without spending a lot of cash.

More Good News for Small Businesses

#26: Ning has found it only takes 20 people to create meaningful many-to-many interactions and bring an online community to a significant level of activity. That’s something almost any business can achieve.

How to Bring It All Together

There are numerous conclusions to draw from these statistics. Clearly, small businesses are increasingly leaning on social media to grow their businesses. Many of your customers are using social media almost every day. The opportunities to connect directly with your customers are unprecedented, but so is the competition.

The free workshops have been very beneficial to all that have attended over the years. The workshops are topic specific and have a helpful Q&A at the end of each.

Our core products: Reconnect Wireless, Virtual CFO & Wireless Marketplace remove the backend headaches allowing you and your team to focus on front-end sales and growth.

We’d love to hear your comments.

Proper cash flow management is critical when considering expansion. In order to be prepared you must complete 1-year cash flow projection to determine how many stores can be opened and timing of the rollout.

To do this, start with a 1-year P&L projection, add in assumptions for desired amount of new stores. Next determine the projected changes for each non-cash Balance Sheet account (AR, Inventory, Fixed Assets, AP, etc). Each increase in assets reduces new cash for the period; each decrease in assets increases net cash, the opposite is true for liabilities. Based on cumulative cash balance for each month adjust rollout schedule by eliminating and/or deferring new store openings.

Keys to Positive Cash Flow

One of the biggest keys to positive cash flows is payment terms with inventory vendors. If purchasing thru carrier program negotiate favorable offset terms such as higher credit limit and 45-60 day terms. If you can show them projections of future inventory orders and payments with good coverage ratios from commission receivable, then more likely to be approved. You can try the same with outside vendors but this is more challenging since commission receivable not available for collateral. Besides increasing your credit line and terms managing inventory purchases plays a large role in positive cash flow.

Inventory Ordering

Managing inventory ordering is key to cash flow, every dollar worth of inventory ordered in excess of cost of goods sold is a dollar-for-dollar reduction in available cash. Prepare sales forecast by SKU at the beginning of each month and get feedback from field management on desired SKU selection and customer interest for new SKU’s. The next step is to prepare your ordering budget for the month, which shouldn’t exceed 110% of projected COGS.

For each location establish min/max inventory levels. The minimum can vary is 5; the maximum should be the two week run rate plus in transit time from vendor. Orders should be placed once per week for each location and the quantity is determined by taking the maximum amount less the current on hand amount.

Monitor the month to date total amount ordered compared to projected COGS updated with latest sales info and adjust orders as necessary to stay within the limit. Obtain SKU road map information from your carrier to time your exit strategy for each SKU. The goal is to be as close to 0 units remaining when a replacement SKU comes out.

Loss Prevention – Inventory

Perform twice daily (open and close) serialized shelf counts for all phone inventory and non-serialized shelf counts for all accessories.
Review accuracy of count. Make sure all items on perpetual inventory list are included on the count.
Check inventory for open boxes- verify that open boxes contain complete kits.
Verify that all returned phones have been processed in the POS system.
Investigate any missing items.
Use biometric cabinets for phone inventory storage.
Reverse logistics is important, the carrier/manufacturer has strict timelines as to when defectives/remorse returns must be submitted for RMA.
Have managers bring returns back to corporate office for triage a minimum of once per week.

Loss Prevention – Cash

POS system should have Electronic Cash Control
Employees sign off on each tender collected and drop into cash safe
Manager reconciles each transaction at close, records variances (if any)
Manager prepares separate deposit for each day, places into deposit bag and drops in mall night depository (make sure you have bank account(s) that cover all mall locations)
Back office MUST reconcile against carrier deposits

Accounting

Timely and accurate financial reporting is a key to any company’s continued success. Recording and reconciling all transactions on a daily basis is the best way to maximize accuracy, catch irregularities, and pinpoint third party inaccuracies that can drain profitability. The following are examples of accounting entries and reconciliations that should be performed on a daily basis:

-Bank Reconciliation

-Cash and Credit Card In Transit Reconciliation

-Bill Pay Reconciliation

-Vendor invoices entered and matched against inventory receipts

-Vendor credit memos entered and matched against RMAs

-Equipment and Accessory Revenue

-Commission Revenue

-Equipment and Accessory Cost of Goods Sold

By entering and reconciling these items daily the reconciliation process becomes more manageable and areas of leakage are identified on a more timely basis which enables corrective action to me implemented faster. Daily processing and reconciliation also enables for a faster month end close resulting in financial reports being delivered to management sooner thereby enhancing the decision making process.

