The good, old secrets of improving store sales

"Courteous treatment will make a customer a walking advertisement."

And being courteous doesn't cost a penny. But still, every day we hear about stories of pathetic customer service by staff at even the most renowned brands in the retail industry. And this is costing these brands millions of money and loss of faith and respect on the part of their customers. Brands must do something about this.

You can train your staff to smile when a customer steps in your store. But you cannot train them to be supportive, to behave, and to give them an experience that can make these customers come back to your stores time and again. So what is it you can do to hold on to your customers and make many more every day?

Hire the right kind of people

This is well in your hand. Put the right people to do hiring for the sales jobs. Or, you can do it on your own. The idea is to hire only those which are passionate about customer servicing and sales. Passion is important - you can teach them skills later on.

Get this step right and you've won more than half the battle.

Get in touch with your people

You might be the owner of these stores or area sales manager. But the point that I want to make here is that it is important to be in touch with people who actually sell to your customers. Call them by their names. Appreciate the efforts they put into making sales for the store. And share some jokes as well. This will strengthen the bond between you and your sales team and they'll more likely to approach you with their problems.

Understand how training works

Here's a question for you: when was the last time you trained your staff?

Training has to be consistent and isn't a onetime shot.

Some of the programs that I'd like to suggest for improving the communication, behavioral and selling skills of your people.

• Customer service training programs

I find these programs totally awesome. But make sure you get in touch with the experienced sales training companies which have delivered customer service training programs to retail companies like yours.

The new and innovative customer service training programs often start with a needs diagnostic study that gauges the training needs of the audience. Based on the study, the programs are tweaked so that they resonate better with the audience and they can learn quite a lot of tips and tricks to improve their productivity and relationships with their customers.

Customer relationship management training program trains you in building relationships with your customers and nurturing them over years.

I'm done with this article - I'd like to end it saying the same thing that I said at the beginning of this article that being courteous doesn't cost a penny. Trainings, hiring the right people are important - but what will give you instant results is a little change in how your approach and deal with your customers. All you have to do is being courteous with your customers.

For more tips and tricks on increasing your store sales, read my other published articles. I also plan to write a couple of more articles on customer relationship management training programs for the retail industry. For this, watch out for my future articles that I'll publish right here.