An interesting sales moment occurred today. I was in the process of renting my car as I arrived in Knoxville to certify a new client in Telephone Sales Mastery. When I noticed that my favorite car, the Chrysler 300, was not on the lot, the agent in the booth told me I could upgrade to the Chrysler for just $11.00 per day. He did a nice job and seemed very sincere and enthusiastic to help me.
I said, No thanks, and chose a car from what was available. The sales agent then offered me a GPS unit for rental. I explained that I already had a GPS with me. We wrapped up a moment later. I thanked him for the help. Because he had been very conversational, I was planning on a longer wrap up. Perhaps we would talk about the weather or I would tell him that I am so happy to be done flying today. Instead, just as I was about to start a mini dialogue, I heard a very loud and harsh, Thank you. That was it. That same booth agent, who was friendly and conversational, was done with all that. He made his two offers and he was sending me away. He went from being friendly to being uninterested in speaking with me.
Did I hear him wrong? No. This is what I do for a living. If a Quality Assurance agent was listening, he would have received his check mark for Thank the Client. Unfortunately, I heard it the way it was intended. Move along now. You said «No so Im done with you.
Will most clients hear the hidden message? No. Most clients will merely have a bad taste at the end and not be sure why. That is bad customer service. In my case, I will be coming up here a few more times this month. I rent from this car company two to three times each month. I will probably keep renting from them because I am comfortable with them. If I was not happy with them, however, this could have been a final straw, and off I might go to a new provider.
The sad part is that the call wrap up is so easy and customers will usually be friendly right back. You actually have to work harder to be snippy because you have already established the relationship and the rapport. Thank them and tell them you look forward to seeing them again. If you have a required call wrap statement or some branding to do, practice until it sounds natural and friendly.
When you train your sales and service personnel, remind them to end the call with positive, friendly comments, regardless of whether or not the client bought on that call. If we leave customers with sarcasm or if we just remove the friendliness and replace it with professional but lifeless, the client will get the message, but it is not the message we really want to send.
Supervisors, listen to your teams call wrap ups/closes. Make sure they apply the tips from this article. We open well. We close well. We get better results.