Recruiting is a continuous process

Even when your stores are fully staffed keep your eyes open and the process going. Where most fall short is only focusing on recruiting when there is an immediate need. This normally means you’re short staffed and rushed to fill the position, hiring the first individual good enough to fill the position but not allows the best possible candidate.

Talented individuals are looking for work everyday and they typically find work quickly. If you’re only searching part of the time you’re only going to find part of the talent, you can always make room for the right person.

Also, anything that is part of the daily / weekly routine becomes more efficient and more of a habit. Knowing there is a stack of qualified resumes ready at all times keeps low producers as motivated as possible and encourages managers to make necessary replacements sooner.

By having professionally designed “Now Hiring” signs prominently displayed in your locations at all times, creating quotas for your managers to present at least one quality application a week, and maintaining up to date job postings on all free websites and local universities will ensure a consistent flow of applicants.

Recruiting is a team effort

Recruiting should not be left up to a few individuals within your organization. Every employee should be aware of potential openings and encouraged to recommend candidates.

Implementing a referral bonus for employees can be a highly effective tool, people tend to have friends with similar skills and traits so encourage top performers to help fill positions. Be certain to only pay the bonus after the 60 to 90 day vesting period to avoid paying for employees that don’t work out. Although the program needs a financial piece but it shouldn’t be the only reason employees participate. Every employee should understand they play a role in the overall profitability of the company and supporting recruiting efforts is part of that role.

Managers should take on the responsibility of finding candidates for their location as well as others. Implementing a policy of location managers submitting at least one qualified resume per week creates a good balance of taking responsibility while not taking too much time and distracting them from their other duties. By creating employee incentives and utilizing these basic concepts you’ll attract individuals that naturally fit your company’s culture.

Use of Multiple Sources

No one source will yield the results you’re looking for so it’s important to maximize each source and track it’s success. For starters your company website can be your biggest asset or liability when it comes to recruiting. A professionally designed site should portray a positive image of your company and have built in recruiting functionality such as current job posting and online application.

Your social media is another excellent source for recruiting but once again
professionalism is a key to success. A custom designed landing page and consistent, engaging content will undoubtedly attract the talent your looking for.

In regards to external sources the best options in today’s market include; Craigslist, Career Builder, and Monster. If you are using Craigslist, a full-page custom designed job posting will increase your success rate dramatically. Career Builder and Monster are the most expensive options but also yield the best results for management quality candidates.

With so many options, several of which carrying a hefty price tag, it’s important to perform detailed tracking of each. Applicant tracking software can integrate with your website, track all applicants, and automatically post jobs on several free sites streamlining the entire process offering in depth information on the effectiveness of each source.

The following are traits that have proved successful:

- Hire based on personality not experience, you can train on the product, with experience comes bad habits.
- Hire someone that needs money, not someone whose parents are making them get a job
- Hire team players not all stars, a solid team will outperform and outlast great individual sellers
- Give someone the opportunity of a lifetime, hire someone whose never had the opportunity to make this much money

Whatever you decide the employee profile to be, the most important factor is that everyone involved has a clear understanding of what you’re looking for to begin with. Too often location managers have one type of individual in mind, district managers another, and executives yet another.

Coach managers (and all employees for that matter) to always be on the lookout for quality candidates displaying the behavior you’re looking for; friendly demeanor, outstanding customer service skills, professionalism, and salesmanship. Everyday employees interact with individuals that display these characteristics be it customers, waiters, retail sales reps, etc. When they do come across the individuals simple have them say something along these lines, “I’ve been very impressed with your _____ (personality, sales ability, service, etc.), our company is always looking for talented people, if you or anyone you know may be interested I’d be happy to forward your resume to one of our hiring managers. It’s a great industry and great company to work for.” From there they can either direct the recruit to your website to complete an application or have the recruit contact the manager directly and walk them through the application process. If your team is always keeping and eye out and asking quality people this recruiting method can produce impressive results.

