The Retailer's Advantage

March 31 ~ Interview with Bob Negan of WhizBang! Training

admin — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:45:56 +0000

Bob Negen is the co-author of Marketing Your Retail Store (along with his wife Susan) and the co-creator of the Retail Mastery System. His “make it fun, but get it done” attitude has given him an expert edge not only in marketing, but also in practical, proven customer service practices, solid, common sense employee management, super efficient operations, and focusing the entrepreneurial spirit.

He has a strong specialty in staff development and this program is guaranteed to help you get the most out of your employees!

March 24 ~ Interview with Bob Frare: Business Development Expert

admin — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:34:49 +0000

Business Development Expert and author of Partner Selling: Produce Extraordinary Sales Results without Hard Sell Tactics Bob Frare joins us on The Retailer’s Advantage!

Top-notch sales organizations respond to the changing needs of their clients and customers. Effective sales and sales management training reduces the resistance to change and provides specific principles for effective selling behavior and goal achievement. Bob Frare provides sales organizations and sales people with a learning system, Partner Selling, that helps them examine and improve the way they serve their clients.

His focus on creating a high performance sales culture makes Bob an valuable resource to every store owner: you’ll want your entire team to listen to this call!

March 17 ~ Interview with Donald Cooper: Myths, Lies and Management

admin — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:18:56 +0000

Donald Cooper transforms businesses and business people! He has helped thousands of retailers throughout the world to add more real value to their customers’ lives…and more dollars to their bottom lines!

Drawing from his real-life experience as a world-class manufacturer, retailer and business coach, he now helps retailers to rethink and reinvent themselves to create compelling customer value, clarity of purpose and long-term profitability.

His insights into how to sell more, manage smarter and grow your bottom line will inform you, challenge you, disturb you, inspire you…and leave you with a new and powerful understanding of your business, your customers and your life!

March 10 ~ Find ‘Em, Hire ‘Em, and Keep ‘Em

admin — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 17:10:06 +0000

One of the biggest issues today in retailing is finding and keeping good employees. It has become easier to attract good customers than it is to find good employees.

This program will discuss ways of attracting and keeping the best people. It will also explore good management practices that will help you run your business better and uncover issues that prevent some businesses from attracting and keeping the best people.

In addition, we will be discussing the benefits of assessments and have a special guest from Profiles International, the largest assessment company, to explain how retailers use assessments effectively.

How Many Ways Can Your Customers Connect With You?

Cindy Potts — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 16:08:02 +0000

We are in a time of transition. Our society is changing. The days of “Reach out and touch someone” are so far behind us that most of our customer base doesn’t even remember that tag line anymore! We don’t have to reach out: the new standard is that we’re always connected, to everyone we know, in a multitude of ways.

moar funny pictures

Our customers place a tremendous value on these connections, which is an important part of the reason for retailers to have a presence on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms. However, it’s also important that we, as business owners, have a coherent communications policy.

Rick was doing a consultation with a really lovely flower shop. They had it going on, and then Rick asked the killer question: “What’s the best way to get in touch with you?” He asked three employees and the owner: each of them had a different answer. Each one had the right phone number to call. None offered an email address. None mentioned connecting via Facebook.

There’s really two issues here. Issue Number One is the need to offer your customers a range of contact options. Text message use is up, as is email and social networking connections: people are looking online for business information LONG before they think about picking up the phone and calling a business directly. WHY are we making the telephone number the primary contact point? I’m not saying we should hide our phone numbers (I for one am still old school enough that I actually call businesses on occasion — but if I have to spend five minutes trying to find your number on your website, I will find some other business that makes it easier for me to shop with them!) but no longer can we assume that that is the contact information that is the most valuable or relevant to our customer base.

Issue Number Two is a matter of store operations. As an organization, there needs to be clarity and unity about how we have our customers contact us. If we tell one customer one phone number, another customer another number, a third the website, and a fourth “You can find us on Facebook”, we’re creating confusion. As a store, we should have one preferred primary point of contact, with a second one readily available. At least one of these contact points should be web-based: your website, e-mail, text address, social network — the choice is yours, but everyone should be sharing the same information. Make sure your primary contact points are actually points you monitor and respond to: sending everyone to an email address that is checked once a week is retail suicide!

Employee Retention: It’s All PR

Rick Segel — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:06:31 +0000

The role praise and recognition play in employee retention.
Five effective, low or no-cost techniques you can use to recognize your employees
The truth about employee bonuses

Keeping great employees is an art and a science. It’s critical that your employees respect you — but it’s also essential that your employees LIKE you. You want your employees to LIKE you, so they’ll work hard for you and be willing to go that extra mile when you need it.

