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What knowledge does a salesperson need? Shop assistant

A sales assistant is a specialist who represents the store and communicates with the buyer, his duties include not only the direct sale of goods, but also assistance in choosing them.

He must know all the information related to the release of the product, its manufacturer, properties and qualities, the material from which it is made, and other characteristics that the buyer may be interested in.

The visitor can contact a specialist on any issue or problem that he must quickly and efficiently solve. To do this, the sales assistant needs to know everything about the history of the store, the availability of goods in the warehouse and the time when replenishment is expected.

In some organizations, a representative of this profession is required to monitor the condition of the goods, their presence in the windows, the change of price tags, as well as the order in trading floor.

A specialist is valued if he brings profit to the store, so almost always wage sales assistant depends on the quantity of goods sold.

What a true professional should know

First of all, of course, it is necessary to get acquainted with human psychology. Why he wants to buy a product, what guides him in choosing and making a decision, and most importantly, how to push him to the right decision.

A person can possess these skills already from the beginning of a conscious life or learn from special trainings. Often, companies themselves hold seminars and training sessions to improve the skills of their employees.

Of course, it would be better if the consultant himself “feels” the buyer, what he needs, how to build a conversation with him, be able to give the necessary advice and help, gain confidence.

The Sales Consultant must have the following professional skills:

Correctly compiling a psychological portrait of a potential buyer is the main point of the work. It depends on how successful you can sell.

What a Sales Consultant Should Know

It is very important to win over the buyer at the first moment of acquaintance, to be friendly, smile, speak politely and courteously, be able to listen and be attentive. Only in this case you will gain due trust and will be able to influence the choice of the visitor. Otherwise, they simply won't want to listen to you.

Your desire to help must be sincere, because falsehood is always felt. So, the buyer will be located to you and will appreciate your advice.

The second important attribute of the profession of the seller is to keep the attention of the client. Here everyone should show their individuality and life experience. It can be unobtrusive humor, personal examples or purely informative advice. At the same time, you should give the client time to think about your words and make his own decision. Don’t be overly intrusive—no one likes that—but don’t get too far out of sight to answer questions if you need to.

Possible Sales Mistakes

One of the most common mistakes of a sales assistant is excessive talkativeness and annoyingness. Customers don't like it when they try to "shove" a product that they do not need. Therefore, listen carefully to the wishes of the client and try to gently lead him to the right idea.

Often a lot of technical information tires the buyer, and he loses interest in the product. Find out what is important for him to know before buying, and consult clearly on issues of interest.

Under no circumstances should you chew gum in the workplace. This is considered a sign of disrespect and bad taste.

Anyone who can't smile shouldn't trade
Chinese proverb

What should a sales consultant do?

A sales consultant is a specialist who has to work in two main areas. First of all, he is engaged in helping potential buyers:

Helps to choose a product;
Selects the right size;
Helps to evaluate the style;
Provides information about the manufacturer, material, company.

For any questions that arise, the store visitor can contact the sales assistant, who should be able to solve the problem quickly and competently.

Therefore, a specialist of this profile must thoroughly know the history of the brands that are sold in the store, the history of the store, and size ranges. It is also important to have constantly changing information about the state of the warehouse, about the available and missing goods, and about receipts.

In some organizations, the sales assistant is charged with the duty to stir or lay out the goods and keep order on the trading floor.

The profit of the store largely depends on the qualifications of sales assistants. And its increase is the second mandatory activity of these specialists.

The job description of a sales consultant can be quite broad, but the ultimate goal of his work is to increase sales. In order for this activity to be successful, a specialist must possess a number of special skills and abilities.

Sales consultant: what should a specialist know?

In order to be a successful sales assistant, you need to know how human psychology works: what pushes certain people to buy, what guides them when making a decision, what is needed in order to push a person to make a purchase.

These are subtle psychological skills that can be learned in special trainings. But still, the talent for sales is not only made up of acquired skills. Many successful salespeople have never taken a training course at all.

They act on a hunch, identifying with their inner instincts people who are worth working with and those who are not worth wasting their time on. They look at the buyer, take a sincere part in it, understand what he needs, and can correctly offer it.

Of course, there are quite a few such unique ones, but many have the makings for successful work as a sales assistant. They just need to be developed and directed in the right direction.

The sales consultant should know that for his work such qualities are simply necessary as:

Without these skills, work will turn into a continuous stress, tension. In this state, it is not necessary to talk about successful sales.

What does a sales consultant need to know about buyers in order to be successful? Ideally, absolutely everything. It is not so difficult to make a general psychological portrait of the main visitors of a particular store.

Based on such a portrait, you can develop an effective behavior model that will allow you to successfully sell a product and even gain new customers. This is an important skill for a sales assistant.

