We do a lot of work for financial service institutions and one of the things we see all the time is the need for front line staff to help build the bottom line. The key is management must realize people will feel like they have been thrown in front of a firing squad when asked to sell. What seems so easy for some builds a depth of fear in others many cannot imagine.
Why Won't They Sell ?:
Fear - plain and simple people hate to be thought of the aggressive sales person so fear will paralyze people from even trying.
Knowledge - most people do not have the exact verbiage as to what to ask or specifically say. In essence without this they won't even try.
Lack of Product Knowledge - Most people have a huge fear of "what if they ask me a question I don't know the answer to". People will literally not try as they fear exposing themselves to such an uncomfortable situation.
What You Can Do:
1. Let staff know its ok to make mistakes and the effort is what is important initially.
2. Provide people with non-threatening approaches such as "permission-based" questions. A permission-based question helps ease the person's fear of being the perceived aggressive and over-bearing sales person by asking for permission. Here is an example:
"Mrs. Johnson would you mind if I shared with you an opportunity to earn a greater return specifically to our new mutual fund products?"
Note: The word shared is used for a non-threatening approach, the word opportunity is "what's in it for them (benefit)", and return is the value to the customer. The key is to make both the CSR or teller comfortable along with the customer!
3. Facilitate simulated scenarios that build practice and skills while every steps of the way encouraging staff they are doing a great job. The key is to make people feel good about the effort as desired results will be off in the future and cannot be used so early in the process as its unfair.
This may also help called "Change Hill":
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