5 Sales Mistakes Pros Make (How Are Your Servers Doing?)
If you want your servers to act as salespeople, you need to treat them – and train them – as salespeople. Here are five typical mistakes that salespeople in all industries make. How do your salespeople add up?
Sales Mistake # 1: Allowing a prospect to lead the sales process. Do your servers lead the sales process or do they take orders? By asking about preferences, special events, etc., they’ll create opportunities for sales.
Sales Mistake # 2: Not doing the research. How many times does a server need to “check” on ingredients, promotions, specials or items that are no longer on the menu? One visit to the back signals to guests that they are not dealing with a professional.
Sales Mistake # 3: Talking too much. Sure, we’re supposed to entertain our guests, but do we ramble on about specials or do we ask what guests want to know and then tell them?
Sales Mistake # 4: Not being prepared. Pre-shift meetings focus employees and pass along critical information (specials, etc.). Then, it’s up to your salesperson to take the initiative and be ready (have the wine opener in the jacket, anticipate that extra napkins will be needed, bring out the silverware before the salad, etc.).
Sales Mistake # 5: Neglecting to ask for the sale. If you want additional appetizer, drink or dessert sales, you have to ask for them, but many present items without ever uttering these five critical words, “Can I bring you one?”
For ideas on how to motivate your severs and reward their sales behavior, check out Playing Games at Work: 52 Best Incentives, Contests and Rewards for the Hospitality Industry
Increase Sales with Suggestive Selling
Many servers have acquired a negative impression of suggestive selling. Often we hear:
“I don’t want to be pushy! ”
Suggestive selling is just that — giving your guests all the options that they have to enjoy a well-rounded dining experience.
“I have a lot of regulars and they know what they want.”
Many regulars do know what they want, but they also rely on you to keep them informed of things that are changing.
“I am too busy to suggest all those items.”
Good dialogue fits right into what you’re saying anyway and doesn’t take but a few seconds. Look at the results and the money you can make by just spending a few minutes a night with your guests.
Make suggestive selling fun and easy to implement in your restaurant. Give your servers dialogue that they can customize and make their own. The last thing you need is a group of servers that sound like robots, saying the same lines to each and every table.
Check out this clip from Real World Selling: Start to Finish to see how real servers use suggestive selling to increase sales and tips. Click here for more information.
Add Up Increased Restaurant Sales
Suggesting extras such as bacon on a burger or guacamole with nachos not only builds check averages as much as 50 cents per guest, but also improves the perception of your restaurant’s service delivery. Customers feel taken care of when servers suggest items that enhance the meal.
Your waitstaff, however, can’t sell what they don’t know. To test their product knowledge, design a fill-in-the-blank quiz with appetizers, soups and salads, entrées and desserts listed on the left and space to write in the appropriate extras on the right. On the back of the quiz, have servers write down examples of suggestive selling dialogue pertaining to add-ons. Award lotto tickets to those with the highest scores.
Need more employee incentive ideas to help increase sales? Click here to check out Playing Games at Work: 52 Best Incentives, Contests and Rewards for the Hospitality Industry
Increase Restaurant Profits and Server Tips with Suggestive Selling
One waiter came up to us after an employee meeting and said, “I know why you guys are pointing out that suggestive selling raises our tips; it’s really so that the restaurant makes more money.”
Yes! Exactly! He was absolutely right! When the company succeeds, the employees succeed. We admit it! The best way to get to know your guests and make them comfortable is to talk to them. The best thing to talk to them about is your food and beverage. After all, that’s why they’re here. And the best way to get your customers to buy what they came in for is to train your servers to sell it to them. Anyone can be an “order-taker.” It requires service to sell.
The art of the “soft” sell
Please understand that the kind of selling we’re talking about here is suggestive selling, soft selling, not “Used-Car-Salesman-Pushy-Loud-Pinkie-Ring-Checkered-Coat-Platform-Shoes-Buy-or-Die!” selling. Suggestive selling means helping guests make decisions that are good for them. It’s recommending what’s good on the menu, asking questions about what guests are in the mood for, and then helping them choose the food or beverage they’d like.
Suggestive selling is nothing more than recommending (not “pushing”) specific extras, appetizers, sides, desserts and beverages. Suggesting specific items shows guests they’re worth your time; it’s perceived as better service. Bottom line: you and your servers have everything to gain from suggestive selling (higher sales, bigger tips, better service, more business) and nothing to lose (the worst that can happen is that the the guest says “no thanks!”).
Excerpted from Service That Sells! The Art of Profitable Hospitality, the best-selling book in foodservice history. Click here to read more.
For Restaurant Servers: Guide Your Guests
When suggesting appetizers and desserts, have you ever noticed that some guests never quite say yes or no? They may mumble that they’re “kind of full” or “not sure.” Indecisive guests want guidance. Who better to offer direction than their server?
If you suggest dessert and a party of two or more hesitates, never say: “I’ll give you a few more minutes” and then leave the table. Instead, suggest they share, using this dialogue: “You know, all of our desserts come with multiple forks!” The same strategy works well when suggesting appetizers.
Another way to guide your guests is to suggest your favorite items. Your endorsement carries a lot of clout. “Make sure you save room for one of our great desserts. The apple pie is my favorite, but the bread pudding is a close second.”
When a guest asks “What’s good today?” describe the specials, and if you’ve tried one that you especially like, remember to endorse it: “I tried the veggie quesadilla before my shift and it’s really good!”
From the interactive waitstaff training workbook Work Smarter Not Harder: The Service That Sells! Workbook. Click here to read more.
S.A.L.E.S – Sell A Little Extra Something
Many guests are tired of pushy sales staff. Why? When suggestions are not made in the appropriate fashion or at the right time, they seem insincere and mechanical. Let’s take a look at the three different types of selling:
- Upselling is enhancing an item already ordered (such as “up-sizing” a value meal or a draft beer, or adding cheese and guacamole to a burger).
- Suggestive selling is describing an item guests have not ordered yet.
- Situational selling is assessing the situation and informing guests of items or deals that best enhance that situation (let them make the choice).
Knowing why guests are paying a visit makes it easier to sell. Lose the monotone “Would you like to try our special today?” and insincere “I have to tell you about our soups or we get counted off by our mystery shopper,” or “I’m trying to win a contest — would you like to buy a gift card?”
Suggesting enhancements to the meal is a key step in the cycle of service, but the practice needs to be subject to interpretation. While guests may not like to deal with pushy salespeople, there is no doubt they like to spend money and buy things they like or want. Make it easy for the guests to say yes.
From the popular restaurant management book Now That’s Service That Sells! Click here to read more.