Retail Sales Tips: Selling More During Peak Hours

There’s no getting around it: 2020 was a rough year for in-store traffic. The April 2020 price drop was a staggering 96.4%Foot traffic is increasing for US retailers. Traffic is beginning to rebound, and Black Friday is almost here. Traffic is half the amountIt will be 2021. 

Most retailers share the goal of driving more foot traffic and continuing to bring shoppers back to the store, but there’s a second hurdle inherent in that goal: what good are more customers if you aren’t selling more during peak hours? 

Whether it’s through cross-selling and upselling, promotions or just flat-out amazing customer service, selling more during peak hours is a must for any retailer that wants to grow. 

In this post, let’s focus on how you can do just that with six retail sales tips: 

1. Find your store’s peak hours
2. Schedule your top sales associates
3. Provide effective sales training
4. Offering complimentary or paid services 
5. Send attention-grabbing promotions
6. Accelerate the purchasing process

Sales tip 1: find your store’s peak hours 

You must know your peak hours in order to increase sales during peak times. 

Half of your total sales come from around the 20 busiest hours of the week—this is the 50/20 rule. The 2020 peak sales hours saw slight increases in sales. This was due to shoppers becoming more organized and the shift from weekends and evenings to weekdays and afternoons. 2021 has seen some of those peaks shift back to pre-2020 levels, but there’s no hard and fast rule that says your shoppers will be following either pattern. 

If you had a good grasp on your peak hours prior to 2020, you’ll still want to find out when shoppers are shopping Now. Even with some workers returning to the office in 2021, the patterns of life have been shaken up enough that you’ll want to double check what your customers are doing. 

Start by evaluating the volume of people in your store and when they’re most likely to purchase. You can find that out using your point of sale system’s sales and employee reports; with Small Biz Sense, we suggest pulling the Sales by Hour of Day report for a clear view of the percentage of total sales each hour of the day accounts for. 

Keep in mind, however that your peak sales hours might not coincide with the peak traffic in-store. If customers are just browsing, your point of sale systems sales reports can’t capture that information. 

If you’re curious about your non-transactional store traffic, we’re a big fan of RetailNextPeople Counter Solution – Measures walk-in customers and average store visits. These numbers are then sent to your point of sales system in real time. 

It’s also a good idea to compare your online sales versus your in-store sales by day of the week. Is there a time when online traffic or sales are high? Perhaps you can run a promotion that’s exclusive for in-store customers (or offer free in-store pickup), advertise it on your site and convert more online traffic into in-store sales. 

To do just that, we like using Small Biz Sense’s eCom Sales by Day of the Week report. Knowing when your online store is active allows you to explore the possibility of running Dayparting CampaignsIt is important to time your in-store promotions well and convert the traffic into sales.  

#2: Make sure you schedule top sales reps 

Once you have an idea of peak times, your A-Team can plan your sales associates so they get maximum traffic. Hopefully your sales team is strong across the board, but even so, you’ll have top performers who really stand out. 

Look at employee reports to identify the top sales reps in terms of total sales or items per transaction. This will help you determine their work hours. We recommend that you also check their reviews after each purchase. NPS survey.

You want to identify the sales associates who are most effective at closing sales and put them on the schedule during peak hours because they’re the ones who can generate the most revenue.

Retail sales tip: Small Biz Sense Analytics’ Individual Performance and Upsells employee reports can help you track this. These reports can help you determine which members of your team you should call during busy times.

These sales associates often have more experience than the rest and are well-versed in your products, services, and brand. They’ll be able to help the customers effectively and offer relevant recommendations with a smile. 

We suggest scheduling at least one of your top-performers at all times when you’re expecting high volumes of traffic. 

However, in order to have top sales associates at all, you need to have sales associates that are ready to work—employees that aren’t burned out and that are motivated to provide the best possible customer service. The pandemic has been hard on retailer workers’ morale, with many quitting the industry altogether.

It’s good to know that sales goals are in line with two things employees need to be less stressed. Predictable, pre-determined schedules Management appreciation. 

Your peak periods shouldn’t change much week to week, so your top performers should have a relatively predictable period of time they can expect to work. Make sure they know you’re scheduling them for peak periods because you appreciate their hard work, and keep the line of communication open for all your employees. 

Sales tip 3: provide effective sales training

It is important that all your sales representatives can perform well on the sales floor. 

Cross-selling is a way to get users to add on items, like getting them to buy the matching wedding ring with their engagement ring. 

Upselling is the practice of getting users to purchase a product that’s a higher value than the one they were originally looking at. Instead of that $1,000 engagement ring they’re considering, you also want to show them the $1,500 counterpart and explain why it’s superior, as long as you think it’s within their budget. 

Upselling and cross-selling both can increase ATV and revenue. Make sure your sales associates have enough product knowledge to be able to suggest alternative and additional purchases that are relevant to the customer’s wants and needs. 

Cross-selling and Upselling can be read in detail HereThese are just a few tips for retail sales that you can teach your staff.