I like to say that keeping your best employees is really a PR job…but instead of Public Relations, you want to focus on Praise and Recognition. The behavior that is rewarded is the behavior that’s repeated — and Praise and Recognition are two ways to ensure that your employees know that you value them and what they do for your store!

Five Effective Ways To Praise

1. Face-to-face Personal Praise

The simplest method
If someone does a good job, tell them!

2. A Personal Note

Write a short three or four sentence note praising a specific action
Send this note to your employee’s home

3. An Official Letter

Particularly valued by high school and college students who need to apply to college or for employment
Develop a reputation for writing great letters & you’ll have a steady stream of student applicants for every job opening

4. Public Praise

Praise an employee for a great job at a staff meeting
Make sure not to pit one employee against another
Avoid the temptation to ‘hold one employee up as an example’ — this breeds resentment

5. Bulletin Board Note

Write a note and post it on the store bulletin board
Be cautious how you word this note to avoid causing resentment in other employees

Time is Of the Essence

No matter HOW you choose to praise your emplyees, it’s essential to praise them as soon as possible. If you wait too long, praise is worthless. Try to praise you’re employee within one day of their exemplary actions — if that’s not possible, make sure to praise them before the next pay period.

The Role of Rewards

Giving your employees a little something extra in their paycheck for doing an exceptional job never hurts. Unfortunately, too many business people have made bonuses somethign that people expect. NEVER give bonuses!!! The first year, a bonus is a bonus — after that, it becomes something people expect: if you can’t give bonuses for whatever reason, your employees feel slighted and resentful.

Give rewards — sporadically, when the occassion merits. That way, there’s no expectation — and the reward is truly that: recognition of a job well done!

Handling the Negative Employee: The 4-Step Process Every Retailer Needs to Know

Rick Segel — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:00:34 +0000

In this article, You Will LEarn:

The three types of employees
The impact negative employees can have on your store
The four step process to change negative employee behavior — before it’s too late!

Find Em, Hire Em, and Keep Em

Rick Segel — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:00:27 +0000

Teleseminar Recording
One of the biggest issues today in retailing is finding and keeping good employees. It has become easier to attract good customers than it is to find good employees. This program will discuss ways of attracting and keeping the best people. It will also explore good management practices that will help you run your business better and uncover issues that prevent some businesses from attracting and keeping the best people. In addition, we will be discussing the benefits of assessments and have a special guest from Profiles International, the largest assessment company, to explain how retailers use assessments effectively.

Top Ten Management Practices

Rick Segel — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 13:41:55 +0000

Be a More Effective Manager
Motivate Your Team
Accomplish More While Doing Less

Managing people is an art and a science. Too often, we get caught up in the day-to-day burden of running the store, and lose track of the fact that our people need just as much time, attention, and effort as our merchandising, advertising, buying, recordkeeping…in fact, sometimes it seems like your sales staff needs ALL of your energy, leaving nothing left for anything else.

Here are the top ten management practices you can use to help motivate your team, raise morale, and make life a little easier on yourself:

ONE: Be up when they’re down. Be down when they’re up.

Your job is to provide balance. When your team is chipper and enthusiastic, that’s the time to point out areas that need correction and the need for hard work. They’re already up: they can hear that there’s more work to do and not be crushed by the news!

On the other hand, when it’s been a rough couple of days and everyone’s bottom lip is dragging on the carpet, you need to be a cheerleader and perk your team up. They need the positive, the bright, the funny.

It may seem counterintuitive, but being up when they’re down and down when they’re up helps keep your team on an even keel and focused on the larger picture.

TWO: Management is not one size fits all.

People are motivated by different things. You need to approach each employee as a unique individual and understand what makes them ‘tick’. Some people work for praise, while others value the time out of the house. Others are in it for the money, while others are trying to build a resume. If you want to offer incentives to get top performance out of such a diverse group, it’s obvious that the same items won’t appeal to everyone.

This is clearly easier in a smaller store where you have a few employees. If you’ve got a larger store, you need to lean a bit on your managers or shift supervisors to discover what influences the people they supervise. Explain the power of motivations to them.

At the same time, you have employees with different learning styles. Be aware that one employee might need instructions written down while you can just tell another what you want to have done — while a third might need you to physically walk him through whatever it is you want him to do. Whenever possible, provide instruction in the manner that best matches your employee’s learning style.

Bear in mind that younger employees, raised on the media, often have exceptionally short attention spans. It’s better to often several short training sessions that ’stick’ than one marathon session that will just bore them to death.

THREE: The behavior that is rewarded is the behavior that’s repeated.