Points to remember:

- Professional, custom designed “Now Hiring” signs in each store
- Create “Now Hiring” page on company website
- Promote openings through social media
- Utilize all free online job boards including universities
- Applicant tracking software
- Custom designed Craigslist job postings
- Career Builder, Monster, Simply Hired, Snag-a-Job

The interview process offers the first real impression of what it’s like to work for a company. Although the primary objective is to determine if the candidate is qualified and a good fit for the position another objective should be to establish expectations. Setting the proper tone and creating an efficient & thorough process is important.

Performing two separate interviews by two individuals creates a more professional environment for the candidate and provides two points of view on potential new hire.

It is recommended to have at least one interview at or near a location so the employee has a clear understanding of what the work environment is like. Both interviews should occur within 5 days at most and the entire process from submitting an application to hiring a new rep should take now more than two to three weeks at most. The longer the process takes the more likely you are to lose quality candidates.

Recommended interview process:

- Initial screening (Day 1)
- 1st interview (Day 2-7)
- 2nd interview (Day 5-14)
- Reference check / Background checks (Day 6-15)
- Schedule for training, contact 24 hours prior to ensure attendance

Each manager should be trained and qualified to perform initial interviews. Since managers will ultimately be responsible for their employees performance the more involved they are in the recruiting and hiring process the more they will take ownership of developing the employee. It is crucial that everyone involved in interviewing be trained on the do’s & don’ts.

The following is a list of illegal items to ask a candidate:

- Race / color / national origin / birthplace
- Marital / family status
- Age
- Sex
- Religion
- Disability
- If they own a car

You can and should however ask:

- Do you have reliable transportation?
- Are you over 18?
- Is there any reason you could not perform the duties required? (standing for
several hours, lift boxes, etc.)
- Have you been convicted of any felonies?

There are several effective interviewing styles and techniques, by performing a little research online you’ll be able to determine what works best for your personality. As for some basic tips; dig deep into certain answers to discover the truth, be wary of anyone that has too many cookie cutter responses, focus on talents or experience, and have a clear understanding of why they left each previous job.

Operations and Sales Management are two entirely different beasts and ideally should be managed by two different teams. Operations is a very black and white world; requiring structure and organization while sales quite the opposite. Sales Management is as much an art as it is a science. No one method works for everyone or every time. Sales management requires high-energy, charisma, and the hands-on ability to produce results.

Build the right team
In sales the right team chemistry, environment, and energy is everything. When building a sales team you’ll produce better results with 5 reps that work well together than one superstar rep that nobody gets along with. Create a positive, supportive environment where all reps are encouraged to help with each other’s customers, assist new employees, and provide feedback to upper management.

The manager should be friendly but not friends with the sales reps, there needs to be a separation to ensure no favoritism or rule bending goes on. The more involved the manager is in the recruiting and hiring process the more he will naturally take ownership and responsibility for the employees.

Creating the right environment
Driving sales is a non-stop process; every hour of every day your reps need to stay motivated. As you know that’s easier said than done, for starters compensation is not enough you need competition and goals.

To create competition posting daily top ten lists is a good start but the lists are
meaningless unless management pays attention and cares about them. Location managers and district managers should review them daily and be sure to praise those that have moved up on the list and encourage those that have moved down on the list to move back up today. These lists can involve more that just activations, all KPI’s can have their own list, or the list can be a combination of the KPI’s.

Consistent communication is another key to creating competition. There should be multiple times set throughout the day when District Managers communicate with stores; a brief phone call updating the sales and issues that have come up. We recommend 5 times a day; opening, 1pm, 4pm, 7pm, closing. This creates continuous motivation as the manage never wants to answer the call to tell his boss nothing has been done since they last spoke. Depending on your District Managers work load these updates can be done as text messages and the phone calls are only required occasionally if something is out of line or additional motivation is needed.

