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Hey there. Happy, what is it, Wednesday afternoon. Glad to see you all. Hey, Erica. Great to see you.

So I'm going to probably be admitting people as we go for the first few minutes. So thank you for being generous with that. Hi, Jessica. Good to see you. Yay. Yay, yay, yay. So I trust that, well, first of all, I hope everyone had a wonderful President's Day weekend, was it a good one?

Yay. All right. Yay, Jessica. Okay, good. It sometimes is a good mattress weekend. Was it a good mattress weekend? Yeah. Okay, Erica.

Okay. Yay. Saturday was great. I think Sunday was better. Monday was a little bit lighter. But we also got snow, so that changes everything.

Yeah, we've got more of that coming. This hasn't left yet.

Yeah. I like the

reflective light of all this snow, though. Right. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. How are you doing? All right. All right.

Well, we got quite a group here today. So thank you. Thank you all for coming. I'm recording this, so you'll also get the recording and the summary of this.

And I'm going to assume that there's something about this topic that had you want to hop on. So selling intangibles. And so as I've done in the past, what I'm going to do is go through some high points on this, and then I really want to hear from as many of you as possible. And let's really be willing to drill down on this, because this is a huge area of opportunity that I think we're just scratching the surface on. If you're following the blog, you'll know that this aligns with that. So there are four areas that we're going to look at when it comes to selling intangibles.

So starting with the first one, which is that whenever we're selling an intangible, and for our conversation, we can look at intangibles in retail. And I know that we've got some tradespeople on here too, and designers. So in retail, we're looking at appointments. We're looking at financing. And we're looking at protection, accident protection. So those are three intangibles that, all of which increase your average sale and your close ratio, but the ability to be effective with them requires some things that selling a sofa does not require. And so, excuse me, the first one in selling intangibles is that we need to. We know that we, and I know I've got some sales managers on here, and what I'm going to say is going to resonate for you especially.

And that is that when selling intangibles, you have to talk about them early and talk about them often. Now, I know that we all nod our head with that one. But the thing about that is, what does that actually mean? And that's one of those things like you got to sell yourself. And there are things that we say that we all nod in agreement with familiarity, but I'm not sure. That we really agree on what that means.

And I would say the way to know is what are the actions that you attach to that statement?

So if you were to say, and I'll speak to the sales managers, if you were to say, as a sales manager, what are your actions that align with, you got to bring it up early and you've got to bring it up often. And you might say, well, I talk about it in the huddle every morning. I talk about protection. You might say that. Or you

might say,

throughout the day, I might come around and I might say, you know, I know that you've got an appointment coming back in. If you've priced that out, have you priced it with protection? If you haven't, do that now. Like there are things that sales managers can actually do that support, encourage, and prompt the behaviors we're looking for that align with bring it up early and bring it up often.

For the salespeople in the bring it up early, bring it up often, are you intentionally introducing the concept of something only to go back and close on it later? Because here's the reason that all of this makes sense, is that our brains, aside from not being able to distinguish the difference between a vividly imagined event and reality,

Our brains also can't take an intangible concept and commit to it without familiarity.

So that when you say to someone, let's say I'm going to go to a retail designer right now, or an independent designer, or a trade showroom person. So this is going to apply everywhere. So if you were to say, all right, since we only have 45 minutes together today, and we have quite a few things on the list that we want to accomplish.

Let's accomplish, let's get the big rocks in the jar. Let's do the big stuff first.

And then as we get closer to 45 minutes, we'll take a look at what's next and what the next steps will be. So you don't actually have to say, let's get as far as we can, and then we'll make an appointment before you leave. But you need to introduce the concept, even if it's sort of peripherally, the concept of what, that there's something that's going to come later. I find homework. It's a wonderful way of doing that because no one gets homework on the last day of school. We all know that homework has something coming after it, right? So there's that.

