It’s December … new products have hit the shelves and your customers are starting to visit your salon more and more frequently as they prepare for holiday parties. The opportunity to sell products and gift cards as holiday gifts, stocking stuffers, and teacher gifts is at an all-time high. But, for some reason, this isn’t happening like it should. New products aren’t moving, add-on sales are low, gift cards are just sitting in a pile on the counter next to last year’s discounted sample packettes.
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What’s going on? Why aren’t we selling more? Our guests need these items! Perhaps, we aren’t giving them the right reason to buy. Perhaps, all we are doing is telling them what they CAN buy. Perhaps, we need to tell them WHY they need to buy it. Perhaps, we forgot to address the oldest question in sales: “What’s in it for ME?”
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Stay with me here. Back in the 1930s, one of the most popular cartoon characters of all time was introduced to the world: Popeye the Sailor Man. Kids saw Popeye in comic books, in newspaper comic strips, and heard him on the radio. Every episode was the same: Olive Oyl (Popeye’s girlfriend) got into trouble, Bluto kidnapped her, and Popeye saved the day, but only after eating his spinach to get super-strength. Muscles bulging, Popeye became invincible, rescued the girl and put the bully in his place.
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Kids flocked to these tales. Kids wanted to be like Popeye. Kids – wait for it – started eating spinach at a rate that became measurable in studies conducted as recently as 2010. Did they eat their spinach because it tastes good? Probably not. Did they eat their spinach because vegetables are healthy? Don’t think so. Did they eat spinach because they wanted muscles, to be stronger and to get the girl? BINGO! Parents have forever told their children, “Eat your vegetables – they’re good for you.” Popeye showed them “what’s in it for me when I DO.”
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Bringing us back to our sales dilemma, are we just telling our salon guests that they should do their shopping with us, that they should try one of our amazing new products, that they make great holiday gifts? If so, we’re falling into the “what it is” trap. “What it IS” is the oldest, safest, easiest and least effective sales technique, but it also tends to be the go-to for many new, inexperienced, or apprehensive salespeople. If you’re simply describing an item, a service or an idea to the guest, you are in the “what it is” trap. You are telling them WHAT they should do instead of educating them on WHY they should do it. Simply telling someone “you should try this” or “this would make a great gift” is not giving them a reason to spend their money.
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What it will do for them or why it makes a great gift, does. The new product might have technology that will solve a problem they have, and once you explain what that technology does, they may understand why it’s right for them, or “what’s in it for me.” A tan extender might be a great teacher gift or stocking stuffer since they can be used by anyone, even non-tanners; but what might make a salon guest understand “what’s in it for me” is the fact that they can do a big part of their shopping right there in your store, with no need to drive to several places looking for that perfect gift.
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There you have it. Be like Popeye! Focus on “What’s in it for ME” and increase your sales! Eat your spinach! Save the world, one tanner at a time!
Instead of telling guests what they CAN buy, we need to tell them WHY they need to buy it.