Setting Goals
Setting and managing to goals is a tricky science to master. Setting goals too low doesn’t provide the necessary motivation while setting them too high can cause frustration and abandonment of the goals. The best answer is to find a systematic method based on previous sales. Picking arbitrary numbers to hit each month with no basis behind then will most likely cause employee to not buy into them.

Once goals have been set for the month you then need to manager to them, adjusting the required pace needed to hit each day to stay at or above them. Always having a hyper goal is effective for top achievers as well.

Sales Management Meeting
If possible holding a weekly manager meeting / training is preferred. The meeting should include operational, sales, and developmental training aspects. Each employees performance should be reviewed on a monthly basis with each manager, setting goals for the following month and determining a game plan & timeline for struggling employees. Friday morning can be a good time if it works logistically, it creates a good opportunity to get the managers motivated for the weekend.

• Weekly manager meetings / trainings – meeting should be half operational / sales review and half advanced training
• Post Top Ten Lists daily
• Monthly sales contests
• Text daily updates (opening, 1pm, 4pm, 7pm) include sales, operational and company initiatives

Determining KPI’s
When prioritizing which KPI’s to track the impact of each indicator on the company’s profitability should be considered. Improvement of some revenue metrics can bring more incremental profit to the company than others. Also, some operational metrics of risk and loss can have a higher detrimental impact on profitability than others. Also, there are multiple layers of KPI’s that need to be tracked. These are company level, market level, store level, and sales rep level. Examples of sales driven KPI’s are units sold per store, gross profit per store, gross profit per sales rep hours worked, new to renewal ratio, feature attach rate, and accessory attach rate. Examples of operationally driven KPI’s are deactivation percentage, inventory loss percentage, percentage of inventory over 60 days old, sales rep hours per store, and sales discounts per transaction.

Measuring and Tracking
After determining which KPI’s are most important to track a reporting system needs to be implemented to ensure that information is flowing in a timely fashion, and that each layer of the organization is receiving the information that is necessary to drive their effectiveness. As a general rule, the more often and expeditiously KPI data can be updated the more useful the information will be. In addition, to the extent POS data can be scrubbed against the wireless provider data and corrected, the more accurate and meaningful the information will be. Reports can be distributed via a company intranet or by email push. While drill down information should only be distributed to the applicable location, region, etc it is helpful to distribute sales rep, location, and region rankings for KPI data to encourage competition between sales reps and locations.

Enforcing
For each KPI metric there should be a goal and a minimum standard established. In general minimum standards should not be set below profit and loss breakeven threshold for that particular category. For each sales rep, location, and region the KPIs should be reported in relation to minimum standard and in relation to goal. Recognition should be given when reps, locations, or regions exceed goals. These can also be tied into a performance bonus system whereby exceeding a goal will trigger accelerators on P&L or Gross Profit bonuses. Conversely, if minimum standards are not being met in one or more categories corrective and or disciplinary action should be taken.

Daily Responsibilities

Whether there is dedicated Operations Manager or all operational responsibility is dedicated to the sales management team having a daily schedule of operational tasks that must be completed is essential to ensuring that no key functions are being overlooked. The following are some examples of daily and/or weekly tasks that should be scheduled:

-Review previous day’s cash deposits actual against the total per the POS system (cash out)

-Review previous days hours worked versus scheduled

-Review previous days closing and today’s opening inventory counts

-Prepare and analyze weekly de-act report, broken down by company, region, store, and employee level

-Generate and distribute KPI reports for previous day’s activity

There should be checklists maintained for each location to ensure that each task has been completed and that all discrepancies found have been followed up upon. Also, it is recommended that a portion of weekly sales management meeting are dedicated to operational review where the KPI statistics are reviewed and corrective action game plans are formulated.

Paperwork
Match up physical contact (or V-Docs) against list of transactions from POS report daily.
Review to ensure all signatures are captured, especially for secondary contract.
Review errors with staff, making notes on transactions with errors.
Re-print any missing transaction.