Because all intangibles have to be sold. So you want to catch your gremlin that might say, oh, protection sells itself. Or financing is such a great option that people just want to go for it. Like that just isn't so. So we want to distinguish. Where am I either falling short, giving up, or just

don't know the next step to take, which is, let's say that you introduce the concept of meeting for an appointment, but you don't actually bring up the value and the benefits to them of actually doing that. I'm going to talk about objections in a minute. But when we want to sell an intangible, what we need to know that we're doing is distinguishing the difference.

Between introducing a concept and offering it and really going in to actually move and get some action on it. You might find these if I've got retail designers on the call and if we've got some independent designers. Explaining what your service offers and how it gets executed is not the same thing as selling it. All you're doing is explaining it. But that's not the same as... Looking to link the value in it with the person you're talking with for things that matter to them, not universal general important things, but things that matter to them because you've learned some things that matter to them early on in discovery, right?

So it's easier to sell a sofa than it is to sell an appointment. It is. Because when you're looking to sell an appointment, an intangible like an appointment, They have got to find value in seeing you again. They've got to see that that matters to them so that they would be willing to set aside that time in the future and move other things around if they have to, to accommodate that time, right?

So for the sales managers, when it comes to that, you want to have your ears open and listening for that. With sales associates and designers, are they setting up an intangible? Are they setting up protection? Are they setting up financing? Are they bringing it up in a way that they can refer to it later and then ask for a commitment? Or are they bringing it up at the end, hoping that something's going to happen?

And I'll talk about what you do if they do the second one, if you're in the proximity to be able to actually change that out. And as sales associates, whether it's designers, sales associates, retail designers, you want to just look at what kind of a habit have you developed in talking about intangibles and where is there an opening to bring it up earlier that would increase the likelihood that when you go in to explain it, to close it, you're going to get a yes. Okay, so that's number one.

Number two. And this is for all the salespeople on the call, whether you're a selling designer or whatever, all the salespeople on the call. One of the things that you want to get real with yourself about is what are your objections to that particular intangible? I use financing like that. What is your objection to financing, especially when you've got a zero interest, 48 months promotion to be selling? Now, I know that with the retail people on the call, I know that quite often, and I know that Brian at Garrison's, thank you, Erica, Brian did a great video when he talked about we're going to get a sale price and financing, which is amazing because it doesn't usually happen, which is wonderful. But if you want to look at what are my objections to it, what are my objections to using financing?

I'm observing it. You're living it. So you may not notice it the same way. I find that often the sales person's objection to that intangible is stronger than the customer's. And so you get sold on their objection too.

So that, for instance, if you say, if in your head you're thinking, the only people who need financing are people who can't afford to buy it if they don't have financing, that's the perspective you're going into it with. And the customer says to you, and you say, oh, we've got a great 48-month no-interest promotion going on right now. And they say, oh, that's okay. I don't need that. And it dies right there. Because you think, well, you know, they don't.

On the inside, maybe not, right? And so this is going nowhere. But you've got a great promotion and great opportunity that just flatlines because One, you kind of think it's true already, and they are evidence that you're right when they say that.

Or they say, I don't really need it. It's like, well, that's not really why we have protection, right? So that when you look at protection and you want to ask yourself, why would someone use protection? I'm sorry, why would someone use financing? But why would they use, what are the benefits to the customer using financing?

So I looked at it as financing is always a promotion. So when your customer says to you, your prospective customer or client says to you, when's your next promotion? And you don't have a BOGO or 15 % off or any of that. You say, we've got an amazing 48-month zero-interest financing promotion right now. Let me tell you what it's about so you can take advantage of that. Like that's the response with financing because it's a promotion, right? It's a promotion. When we see it through a limited view of the only people who use financing or people who can't afford to buy furniture without it, we eliminate almost everyone.

And I'm so crazy about financing.

So there was a team I was working with and they were like, they were off to make target. They were like not going to make gold for the month. So I said to them, All right, so let's just do a little exercise right now. What percentage of your business is financed? And they said, it was like, at that point, it was like 11%. I said, okay, tell me what your current average sale is for promotion for when you use financing versus when they pay cash, you use a credit card. And it was like two and a half times. Check your company and it will be two and a half times.