What should a sales assistant be able to do?

First of all, win over people at first sight. That is a very important skill for a specialist of this kind. With a seller who does not know how to smile, say hello, start a conversation, no one wants to communicate.

Thus, he simply does not have the opportunity to recommend anything or somehow prepare the purchase. Greetings are an important part of the job of a sales assistant.

You can master all the skills that trainings and courses offer, but never learn how to properly meet customers. it is important to do it with a sincere smile, with a real desire to help them buy exactly what they need.

Secondly, it is very important to keep the attention of the client. To do this, each seller uses his own method. A few of these tricks are what a sales assistant needs to know when he gets to work.

In no case should you leave a potential buyer on the trading floor unattended, but being intrusive is also dangerous. The sales consultant must find a balance of attention given to the buyer in order to always have time to help, seeing that the client is confused, and at the same time not prevent him from thinking in the right direction.

Advice to the sales consultant boils down to the fact that this work involves complete dedication, enthusiasm, interest. A person who is not interested in selling will never be able to make money on it.

The profession of a sales assistant is not unpromising. In large organizations, such specialists are promoted to managers and above. The salary of a sales consultant most often consists of a fixed salary and a percentage of sales.

Direct selling is a promising and highly profitable, but rather tough area in which you need to have an iron grip, strong character and a strong desire to improve your skills every day. Become good seller maybe not everyone, but if you are confident in your abilities and ready to work hard on yourself, then this article will help you understand how to learn how to sell online and offline, as well as what you need to know and be able to do for this.

What should a good seller know and be able to do?

The seller is a key player in any business. Not only the frequency and number of sales depend on his skills, knowledge and professionalism. Customers judge the entire company by their experience with him. Many people can “sell” once, but only the best can build long-term and trusting relationships with customers and turn them into real fans! And in order to understand how to learn how to sell, you need to figure out what skills and qualities a good sales manager should have.

The 5 Essential Skills of a Good Sales Manager

5 Personal Traits of a Successful Salesperson

Flexibility of thinking. The ability to quickly respond to changing situations and just as quickly accept non-standard solutions very often can decide the fate of the transaction.
discipline and self-organization. It is necessary to organize a transaction, prepare and send documents, control payment issues, update data in the client card, etc. The manager must lead his clients from A to Z, monitor their development and keep them under control. Therefore, the issue of self-organization and discipline is acute. This is exactly the skill that you need to “educate” in yourself day after day.
Persistence. But not to be confused with obsession, which only annoys people. An obsessive "salesperson" will constantly peck at the same pain point of the client until he finally gets it. A persistent manager understands that a few rejections are no reason to give up. He will look for other approaches to the person, use other triggers (psychological hooks) and interaction models.
Self-confidence. Fear of rejection or failure often plays a cruel joke on novice salespeople. No need to be afraid of mistakes, you need to be able to analyze them and draw the right conclusions.
Stress resistance, ability to find compromises and overcome conflicts. Clients are different. Everyone has a different personality, temperament and, most importantly, a buying experience. Therefore, conflict situations are not excluded, from which it is very important to find a way out that will suit both parties. One must always remember that one dissatisfied customer can destroy the reputation of a company that has been built over the years.

How to learn active sales? Key sales technologies

Someone believes that the main thing for the seller is talent. Others believe that it's all about experience and practice. Therefore, a reasonable question arises: how to become a powerful sales manager and is it worth learning this profession?

In fact, the ideal salesperson combines natural talent, knowledge of the basic principles of sales, understanding of psychology and practical skills. Therefore, to begin with, it is extremely important to study the basics of the theory and technology of sales. This is what we will talk about next.

The first question to be sorted out is where to study to be a sales manager? Fortunately, there are many specialized courses and trainings both online and offline. But most likely, one basic course will not be enough, since the main knowledge portfolio of a sales manager should include at least the following areas:

theory and methodology of sales;
effective product presentation;
technologies for conducting successful negotiations over the phone and during live meetings;
the basics of public speaking;
customer psychology, characteristics of consumer behavior and purchase decision factors;
technologies of influence and methods of persuasion;
handling objections;
creating a positive impression.

In addition, it is important to gain sufficient knowledge about the specifics of doing business in the industry in which you plan to work and sell.

That is, ideally, in order to learn the art of selling, you must:

take specialized courses to get a theoretical base;
engage in self-education by studying specialized literature (we will talk about it later), specialized resources, as well as communicating with sales practices;
learn in the process of work - analyze your successes and mistakes, draw the right conclusions.

Basic Sales Technology

How to learn to sell any product? To do this, there are basic sales technologies, on the basis of which the entire process of concluding a deal is built. We will talk about them further.

