By Scott Kreisberg

In today's market, most of us are focusing on how to stay in business and increase profits without having to spend a lot of money in the process. Doing this can be a real challenge and at times, really frustrating. So, I like to look at this process like playing a strategic board game. It takes some real “think out of the box” along with some good team players and some creative ideas, all mixed together to reach the end of the game and win the prize as inexpensively as possible.

Having weathered 3 economic slumps, I found a very key and free way to immediately increase sales without spending a dime.

While every sale can be broken down into any number of pieces, there are really only two essential parts that encompass the sale from start to finish. The first is the business part, which would be all aspects of making the sale; marketing, inventory, point of sale system, etc. Then there's the human part. The interaction between your staff and the customers, how the customers are greeted, helped, etc. The human part is the finesse or essence, if you will, of the harder business side of retail.

As I'm sure you've seen, some customers want a lot of interaction from the sales person, showing them where things are in the store, telling them about current sales going on, etc. There are some who don't want to be bothered by anyone at all. They want to be completely left alone, find what they are looking for, pay and leave. Having a good staff, who can see which customers need a little hand holding and which do not, can make the shopping experience more enjoyable for the customer and the staff as well. Proper care of how a customer wants to be treated will be a key reason to come back to your store. Customers remember that kind of thing.

So when we talk about improving the shopping experience, thus improving sales, we need to think about building customer loyalty, not just the customer service end of things. I can't stress enough how important customer loyalty is for staying power in the retail business.

Here's an interesting story. There's a corner coffee shop I have been going to for about four years now. The coffee is pretty good and it's marginally priced, but I keep going back because the owner and staff know who I am, they always smile when talking to me, they engage in conversation during the transaction and seem to be genuinely interested in how I'm doing when I come in. They have my customer loyalty because the customer interaction is real, I'm not just another Joe coming in for a cup of Joe! They care.

Your staff should be responsible for having good manners with the customers, smiling at them, engaging in conversation, treating the customer with respect and ensuring they've actually helped the customer find what they need.

Your role, as the owner or manager is to spot the right staff to be out interacting with the customers and the ones who are better placed in lower customer traffic zones. This is the part that is like playing a board game. Using strategy and capitalizing on the strengths and weaknesses of your team to better offset loss of potential sales, will give you an immediate return on investment. If you have an employee who is very social and enjoys talking to people, put that person on your front lines to greet new customers and help those customers find what they're looking for. If you have another person who shows leadership type initiative, put them out to run your floor and team, not in the back sweeping the floors.

This brings me to the point of sale system. A store is crippled without a good point of sale system and people who know how to use it. The reporting analytics alone make a good POS worth its weight in gold. The point of sale can also help increase customer sales by alerting the sales person about related items to the ones being purchased by the customer or additional warranties available on certain products. Bringing this to the attention of the customer with a smile and helpful tips can really make the sales experience much better all the way around. And… It doesn't cost a dime to have a conversation with someone and thus add more to the existing sale.

The number one thing that makes customers come back to your store is the experience while shopping. Your staff, who know how to interact with customers and know how to get the most out of the point of sale will increase your sales the very same day. Simple, but very true. Here's to more profitability!