De-Acts/Fraud Prevention

With phone inventory and subsidized model managing de-acts is critical.
Need to analyze de-act data from carrier and monitor rates by market, location, and sales rep.
Also helpful to breakdown by reason code (fraud, non-payment, etc).
Institute de-act quota percentages and take disciplinary action if exceeded against sales reps and sales management.
Implement customer service follow-up program to proactively reduce de-acts and gain insight into potential negative trends.
Use secondary contract/collections to mitigate de-act losses.
Charge sales reps back for de-acts.
Run comparisons of carrier activation data versus POS data to spot fraudulent
transactions that sales reps ring up that are non-commissionable.
Pay sales commissions and bonuses based on carrier data to discourage non-commissionable transactions.
Monitor physical contracts and investigate any that are done manually (outside of the carrier activation system). These are usually an indication of fraud.

Scheduling/Timekeeping

Optimal number of sales rep hours is 2X the number of hours that the store is open.
Can be adjusted upward for high volume (over 200 units/mo) locations.
Don’t exceed the total number of budgeted hours when preparing the schedule.
Avoid overtime at all costs.
Biometrics for punch in/punch out strongly recommended.
Monitor variances between schedule and actual hours worked daily.

Product Knowledge

In recent years the ever-increasing number of devices and features these devices offer has forced product knowledge to the forefront of training. For starters leverage your carrier and manufactures reps as much as possible having them conduct in-store as well as classroom trainings. There is no shortage of resources to find product information what you need to focus on is creating an efficient process to ensure everyone on your team is up to speed.

The best way manage this is by creating a product certification program in which employees must pass before being allowed to sell. Exactly how this needs to be structured varies by the size of the organization but the following key elements are universal:

1 – Pick on easy to use platform, for small organizations simple Word documents may suffice. For larger organizations try creating surveys in Constant Contact, it’s easy to create, send and, grade hundreds of quizzes.

2 – Set a standard and stick to it. There need to be repercussions for not passing, generally additional training with a manager is a good first step.

3 – Offer prizes and/or recognition for top performers, enforcing product knowledge as core company value. If there are negative consequences for not passing there should be positive ones for excelling.

Operations

Successful operations create an efficient workflow and minimize lose. Effective operation training includes a detailed procedures manual, method of tracking, benchmarks, and most important disciplinary action for not achieving company benchmarks.

Each of the points must be reviewed during the training process to give trainees a complete understanding. It’s also helpful to explain the why behind operational procedures, this gives the employee a better “big picture” perspective on the company. For instance, don’t just tell an employee they need to count inventory each morning to ensure nothing was stolen the night before. Explain how is it tracked, what the tolerances are, what happens if something is missing, how much a small percentage costs the company at the end of the year.

The training should first take place in classroom environment to avoid distractions and then followed up with in-field, hands-on experience. Create a detailed training manual where employees sign off when trained on a specific item, this way when problems do arise you can quickly eliminate the “No one told me that” excuse. Anytime an employee falls below company benchmarks for operations retraining should be the first step that occurs.

Sales Skills

Training on product knowledge and operations is a fairly black and white process, however, training on sales skills is as much an art as it is a science. All employees should be trained on the same basic process but how each employee interacts and conveys their message to the customer is going to vary based on their individual personality. This process can be initially reviewed in a classroom environment but ultimately shadowing and effective role-playing are the best methods to teach sales.

No matter how much the technology changes basic selling skills and techniques are universal. They can be broken down in several ways but the essential elements in any sales process are; greet, qualify, present, over-coming objectives, and close. These steps or a similar version of them should be engrained in your sales reps head and become second nature.

One thing you may want to consider is where the credit check comes into the process if it is a new activation and not a renewal. It’s recommended to take care of it first so you have a clear understanding of what the customer is eligible for prior to start the sales process.

Proper greeting should not be overlooked it creates the first impression and sets the tone for the sale. Every customer should be greeted within 30 seconds of entering the store. Even if all the reps are busy at the time a simple “Welcome to XXX, feel free to take a look around and someone will be with you momentarily”. When a rep does fully engage with a customer a smile, handshake, introduction, and friendly comment is the first step. Relating to the customer on some level prior to selling breakdown the typical barriers customers put up.

Only 7% of communication involves actual words, 55% is conveyed through body language, and 38% vocal (pitch, speed, volume, tone). People feel comfortable buying from someone with similar traits, that’s why mirroring is an effective method for interacting with customers. Skilled sales reps easily pick up and adapt to the customers body language emulating the customers visual and vocal patterns.