So, sales technology is a standardized algorithm of actions that regulates the interaction of the seller with the client. Each company can have its own proven and approved scheme. However, there is a basic technology that consists of 6 key steps:

Another technique that will help you master selling and understand how to learn how to sell is SPIN-selling.

SPIN sales

SPIN selling (SPIN: S - situation questions; P - problem questions; I - implication questions; N - need-payoff questions) is a sales technique that is based on 4 types of questions: situational, problematic, extracting and guiding. The author of the technique is the English psychologist Neil Rackham.

How it works? The essence of SPIN sales is to gradually lead a person to the conclusion that life is not sweet without your product. Let's take a look at an example. Imagine that you sell the delivery of hot full meals to offices.

Situational question (understand the situation) - “Probably you have a lot of things to do today, and you didn’t have a normal lunch or, at most, got by with a couple of sandwiches?”. The point is not to draw a conclusion, but to allow the client to come to him through this question - "Yes, I really haven't eaten anything and now I'm terribly hungry."
Problematic issue (identify the problem) - “Interrupting with dry food is harmful to the stomach. Are you already experiencing discomfort, pain, heartburn? It is important to address the main problem of the client.
Extractive question (expand the problem) - here you can ask a variety of questions that increase the client's anxiety about his problem, or vice versa, show what positive results a change in the habit of interrupting sandwiches can lead to.
Guide (suggest a solution) - “If you have a full lunch without leaving the office, how will this affect your health and well-being? Will you be more productive? Slightly exaggerated, but the point is to lead a person to the decision that he needs the proposed product.

As we have said, in order to learn how to sell well from scratch, you need to take the time to self-educate and study specialized literature. Therefore, take note of the recommended books on the art of selling that you need to master first:

Spin Selling by Neil Rackham
Selling Champions, Matthew Dixon, Brent Adamson;
“Say no first, Jim Camp;
"No thanks, I'm just watching"
“Flexible sales. How to Sell in an Age of Change by Jill Conrath.

Let's summarize. In this article, we tried to analyze in as much detail as possible the question “How to learn how to sell goods and services?”. In conclusion, it is worth noting that in order to become a good seller, you must have a number of necessary personal qualities and have a strong theoretical base, which can be obtained in specialized courses, as well as gleaned from specialized literature. Professional skills, respectively, will appear only in the process of "field" work and after the analysis of the first sales.

Profession Sales Consultant

What is a Sales Consultant?

The position of sales consultant involves working on two fronts. Firstly, he must convince the client of the need to purchase, his task is to sell a product or service by any known means. This is a real art, and each buyer requires an individual approach. Secondly, he must clearly and clearly explain to the buyer information about necessary goods, terms of payment, shipment, warranty service, after-sales service. At the same time, the buyer should not have the feeling that he is being deceived. A professional knows how to sell goods to anyone, even to a visitor who accidentally enters the store. And moreover, to persuade him to purchase a whole bunch of related items. It follows from this that a qualified sales assistant is a marketer, a designer, and an advertiser all rolled into one. He should be tactful, but not flattering; sociable, but not talkative; smart, but not arrogant.

The goal of a sales consultant is to find out the needs of the buyer, and only then sell exactly what the client needs. An ideal sales assistant should be able to not only make a deal: take the money and give the goods. He goes a long way of working with a client and working on himself.

Sales consultants are needed in departments household appliances, furniture, clothing stores, cosmetics, etc. In other words, they are needed wherever the buyer is everywhere, where the buyer can get confused in the variety of goods and still not decide on a purchase.

The sales consultant should know that for his work such qualities are simply necessary as:

Restraint
Patience
self control
Stress tolerance
The ability to resolve conflicts
Ability to resolve conflict situations

Without these skills, work will turn into a continuous stress, tension. In this state, there is no need to talk about successful sales.

Functional responsibilities of a sales assistant

Ability to competently negotiate at any level and overcome any objections
Politeness, friendliness, attention to customers and to their colleagues
Creation for consumers of all necessary conditions for familiarization and selection of goods, control over the rules of trade
Servicing customers in accordance with sales technology, advising consumers on the properties and quality of goods, their purpose, rules for use and care, operational periods, calculating the total cost of the purchase, its packaging, exchange of goods
Taking official measures to resolve any conflict situations
Informing the company's management about discrepancies, shortcomings or shortcomings in customer service, taking the necessary measures to eliminate them
Good knowledge of your regular customers
The ability to offer alternative product replacement for missing product
Prevention of damage and theft of goods by unauthorized persons
Performing the duties of a cashier
Participation in the design of the sales area

Working with products official duties sales consultant includes:

Pre-sale preparation of goods (checking the conformity of the name, the presence of all components and their quantity, labeling, unpacking the product and visual inspection of it appearance, service check)
Informing the authorities about any discrepancies, lack of goods or its components
Placement of goods sold by groups, types, frequency of demand and other criteria according to the principles of merchandising
Checking the quality of the goods, the presence of all markings and price tags
Constant monitoring of consumer demand
Preparation of applications for goods that the buyer asks to include in the assortment
Knowing the approximate date of the next delivery of goods

Salary and career prospects of a sales assistant:

The sales assistant may well become the administrator of the trading floor, and sometimes even the director of the store or salon.

