A word to the wise
Ian Segail is a XXXXXX Increasing your sales conversion
As a business person are you aware what percentage of your shoppers become buyers? How many people who walk into your store/s buy something?
Retailers are a savvy lot. They can tell you about the total number of transactions and average dollar value. Others can tell you how their average dollar value is tracking against others stores in the group and against the same time last year. The great ones can even tell you profitability by item by store. But ask them, "How many customers who visit the store are converted to sales?" and most can't answer with the same decisiveness.
Conversion rate is the percentage of customers who become buyers. No matter what one sells, conversion rates are a critical store sales performance measure. They are also a great means of determining the health between the four walls of a store.
In short, conversion rate is to retail what bowling or batting averages are to cricket. Without knowing your store's conversion rates you don't know if you are a Freddie Flintoff or just Fred. Below, I have included five things you can do today to increase your sales conversion rates.
Measure it
There's a saying in management, "If you measure it you can manage it". Whether you get door counters or whether you make one or all of your team responsible for counting the traffic through the store, just do it! Start measuring conversion rates and watch the accountability increase. When retail sales people begin to see the gaps between the amount of customers and the amount of converted sales, they very quickly begin to work out what is working and what's not, who is working and who is not.
Focus on it
Isn't it amazing how in retail we get what we focus on? There is one national retailer that has a very active OH and S department in head office, guess what they get an abundance of in their stores? OH and S. Put the focus on stock take and people forget customers so that they can count stock. Focus on the customer and customer service goes up. Focus and measure conversion rates and watch them increase.
Concentrate on the four most important conversion rates a) Obviously as I have mentioned, it is vital that you begin to measure "How many customers who visit the store are converted to sales. This is the primary conversion rate. b) The next conversion rate to record and measure is, "How many customers were approached and how many allowed themselves to be probed for needs? This conversion rate is known as Approaches to Needs identification. If you want to increase your sales, having your sales people become aware of how often they don't really establish needs before talking about products, is a very powerful sales statistic to record. When sales people invest the time to find out not only what the customer is looking for, but also why they want it, multiple sales are the result. c) How many customers are willing to try on merchandise or go through a product presentation/demonstration following a well-conducted needs determining process? This is the next sales number/conversion rate to measure. Needs to Product Demo/try on. Keeping and monitoring these statistics will clearly show that the more exposed to the merchandise customers become, either by trying it on, or by being included in a product demonstration, the more predisposed they become to owning the new merchandise. d) The fourth conversion rate to measure and monitor is the number of demonstration/try on's that get closed as sales. This number will tell you how effectively your merchandise is being sold. How much are your sales people including the customer in the product demonstration. This number also points to how well your change rooms are being serviced. This conversion rate is known as, Demo/try on to Sales.
Sell the try on The quickest and most effective way to increase your store sales is to get customers to try the merchandise. Get the customer into the change room, give them a reason to sit and try on the shoes. Athletes Foot do this so well. They offer to have you walk across an electronic platform gizmo to measure your "heel strike" and "gait", apparently two essentials when choosing a running shoe. Whilst the exercise is informative, it also ensures that the customer remove their existing shoes. Let's face it; the hardest part of getting customers to try shoes on is to give them a reason to take their old shoes off.
Measure the conversion rate of your merchandising displays
"If it is not paying rent, get rid of it!" Every square meter of display space needs to "pay rent". Space productivity and measuring the conversion rate of display merchandise is a science focused around maximising the most valuable retail selling space in a store by assigning it to merchandise that produces optimal gross margin dollars. There is a national jewellery chain that measures the conversion rate of its window merchandise. If a display doesn't net an enquiry it's gone!
Train, train and train your people to effectively convert visitors to your store to happy customers. Retailers spend millions on store layout and design; on sophisticated, computer merchandise management systems, which can tell down to the minute what product is selling and what is not. They invest heavily in security systems and pour thousands of dollars into fixtures, fittings, in-store music systems, classy lighting and unique window dressing, and all of this investment is in order to get a leap up and create competitive advantage driving customers into their stores. Whilst all the aesthetics and business systems are necessary today to run an effective retail business in today's market place, all thing being equal, it is your frontline people that demonstrate to the customer how your business is as unique as the merchandise on show. Hold your retail team accountable for their conversion rates and train them how to effectively engage customers, and identify customer's needs. Train them to get customers into the change room and effectively demonstrate your merchandise. Train them to close multiple sales. If you don't improve their skills they will keep delivering the same level of sales they are doing now. Train your team to become your competitive advantage.