It seems that I have been out shopping a tad too much lately. So I was in the home ware section at a popular retail store and remembered that I would like some red pot pourri for my living areas at home. I asked the sales boy who was aimlessly watching us whether they have pot pourri. As you may be aware, it is pronounced poh – puh – ree and I stuck to my guns.
I was more than willing to whisk my phone out, show some photographs and explain to him that it consisted of fragrant dried flowers and leaves. However, the only response I got was a smirk and a shake of his head. Almost as if pot pourri was not ‘cool’ enough to be sold at this store. I said ok and turned to stroll around with my friend who was animatedly telling me some gossip. I had barely taken 10 steps when I saw boxes of pot pourri neatly stashed towards the bottom of an open cupboard. I bent down, found a red one, picked it up and turned to my friend. She said ‘oh…they do have pot pourri’. I nodded – again amused at the service or lack of it that I got.
Let’s face it, half of the things we like to have in our houses have not been invented yet, but pot pourri has been around in this world for ages. If we want to sell and we want people to come back to our stores, we should probably consider training our teams to do the following:
01. As a sales staff or as any staff for that matter, act useful, be helpful and interact even if you are thoroughly bored – that way more people will engage with you.
02. Do not smirk! Good grief! This goes without saying. Even if your customers asks you to find something that makes you blush – DON’T blush!. The customer must always feel important and cherished.
03. Talk – for crying out loud, if someone has uttered words to you, return the favour. Even if you need to say it is not there, please open your mouth and say, ‘I am afraid we do not carry that’ or ‘we ran out of stock just the other day, but we should get some new ones next week’. A shaking of heads, gesturing of the head or an expression on the face does not count as a suitable response to your customer.
04. Know what you sell. Take an active interest in knowing what you sell, read up about new items, go through the names of packets, read labels and check the inventory regularly.
05. Clarify politely. Some customers probably do inquire whether star dust from heaven is sold, but just to make sure you know what he or she is talking about, politely ask for a few details. Customers like me, may have additional information that they could share.
06. Have Name Boards. There are some items which do not sell often, have weird names like pot pourri or are generally unknown in the market. To make life easier for everyone, have name boards for at least those irregular products so that a customer also can try to look for it.
If I had not been ambling around that shop anyway, I would not have seen the pot pourri packs and the retailer would certainly not have been able to sell to me. This is after I as a customer actively asked about it. Had I asked for pot pourri in a country where they were keen to sell or were enthusiastic about service and etiquette, I would have come home laden with packs of pot pourri, additional bottles of oil for the packs and probably even bowls to place them in.
Is it not time for us to raise the bar and make all our staff Full of Etiquette? So much so that customers want to come back simply because they like the way they are treated. Ahhh… my dear fellow Sri Lankans, that will definitely be the day that we win the heart of the world.
Full of Etiquette 