The salary of a sales assistant depends on his own efforts. Most employers employ employees according to the system: salary +% of sales. This is best motivation to work. According to statistics, average salary the seller is 3000-4000 UAH. But this is not the limit. If a person has perfectly mastered the profession, feels like a fish in water on the trading floor, sales are successful, then his financial ceiling is not limited by anything.

The profession of a sales assistant has specific advantages that turn out to be very convenient in everyday life:

Accessibility (usually does not require special education)
Opportunity to work close to home
Salary below average
Constant movement and communication with people
Teamwork

What does a sales consultant need to know to improve the efficiency of their work? From the huge amount of theoretical information, I would like to highlight a small list of recommendations that will help the seller in working with the client.

What does a sales consultant need to know?

First of all, every sales consultant must understand the essence of his work. Under the words "advise" and "sell" there are many more fundamentals that any seller must own:

1. The technique of establishing contact with the client is the most important stage that you can read about;
2. How to overcome sales barriers and deal with customer objections? More in this;
3. Every seller must master the art of presentation, otherwise you will not be able to present the advantages of your product to the buyer. See about it.
4. If you learn to analyze the behavior of the client, you can always find a way out of this situation. How to do it, click .

What else does a sales consultant need to know? A few more tips:

- Activity. Be on the trading floor when there is activity. You should be the first to meet the client, if possible, and not your colleagues. if you have certain rules approach customers, follow them and make sure others follow the rules that apply to everyone. Do not forgive violations of the rules, get your way. In a word, communicate more with customers and the result will not keep you waiting.
- Phone is a sales tool. If your duties include, in addition to basic contacts, advising customers by phone or via the Internet, do it as diligently as you work with a buyer in your store. It has been proven that about half of potential buyers make preliminary calls to the store they are going to visit. How you do your job over the phone can make a big difference in the sale.
- Feel the situation. It is necessary to pay attention to absolutely all customers, both those who are ready to make a purchase right away, and those who are still thinking, but at the same time, consultations should be different in content. If you ask a question: "When do you plan to buy?" and the person will answer: "Next year"- this means that you do not need to offer him to make a purchase now.

He just needs to be helped to decide on the option, make a good presentation of the product and, most importantly, leave good impression. Six months later, potential buyers will not remember the content of your consultation, they will remember you and they will definitely want to return to you.

With a person who has already made a choice and is ready to buy, it is necessary to work with specifics: offer options that are available, talk about promotions, loan offers, visualize the benefits of owning your product together with the client. .

- Exchange contacts. If the sale did not take place the first time, this does not mean that you have lost a client. The main thing is to exchange contacts with the client. You just need to take the phone from the client, and in return give him your business card. If you notice that customers are reluctant to leave you their personal phone number, you need to take on the skills of experienced salespeople. A business card is not a piece of paper with a phone number scrawled in pencil, but solidly designed data that indicates that you take negotiations and acquaintances seriously and your organization does not cause banal doubts.
- Say "No" to fatigue. A real "salesperson" should not have thoughts: "I've had enough, I sold out today." When there is a flow of clients, do not take days off, do not take vacations, work while the "wave" is coming. Such moments you will remember as a pleasant dream when sales decline begins. That's when you rest.
- Mood. Working with people - does not allow bad mood! How to set yourself up for work and big sales, read.
- The success of your business depends on it, whether you are an employee or a business owner. No one wants to deal with a disgruntled, cocky, negative salesperson.
- Balance in work with the client. Let the client express himself. If you take on the client in the first stages of the consultation too zealously, then you can not give the client the opportunity to speak.

Look for golden mean: you must not be silent and do not rumble like in a bazaar, it is best if you manage to build a mutually interesting dialogue with the client.

Do not forget that the client at the time of making an important decision is not comfortable, and from the first seconds he does not consider you his friend with whom you can talk nicely about where to attach his money. A client who is a little used to the environment, to you, will start talking more - he will give more information, his psycho-type will also appear. This will help in building relationships.

Conclusion

These sales tips are not instructions - they are just tips that will help you work more efficiently and not miss anything, as well as understand what a sales consultant needs to know and what to use in everyday work.