Qualifying

Qualifying is too often a rushed portion of the sales process. Slow down and take the time to understand the customer’s motivation and point of view. Ask what they like and don’t like about their current service and handset, what additional features are they interested in, accessories, etc. When the customers answer relate to their response, customer “I really like the phone but the camera is not very good”, sales rep “I know what you mean, it’s so convenient to have a phone with a great camera several of our new phones take amazing photos, better than my old digital camera”.

By asking the right questions you’re learning about the customer wants and needs, setting the sale up for success. This is also where addition items such as warranty and trade-in should be introduced. Thoroughly qualifying the customer makes the remaining steps in the sale that much easier.

This is a also an excellent time to mention a handset trade-in program if your company offers one, letting the customer now you may be able to discount the price ofj their new phone.

Presenting

So far you’ve built a solid report with customer, taken the time to understand their needs, and now it’s time to present. One the biggest things to keep in mind when presenting is to focus on benefits not features. For example a feature is an 8-megapixel camera, a benefit is it takes pictures as good as most digital cameras. Benefits focus on what the customer gets out of the product while features are just that, the feature of the product. Once again mirroring comes into play; if the custom is interested specs & stats, then by all means give them specs & stats. Be cautious however not to rattle off too many stats if the customer doesn’t show interest. Having a live demo or at least a dummy phone for the customer to hold is extremely important.

Always start the presentation determining the proper rate plan (unless of course the customer is only interested in the phone) then move on to the phone. This way you first tackle the sensible portion of the sale and end with what is typically the emotional part of the sale, the handset.

In general you want to give the customer enough information to sell them on the product but not too much that they need to think about or talk it over with someone else. Pay attention to the customer, read there reactions, listen to what they are saying don’t just rattle of the same rehearsed pitch every time.

Overcoming Objections

If you asked the right qualifying questions and have been listening to the customer overcoming objections should be the easiest part of the sale. When overcoming objections focus on the positive as much as possible, making negative remarks more often than not leads to a negative customer response (they are mirroring you without realizing it) and that doesn’t get you the yes you’re looking for.

For instance, if the customer mentions they like something about another carrier more your response should be something along these lines “You’re right Verizon does have a reputation for having a great network but with AT&T you’re able to talk and use the phones web capabilities at the same time, and quite frankly I never have issues with coverage on my AT&T phone and you’d be amazing how handy it is to have that functionality with all the great new apps available.” Remember agree with the customer then point out an additional benefit your product offers.

Closing

It’s amazing how many sales reps do a fantastic job at the first 4 steps but don’t ever even ask for the sale or if they do ask for it they give the customer an easy out right away. Once again, if qualified properly the sales rep should feel good about the sale and expect the customer to buy. The ability to close is what separates average sales reps from exceptional ones. The old saying is you need to hear no at least 3 times before letting the customer walk.

The best way to handle closing the sale is the assumptive close. In other words once you’ve overcome all objectives you precede as if they are going to be purchasing the phone, don’t ask, politely assume. “Mr. Customer, it looks like we’ve answered all of your questions, have you thought about insurance and what accessories you’ll need?”

Role Playing & Shadowing

Role-playing is the most under utilized tool in sales training. The initial interaction with role-playing will almost always be awkward but once you learn how to properly handle the situation it’s an invaluable training tool. Some people are natural sellers and they need little guidance, but the vast majority will benefit from this practice tremendously.

Role-playing should take place in the new hire training as well as continuously in the field until reps are smooth and polished in their pitch. Use different scenarios and run through the entire sales process before correcting mistakes. It will most likely take at 3 attempts to get a decent sales pitch out of someone but it’s well worth the effort. Not only should Location Managers be practicing this with reps on a daily basis but District & Regional Managers should as well.

Shadowing is a must for new hires and it should be done as a two steps process. For step one the new hire is a complete observer of the sale, simply standing alongside the manager or senior sales rep to the process in action. Step two is for the new hire to begin the process then allow the manager to step in as soon as help is needed which can be at a predetermined point in the sale or whenever help is needed. Shadowing can play an intricate role in a new reps confidence and development, especially in the first week of training.