Now let’s imagine you’ve used the aforementioned advice, but your customer still balks and won’t buy the product. What should you say now to the customer? “I think some time needs to be spent with the customer to qualify both wants and needs,” said Soucy. “If the customer needs a piece to have their system work correctly, it’s a different conversation than if a customer just wants a piece. When I was on the sales floor [when I worked in the retail environment], I wasn’t afraid to tell a customer that if he was going to use his equipment in a certain way, then he needed a particular piece I knew was missing. It’s a different situation if they just want something. In those situations, I would pay close attention to what the customer is telling me, and find ways to overcome roadblocks. After qualifying the sale, if price is the roadblock, I would always have alternate products in mind before offering a deal or reducing my margin on the item he was initially looking for. In many cases, this helped me close the sale and retain the margin I would have otherwise lost, plus still satisfy the customer’s wants.”
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“You have to be able to speak the same language as the customer,” said Birr. “As I mentioned earlier, know what their goals are. How comfortable are they with what they’re about to purchase or want to purchase? If customers don’t understand every detail about the product, you must make sure you speak on a very human, personal level. Because at the end of the day, the customer probably isn’t too concerned with the technical stuff anyway. They just want it to sound right. And being a very good listener is what everything is all about.”
Behind the Glass
Although it’s clearly not the case with speakers, many other pro audio products perhaps sit behind the glass or on the wall behind your register. Therefore, customers cannot simply pick up the product and try it out. Customers need to either ask you to look at the product, or view the package from several feet away. This can be a disadvantage when trying to sell that product. So how do our experts say you can overcome that potential problem? “Packaging is becoming more important,” said Castle. “For example, if a salesperson is busy, he or she can hand the customer the box. That customer can get everything they need to know about the microphone right off of that box. We all buy with our eyes. You need to draw people in visually, no matter what you’re selling. But the bottom line is the salesperson is still the most important factor for what the customer buys. If he or she is familiar with the product, and possibly uses it his/her self, that’s the biggest factor for a customer buying it. We do make an effort to reach out to salespeople and make sure they are at least familiar with our product. We have programs where they can try the mics out and even purchase them.”
“Most manufactures are doing a really good job at having good point of purchase bullets on their packaging, so making these easy to see will help,” added Soucy. “In my experience, a lot happens behind the counter and it’s easy to let things get messy or have the displays look unorganized. Retailers need to keep in mind that if they have to go digging behind their counter to find something, then the customer will never see it. If customers can’t see it, there’s the risk they will leave without asking about it [especially when the store is busy], so the sale and the customer are lost even though you have the item in stock they wanted. I am also a big fan of having small, neatly displayed stacks of impulse items in the counter area. Good point-of-purchase signs are important to get the most out of impulse item displays.”
“As a speaker manufacturer, we can’t talk specifically about the behind-the-glass aspect,” said DeLoria, “but a huge factor here is retailers can’t always demonstrate pro audio products. To that, I say, find a corner, find a back room, or take it outdoors if the weather is nice. That way, a customer can get a real connection to the product. Whether the product is behind the glass or not, you must demonstrate it. Because you might sell the product, but they very well may bring it back.”
If All Else Fails, Pray
Another area we have yet to touch upon is the house of worship market. This is an area where margins are often more comfortable compared to other MI niches. According to Peavey’s Gibson, the best advice for retailers is to differentiate yourself from other retailers by starting an installation division.
But how much space in your store will these products eat up? Gibson said the nice part about installation products, including his company’s Sanctuary Series, is “they don’t really take up much room. Unlike before, most of the products are built into the mixer. The mixer itself takes the place of a lot of outboard gear you would have had to buy.”
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