This article is the second in a two-part series — Part I of “Customer Service in the Post-COVID Apocalypse” appeared in the September/October issue of Footwear Insight. In Part I, we examined how challenges in Staffing, Leadership and Management have affected footwear retailers over the last several years, and began looking at specifics of your in-store Customer Experience. We began with “Engaging with your Customers.” Now we are moving on to the rest of the interaction, focusing on what’s occurring out there today, and what it takes to do customer service right when it comes to Probing and Discovery, Demonstration, and Adding-on.

The very best reason to spend the “first minute” in an attempt to create an open, authentic, healthy, and human Engagement is this; if you can’t get the customer to willingly “let you in,” the next three steps of the interaction (Discovery, Demonstration, Adding-on) suffer greatly.

The Discovery Step

There is a natural flow that one can create by Engaging well, then transitioning to Discovery by very simply asking, “What brings you in today?” In our Sales Training courses, we refer to that phrase as a “Transition Question,” and it is absolutely an attempt to move from the “getting to know you” step to the “doing business with you” step, in a natural way. Once I hear the answer to that question, I can begin Discovering 1) what my customer most wants, 2) why they want it, and 3) I can create the opportunity for a dialogue between us.

Sadly, what happens 90% of the time on retail floors across America is that upon hearing the answer to “What brings you in today?” most salespeople skip Discovery altogether, and start leading me towards or suggesting product (the monologue), robbing themselves of an opportunity to create a dialogue, one that builds Trust. So, there’s that.

Then there’s this; the original intention of “Sit and Fit” was to, very early in the process, get your customer to sit down and remove both shoes, offering to measure both feet (my “big foot” thanks you for this!) using the Brannock device, allowing a salesperson to establish themselves as an expert, literally creating the opportunity to slow the interaction down, and ask questions. Yes, Discovery Questions.

Questions like these:

“So…what’s the special occasion?” “What have you seen out there that you like?” “What’s the average day in the life of your feet look like at work?” “Tell me about recreation, what do you and your feet do for fun?” “What do you own that you love?” “What doesn’t work for you?” “What kinds of foot pain might you sometimes feel?”…and on and on. The answers to these questions are the “secret sauce” that allow you to build Trust, Demonstrate well, and offer Add-ons that are more likely to resonate.

In the last interaction I had with a shoe dog several weeks ago in the Midwest, the “Sit and Fit” amounted to a Sales Associate sitting on his shoe bench, three feet away from me, watching me put the shoes that he’d brought out for me, on my own feet. No Brannock device, no questions prior, no shoehorn, no add-ons. Bummer. Not only, “no effect” but “negative effect.” Defeats the entire purpose. What does the quality of your own “Sit and Fit” look like?

Ideally, once I’ve gotten the answers to the Discovery Questions I’ve asked, I am very well-equipped to offer suggestions, utilize my Product Knowledge to deliver to my customers’ “value points” (Feature-Benefit statements) in the Demonstration, and to bring out (four-on-the-floor!) additional offerings that are more likely to be “homeruns” rather than “strikeouts.”

A Word on Orthotics

I have in the past, or currently own at least nine of the following diagnoses after a lifetime of playing hard: Early-stage Charcot foot, osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, peripheral neuropathy, torn ligaments, tendonitis (Achilles and plantar fasciitis) hammer toes, bunions, corns, ingrown toenails, over-pronation, over-supination… I’m not asking you and your staff to behave like podiatrists, but there’s information out there, and there are things they need to understand and not be afraid to talk about with a large segment of your customer base, i.e. Baby Boomers. I sure wish I’d started to investigate earlier than I did, beginning in 2012 when I started putting ice bags on my feet after running.

Our feet are the foundational core of everything else we do in an upright position. At the opposite end (Gen Z’s, Alphas and Betas, soon!) the time to take very good care of our feet is early, the sooner, the better. The 20-somethings at my foot and ankle care provider are wearing carbon fiber inserts now, to minimize cartilage wear, decades before they’ll feel the effects of cartilage loss in toe, mid-foot and ankle plates.

You get to decide to what extent you offer orthotic solutions, but please educate your staff, ask your customer the related questions, and suggest responsibly. Even landing short of full-blown Orthotics, there are features like oversized toe beds, Vibram soles, glove leather lining, and Add-ons like carbon fiber insole inserts, that make a world of difference to feet that are compromised through years of hard use. Getting old is no joke. We Need Our Feet!

Giving Your Customer a Reason to Buy - Demonstration

It’s obvious at this point that if Engagement and Discovery are lacking the result is a Demonstration that fails to create Value and Desire, the two overt goals of the Demonstration step.

At this point in the interaction, the biggest misstep (pun intended) is that a salesperson shows footwear that isn’t a match at all, because they never learned the Value Points that were important to the customer. Another tendency is to offer up the general, memorized features of a shoe, whether they are appropriate or not, rather than giving the specific ones that create value for ME.

Yes… customizing your Demonstration for each customer by delivering the Features, Advantages and Benefits, with a Grabber question (FABGs!) that are important to ME that you learned back in Discovery. “Give your product a reason for being, and you give your customer a reason to buy.”- Dr. William Rossi. Please, give me those reasons, yes?

Give Me More - Adding on

I’m sitting here pondering the effect of bringing out “four on the floor,” when a salesperson has “done the work,” versus how it feels to the customer when a salesperson brings out four additional pair that are nowhere near what I want, need, or desire. The advantages and liabilities of conducting great Discovery certainly play out here, don’t they? “Four on the floor” with poor Discovery makes you look greedy and uncaring, and with great Discovery, you can change my feet’s life! I have hundreds of dollars in my pocket just waiting for the opportunity to be thrilled with a new product that I love, one that you introduced me to.

I’ll see you out there in my travels in your city. I love nothing more than a salesperson who is curious, shows an interest, asks me questions, listens to the answers, knows their product, makes the “match,” builds value, and then shows me additional product that will enhance my feet, my health, my fashion, and my life.

Please reach out to me to learn more about how we can help in all of the areas I’ve written about this Fall. It’s what we’ve been doing since 1980, and all of you in this industry have very much been a part of that. n

Thanks for the great work you all do out there. I’ll see you next time! —Tom

Thomas Post has devoted over 30 years to helping retailers realize higher sales and profits through sales and management excellence from his client’s upper organizational charts to front-facing behaviors, including support roles, operations, employee development, communications best practices, and management. He has enjoyed a long-standing relationship with NSRA and The Friedman Group since 1994. Tom makes his home in Boulder, CO. You can reach him by email at tpost@thefriedmangroup.com, and by text or phone at (720) 641-7713.