Of all the points you’re going to read on this list, this is the one I use every single day. It works with employees — but it also works with children, friends, pets, random strangers, you name it. When you reward someone, even if it’s just with a smile or a Thank You, for a certain behavior, most people will behave in that fashion again. We’re wired that way, from childhood. Everyone does what they do because at some point, they were rewarded for that behavior.

Praise, recognition, and more tangible rewards all work as positive encouragement. Remember the old saying: You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar. While I’m not sure what you’d do with all those flies, it is true: rewarding a behavior almost guarantees that that behavior will be repeated.

This is a technique you can implement TODAY. When you’re in your store and you see a staffer doing something great, take the time to stop and say, “Hey, good job!” Let your crew know that their efforts are being noticed — and appreciated.

FOUR: Criticism and fear do not work as motivators.

Many times managers fall into the trap of pointing out the negative, hoping that by highlighting when and where employees fall short, they’ll prevent it from happening again. It just doesn’t work that way. Managers who rely on criticism and fear as motivators wind up with employees who are afraid of changes, who try to cover up mistakes for fear of consequences, and who resent the boss.

Focus on the positive. Catch people doing something right. When there are mistakes, acknowledge and address them — but then move on. You’ll eliminate the bitter, sulking employees.

I’m not going to kid you: this isn’t always easy. There are times holding your tongue will actually hurt: but before you lash out at the cashier who messed up the register yet again, stop and think: where are these mistakes coming from? What do I want to accomplish? If all I want is a really upset employee in tears, who goes home not at all sure she wants to come back the next day, then by all means, let loose with both barrels. But realistically, if you want to improve the employee’s performance, you’ve got to soften your words and work on fixing the problem — not venting your frustration and rage!

FIVE: Praise, recognition, and appreciation are the three most important words.

It is amazing how far a compliment will go. If you want a loyal team, devoted to you and your store, make sure to give out tons and tons of sincere, genuine praise, recognition and appreciation. Let your team know that you see and appreciate their hard work, and value the contribution they make to your store.

What really works is what I call a Compliment Meeting: you get everyone together, and everyone has to point out one thing that their colleague does well. It’s amazing how powerful this exercise is: most people assume that what they do goes unnoticed. Having it pointed out — by their peers — that their efforts are not only noticed but appreciated can be a career-changing experience.

Remember to reward your people’s efforts on your behalf. On an annual or semi-annual basis, hand out the Best Idea Award @md for the employee who’s done the most to improve your store. Don’t forget the Best Try Award, to be given to the employee who might not come up with that revolutionary concept, yet consistently gives extra thought, time, and attention to making business better. Remember #3 – the behavior that’s rewarded is the behavior that’s repeated. You want your employees to be committed to making your store better.

SIX: Incorporate fun, humor, and playful behavior

Your employees are JUST LIKE your customers. They like to have fun. They like to enjoy themselves. They like to be entertained. Yes, there’s work to be done, of course — but if your team knows they’ll be smiling while they do it, the day goes by quickly and morale is high.

Little rewards can have big results. I used to go to the bank almost every day when I had my store: they always gave away Hershey’s Kisses, Lollipops and other candies. So every now and then I’d fill my pocket with a handful, and give them out to my employees. Every time I handed someone a candy, I’d say something nice, reinforcing a positive behavior. It worked because it was an unexpected treat, a sweet touch added to a genuine compliment.

Many times, management works best when it’s unexpected. Consider the Christmas Bonus: the very first year you give out money during the holidays, it’s a bonus and all of your employees will be thrilled. Every year after that, though, and the Bonus becomes an expectation. It ceases to be special and instead becomes an entitlement.

So avoid expectations. Give someone a surprise –even a little one — when they least expect it. The employees love it — and the customers, if they happened to see it, loved it as well. It’s a nice gesture, showing you care about your team.

SEVEN: Walk in their shoes

You never know a man, the wise saying tells us, until you have walked a mile in his moccassins. The saying speaks to the concept of empathy, a critical quality in a manager.

To be a great manager, you have to know and understand what your people are facing on a daily basis. There’s no better way to do this than to go and actually spend some time doing what your people do for you: get out of the office and work the sales floor. Talk to the angry customer and resolve the problems. Pick up the merchandise that’s been knocked off the shelves. Carry the customer’s order to their car.

Doing this has two benefits: it gives you a greater understanding of what your team faces, making you a more compassionate and insightful manager. Second: your sales staff will gain greater respect for you when they see you’re willing to pitch in and do what needs to be done. It builds and reinforces your relationship with your team.

