No matter how brief the interaction with a customer is, it can have a much larger impact that it may seem!  Here's how to coach your teams to make the most out of even the shortest of interactions and leave your customers feeling as though they're building a positive relationship with your team member:

Suggested Strategy:

• You are coaching your employees to be conversational and build customer relationships – how can you make the most of a short conversation and make a positive impact on a customer’s day?

Suggested Questions:

• Rating Question:  Begin with the behavior and confidence that an employee should have regarding their customers:  On a scale of 1 to 6, with six being 100% confident with every customer you work with, and one being that there is some hesitation or you find yourself uncomfortable in your conversations, where would you rate yourself in terms of being confident in your conversational abilities with customers?  

• Success Imperative:  What actions can you take in your position to ensure that each conversation that you have with a customer is successful and impactful?  

Suggested Activities:

• Role Play:  The most effective way to become confident in the ability to have an impactful conversation is to practice!  

• Brainstorm:  Create a list together of impactful conversation starters RELATED TO the transaction, and practice them in role play.  

Suggested Learning Projects:

• Journal-Based Coaching:  Have the person come back to your next coaching session with journal entries noting five appropriate conversation topics UNRELATED TO the transaction that could be used to get to know the customer better on a light personal level. 
• Self-Directed Learning:  Put conversation topics from both the activity and the learning project to use in conversations with real customers throughout the week and journal the effects that the topics had on each conversation.

Supplemental Coaching Strategies:

• Journal-Based Coaching:  This allows the employee to keep track of what interactions are going well for them because of using the conversation topics discussed in your coaching sessions, and which ones could be better and why they aren’t going as well. 

Interested in learning more about coaching conversations?  Click Here for a FREE 30-Day Trial of The Coaching Conversation Training Series!  

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