Fitpro Business Sales Tip - August

The winner is Julie Aitkin from Harewood Leisure

Julie has won ‘Advanced Selling Strategies by Brian Tracey’ for sharing her top sales questions with us. Thank you Julie. Here are Julie's questions and explanations:

1. What goals would you like to achieve?

2. How would you feel if you achieved your goals?

3. How can we help you?

Question 1 enables the prospect to specifically think about their goals.

Question 2 focuses on the future pleasure the prospect will gain from achieving their goals. It helps them to visualise and feel success.

Question 3 empowers the prospect to tell the sales person what help they want instead of the sales person telling the prospect what they think they need.  

Remember! Questions build relationships.  The act of asking questions show that you care about the person and his/her problems.  The more questions you ask the more the customer feels you are interested.   It helps selling by
understanding the customers needs and interests.  Good questions help you see into the mind and heart of your customers, and equip you with the knowledge  necessary to make the sale.

Mystery shops - what do they really tell us?

Leading Customer Insight specialists Leisure-net Solutions work hand in
hand with Fitpro Business to deliver mystery shops and calls to our
clients, so what do they tell us? Mike Hill, MD of Leisure-net, shares
the key messages coming through.

On the phone...

Our research has shown us that over 50% of initial enquiries will come
in by phone and that most people looking to join a gym will only ring 1
or 2 clubs. That's why you have to get it right first time every time,
otherwise you could be wasting up to 50% of your marketing budget. When
we measure calls we break it down into two areas, What you do/say and
How you say it. The first element is all about following the established
procedures and processes, ie the staff doing what they have been told
and trained to do. The second part is how they do it, ie their telephone
manner and persona.

Typicall most clubs score pretty well on the staff following the laid
down procedures, although in our experience handling (and deflecting)
price enquiries is still the most difficult aspect for many sales staff.
Other common areas of weakness are using the customers name
appropriately (and not asking for it again once it have been given!),
and marketing questions such as "can I ask where you first heard of
us?". However by far the greatest mistake that clubs fall into over the
phone is getting too technical and facility orientated. When we play
back our recordings to clients they cant believe how easily their sales
teams fall into the mistake of reeling off long lists of facilities,
equipment, even the brand of fitness equipment, a lot of which means
nothing to the first time gym goer.

Face to face...

Our mystery shoppers carry out over 400 visits to clubs/centres every
year, so what are the things that frustrate our shoppers? Well not being
expected is the first thing, what a difference it makes to be greeted as
is the whole club is waiting for your arrival and ready to show you
round! Secondly its being shown lots of things that you are not really
interested in, ie spending lots of time in the pool when you hate
swimming... Being introduced to other staff and members is something
that really makes our shoppers get excited and score high, it makes such
a difference to making you feel welcome and at home. Finally getting the
balance right in the follow up is absolutely vital, we tend to find that
either we don't hear any sort of follow up at all, or our shoppers get
bombarded with unwanted texts and calls late at night!

Lesley Aitken
International Fitpro Business Consultant

Sales, Service & Management Trainer - Coach - Speaker
Mobile: +44 (0)7815 800 939
www.fitpro.com/business/training