By Lani Buckley
Business Development Executive
October 2017

Offering retail finance? 10 tips to engage and empower your team

“A brand is defined by the customer’s experience. The experience is delivered by the employees.”

– Shep Hyken

Black Friday is just around the corner. It’s the final leg of preparation - who will win peak? There are many elements that need to align for a successful peak season. Any retailer understands that having an engaged and empowered team is crucial. Lani, from our Retail Partners team gives her top ten tips to engage and empower your team to offer retail finance, making the most of high footfall and securing new customers for your brand. Confidence is key and in this most critical of retail season’s – retailers need to use every lever at their disposal.

1) Start with why. Why is your brand offering retail finance? Is it to give customers flexible payment options, enhance the brand experience, grow your customer base, increase brand loyalty, drive sales, transaction values and frequency or maybe all of the above? Be clear on how your brand benefits from offering retail finance both commercially and from a customer experience point of view.

2) Look at performance. How is the business performing? Drill down to audience level. Link back to the why. What are the opportunities for a store, region, division and brand?

3) Address any blockers. What challenges are you and the team facing? List them down. Be open and prompt the team to think of any marketplace, customer, personal or operational challenges. Get any concerns in the open early. Knowing your audience’s mind set helps you steer the conversation.

4) Go back to the why and do something memorable. What else can you offer to further knowledge? Be sure to have some fun with this. You might play a game to increase understanding of average transaction value, accept rate, value of top spenders, customer profiles and attitudes. As the saying goes, knowledge is power and the more your team understands retail finance, the more engaged they’ll be.

5) What about the customer? Now, it’s time to drive home how the customer wins. Any product is sold on its benefits. Ask each team member what they personally find appealing about your brand’s retail finance. It might be free shipping, spreading the cost, or exclusive campaigns. Grow confidence by helping your team get passionate about the customer benefits of retail finance.

6) Get back to basics. Tone of voice, body language, or words – which is most powerful in communicating? Have your team act out the good, the bad, and the ugliest of examples. Although all three matter, body language is the most powerful – a smile, eye contact, with an open and approachable manner mean everything.

7) When should you offer retail finance? Map the customer journey. At which touch point should retail finance be offered? It’s a trick question, retail finance can and should be offered all along the customer journey – be genuine and customer centred and you won’t go wrong.

8) Treating customers fairly. Be clear on regulatory requirements and the part individual’s play. Practice the application process and drive home the ‘why’ behind each step. It’s essential to cover: T’s & C’s and how to explain them clearly, how to ensure customers understand they are applying for credit, required identification and what to do if a customer isn’t immediately accepted. Touch on the processes they’ll use and available resources - what training modules they can visit, reports to digest and who to contact in case of need. It’s imperative that customers make an informed decision and that retail finance is offered and processed in the right way.

9) Revisit the blockers. Go to the list created earlier, which challenges have been addressed and which have not? At this point, the team has the knowledge to address any blockers. Hand over the challenges to the team. What are the solutions? Take the opportunity to remind your team, that some things are not within their influence and should either be escalated appropriately or dropped. Grow you team’s confidence and engagement further by focussing their energy on what they can influence.

10) Set a goal, make a plan and commit. What is the goal? Is it SMART; specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timely. How will individuals contribute? Who will lead, how will you measure progress and when will you follow up? Your team must have a clear understanding of where you’re going, how they personally contribute, what they should expect next and from whom drawing together all the knowledge and energy around retail finance that you have imparted.

Empowering and engaging your team to offer retail finance is simple. The key is that they have the right knowledge and tools to succeed. At Ikano Bank, we offer retail partners a dedicated team to support our retailers’ strategic growth goals including field team & retail operations support. Get in touch and discover how Ikano Bank Retail Finance can work for you.