The staff is the main driving force behind a retail business. Without staff, a store can’t run. Keeping this in mind, we can assure that investing in your staff is the most important thing you can do for your business. If you have an enthusiastic and productive staff, your sales will soar. Lucía González, Flame analytics´marketing manager gives us 5 useful tips to maximize staff productivity in your store.
1. Hire carefully
We tend to think that working in a store doesn’t require great qualifications, which is why retailers tend to recruit quickly, without thinking too much. Big mistake! Store managers must hire carefully.
In-store staff represent your brand, so they can improve it or break it. Customers are very sensitive to service and if they feel unattended or unfriendly treated they will stop shopping at your store.
2. Train them properly
Staff must meet customer demands efficiently and can only achieve this with proper training. They have to know every aspect of the business: products, brand, customer profile and industry.
Training will keep your staff motivated and will provide an incentive to remain with you if they see that training will open up opportunities to advance through the ranks.
3. Deliver information efficiently
At your company headquarters, decisions are made every day, and then those decisions must be implemented in stores. If communication is inefficient, tasks won’t be carried out.
For example, imagine that headquarters send an email to a store manager who only checks emails occasionally during the day… That store probably won’t implement the action promptly and this can be a loss of potential sales.
A good way to deliver information to staff is in a pre-shift meeting. Another way is within a platform that allows staff to interact.
4. Give them tools
A good tool will increase staff productivity. Think, for example, of an analytics software for retail that allows easy reporting, a tool that allows you to automate certain tasks or send alerts when stocks are low, when many customers are waiting in a queue, when a certain area of the store it’s overcrowded, etc.
5. Motivate staff
If your staff feel undervalued, they won’t think twice about moving on to another job. That is why it is important to appreciate and acknowledge staff. You have to motivate and inspire your staff to give their best to your company.