• You can recommend complementary products for the product that they are purchasing. This is called a “package”, “bundle deal”, or “perfect set”. If they’re buying a phone, suggest car chargers and phone cases, too.
• Make sure you are focusing on the benefits. Upselling is about finding customers who have needs that are not met by the lower-value products. For example, a newer phone may offer better camera or call-recording capabilities that could be very useful to journalists.
• You can ask the customer what they are looking for and recommend products. “Is there anyone else you wanted to shop for?” is a great question to ask, actively putting the task of coming up with additional purchases on the customer’s mind. 

Online selling is easy with the many available eCommerce plugins, such as MyAbandonedCart eCommerce for Small BizSense users.

MyAbandonedCartBy reminding customers by email, retailers can reduce abandoned carts. Anyone selling online should have the capability to retrieve abandoned shopping carts. 

4. Sales tip: Provide complimentary and paid services 

These complementary services not only can encourage shoppers to stop by your shop, but can encourage them to make more purchases. 

A tailoring service can help fashion and apparel stores increase sales. If a pair of pants doesn’t fit exactly how a customer wants, you can close the sale by offering to tailor the garment exactly to their liking. You can also invite customers to make other items at your shop. This not only helps you close a sale, but increases that customer’s lifetime value with repeat purchases. 

In-store services can help seal the deal during peak hours—they can turn browsers into buyers with the extra enticement. They can, however. Also This will allow you to increase your sales outside of peak hours. 

Say you’ve done the math and you’ve found that your peak hours have settled into a late afternoon on weekdays pattern. You could encourage more customers to come into your store Sundays or in the evenings if you desired increased traffic. Shopping for appointments. An apparel shop could provide personal styling and grooming services, while a pet store might have a groomer come to the store at off-peak times. Your customers will be able to get new value from your products and appointments.

Tip 5: Launch attention-getting promotional campaigns

Here’s an easy retail sales tip: a solid in-store promo can help your employees close more sales. Your in-store promotions should be focused on time-sensitive and point-of-sale marketing. 

Maximize in-store promotions 

Your store’s layout can have a significant impact on your sales. Low-cost accessories near the cash register could encourage impulse buys. This is called “The Last-Minute Impulse Purchase.” Point of Sale Marketing. 

You’ll also want to have in-store promotional materials that can help your team with some of the selling, too. 

FOMO-driven signs use scarcity and urgency to encourage people to buy more products or other items. 

In-store promotions that are time sensitive 

Due to its convenience (especially in peak shopping times), online shopping has seen a significant increase in the last few years. couldn’t visit stores). As a result, it’s not uncommon to have people come into your store to browse, but who may not have a ton of motivation to purchase.

Promote time-sensitive promotions in your store online to drive high-intent customers. 

Flash sales and clearances are great ways to bring customers into your store. You can even offer free gift ideas like a make-up palette when you buy more than a certain amount. This will allow you to leverage your highly trained, experienced staff for cross-selling and upselling, increasing customers’ overall purchase.

Time-sensitive can be key here because you want to drive purchases now; if people feel like a great deal will run out fast, they’ll be much more likely to purchase right away instead of wanting to think it over. 

Sixth Sales Tip: Accelerate the buying process 

Prior to the pandemic the peak hours of sales were chaotic. Sales associates waited in long lines to see their customers and customers crowded the entire store. It wasn’t uncommon to see customers walk in, decide it was too busy and walk back out, even if they would have likely purchased otherwise. 

While we’re not quite back at that level of in-store activity yet, traffic is steadily increasing and shoppers have gotten used to convenience with online shopping (which has no wait times beyond shipping). 

How to set up a smartphone POS systemRetail stores need to be aware of this in order to reduce delays. Your sales team can each have their own tablet they can use for quick transactions and sales processing. This allows them to do business anywhere, even at the register. It streamlines and enhances customer service for you and your employees. Sales associates are able to assist customers and inspect their shopping carts, thereby encouraging safer distancing as well as reducing the number of long lines.

This article is about Irisys researchIt was found that the average American consumer is likely to leave a store after only eight minutes. Retailers simply can’t afford to make customers wait, since it’s more than likely to impact their sales. 

You want customers to be able to purchase the second they’re ready to do so, as it eliminates the risk of someone walking due to a long wait time. And don’t forget that the faster your team is able to complete one transaction, the sooner they can serve another customer and make more sales.

This is also possible with curbside pickup. It marries the best of both worlds for shoppers in a hurry: they can browse online at their leisure, then skip shipping times and still indulge in the superior customer service you’ve trained your associates to offer. With a mobile POS, handling pickup orders during peak selling hours doesn’t slow your employees down.

Peak business hours: Sell More 

Increasing retail sales during peak hours sounds like it should be easy, but unless you’re taking intentional steps to maximize sales, there’s a good chance that you’re missing out on major revenue. 

These retail sales tips can help you increase sales.

1. Find your store’s peak hours
2. Schedule your top sales associates
3. Provide effective sales training
4. Offering complimentary or paid services 
5. Get attention with promotions
6. Accelerate the purchasing process

These tips can be implemented in your store. A commerce platform must be able to keep up. Contact us to schedule a consultation and find out if Small Biz Sense may be right for you.