EIGHT: Signage is great management

The more you communicate with your employees, the better your relationship will be with them. However, you can’t really spend every minute of every day on the sales floor talking with them. There’s just too much to do. That’s when you need to take advantage of the power of signage!

Employment enhancement signs — the motivational, backroom, and coaching signs used to communicate with employees — are great management. You can add an element of fun to the workplace, offer encouragement, correct mistakes and inform your crew of vital information — without ever once having to say a word.

IKEA uses signage this way particularly well. In their back rooms, they have signs defining the types of days: a busy day will see X number of customers, and generate X amount of sales, while a slower day (which they term “Opportunity Days”) has relatively smaller numbers. It’s really an eye opening sign, letting the employees know the true size of the operation they’re involved in, and pinpointing opportunities to make the business grow further.

NINE: Share the Problem: Ownership from Inception

The most successful managers bring challenges and problems to their team. Letting your people know what the real situation is creates an atmosphere where it’s no longer management’s problem — it’s everyone’s problem, and they become invested in helping to offer solutions.

Oftentimes, managers keep challenges away from their employees, thinking that if the team knew about the challenges the company was facing, they would become discouraged and despondent. In fact, the opposite is often true!

For example, a major hotel chain in Florida was having a terrible time finding chambermaids. Hardly anyone wants to be a chambermaid: it’s hard, demanding work, with terrible hours. By talking with the existing crew, management discovered that the best chambermaids were the ones who had recently emigrated from Poland.

Management wound up working with local agencies to facilitate the arrival of more Polish women, who were happy to take the chambermaid positions and did a fantastic job providing top notch service to the customers. Yet this solution was not even on the radar until management met with the chambermaids, and said ‘What can we do?’ Making it ‘our’ problem resulted in a real, viable solution.

Another example comes from a Shell gas station. The station owners would have displays of oil outside by the gas pumps, prompting people to check their oil and buy a quart or two if they were low. A great idea — except for the fact that people would steal the oil. Moving the oil inside meant the product was secure — but sales dropped off dramatically.

An employee, when presented with the problem, and asked “What can we do?” offered an incredible solution: have the outdoor display — but empty the bottles and fill them instead with sand. That way, people would see the oil and be prompted to check their oil and make the subsequent purchase from the attendant — but anyone who stole a bottle of oil simply got a few cups of sand for their trouble.

I call this concept ownership from inception.It’s just a fancy way to share the problem with our team. Making a challenge an issue for the entire team allows the entire team to brainstorm, concentrate on the challenge, and sometimes offer innovative, creative solutions. It also makes employees feel more valued and integral to the success of the organizations. Having the boss say, “Wow! What a great idea!” is a tremendously valuable experience.

TEN: Mistakes are opportunities

Everybody makes mistakes. Nobody’s perfect. That’s the way of the world: if there’s a way for things to go wrong, you can rest assured that things will, in fact, at some point, go wrong. Savvy managers know that when things go wrong, or don’t turn out as planned, it’s a chance to put some creative thinking into place and WOW the customer.

You see, mistakes give you the chance to adapt, to innovate, and to do something new and creative.

One day, when I still had a store, I thought it would be a great idea to put our new line of dresses prominently out front for the sidewalk sale promotion. These sequined, beaded dresses looked fabulous in the sun, and a good number of shoppers had wandererd over to check them out.

Then, disaster! A wandering dog lifted his leg and relieved himself on one of the dresses.

A customer asked, aghast, “Now what are you going to do?”

I could have beaten myself up over choosing to put the merchandise out in harm’s way, or not installing dog-proof fencing, or any number of things. Instead, it was time to capitalize on the moment. I told the customer — and everyone else within earshot, “The entire rack’s half off!”

It didn’t take five minutes to sell out of those dresses!

BONUS: Always Give A Little Bit More

There’s one more concept that didn’t quite fit in our top ten list. Ironically, it’s the concept of always giving a little bit more. Go the extra mile! One gesture above and beyond the ‘have to’ level will help transition you from an okay boss to someone your team is loyal to and determined to help out by turning in top performances.

Procedure Binder

Cindy Potts — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 13:30:06 +0000

A procedure binder documents the way you do things. It serves as a manual for your store, something you and your employees can turn to time and time again for guidance.

In this download, we’ve created a 30 page guide you can use to create your own procedure binder. Fill in the blanks and put the pages in a three ring binder: you’re all set.

Of course, you’ll want to customize and build from here. However, getting started is half the battle! Everything you need to get started is right here:

We are providing the guide in 2 formats:

ProcedureBinder.pdf (PDF: Print and go!)

ProcedureBinder.doc (Microsoft Word: Modify with your changes)