So average sale for a finance sale is two and a half times. So stay with the math. So let's say that's one. Two, let's say that someone applies for financing.

They put it in. They apply for, I don't know, 8,500. They get 10,000.

And just know that for most of them, if they get 8,500, you can ask for more. Just know that.

Got to call them, but you can get more if you need it. So now, here we've got, they get approved for 10,000.

The sale that they are making is $5,000, which means they've got $5,000 in what's called open to buy, right? Open to buy. That means that is financing, that's credit that's available that is not being used. So when someone says to me, we're not going to make goal for the month, one of my wise gal questions is, tell me what you're sitting on right now for open to buy. And it's like millions, millions. It's like, holy crap, how are you not making goal when you're sitting on 1.2 million and open to buy with customers that have an account with you that no one's calling, right? Just because they're waiting for the door to turn to make a sale, it's like, pick up the phone on this one.

So financing is not just because people can't afford it. Financing provides options and ease. And for many of you, I know that for many of you, if they're going to use financing, they don't have to put as much down to finance that they do if they were going to pay with a credit card. So you're saving them an opportunity. You're freeing up money. It's just you want to start. Take it on.

Take it on, honestly, as one of your goals for 2026. Take a look at what your current financing percentages are. So let's say that you're at 11%. Get that to 30. For those of you who are retail designers on the call, always have your projects, have an account.

Always. Because when you go to do an accessory house call, when the furniture is delivered, and you're bringing out $15,000 worth of accessories, you want them to stay, and they don't have to go on a credit card. And if you're not doing accessory house calls, this might be one of the reasons you're not doing them, right? There's so much in this, but it's all of that, again, in the intangible stuff.

So, look at your objections. Look at your objections to scheduling appointments. Look at your objections to financing, right? Just take a look at those objections. Look at your objections to participants. If you say something like, my customers are older, my customers are older, they said that they're on a fixed income, and when they looked at the sectional that they bought, They were at the top of their budget. They couldn't afford to do more. They even asked if they could pick it up because they didn't want to spend money on the delivery.

Let's say that's a reality. But here's the deal. If they don't buy protection and something happens, this is an older couple that cares about how their stuff looks and actually vacuums their upholstery.

These are the people that... If something happens and they can't fix it, they got to live with that for the rest of the short end of what they got left. They got to look at that sectional with a stain on it. They can't afford to replace it. So you want to start looking for what are the options and the advantages that I'm not seeing such that when they have an objection, especially if it aligns with my objection, nothing's going to happen.

Okay, next one.

Next one is, all of you know this when it comes to intangibles, when it comes to appointments, when it comes to financing, when it comes to protection. There are common objections that we hear all the time, all the time, about appointments, for instance, like, I don't know what my spouse's schedule is, or, yeah, that's a pretty good one, that one. Or, I don't need to use protection because people don't visit us very often. Or, we don't need to use financing because I want to use points on my credit card for airline travel. Those are three very common objections to those intangibles. So, since I know that I'm speaking with a very smart group of people, Now that we know what those objections are, what are we going to do? And you can unmute yourself and anyone can answer that one.

We're not rushing to answer it, but we can answer that one. All right, who wants to go? Those are common objections. Everyone's heard those objections. So what are you going to do about them?

We hear, actually, before this call, Jodi, I asked all of our salespeople their common objections about these tangibles, just so we could play these out. So we actually, one of the objections Evan got recently is, I don't need protection, I'm going to die soon. And so you just mentioned that, and you kind of already played it out for us in terms of... You know, them not entertaining or, you know, they're not going to live long enough for the life of this particular piece or to see out the GPP. So can you elaborate more on that specific one? So since I, of course, am approaching

that age group, there are things that their lives are different. So someone who's in their 70s or 80s, their life is different from yours in your 20s or 30s or 40s, right? And so the ability to grip something is different at 80 than it is at 30. You don't know that at 30, but you'll know that later, right? And so the thing about, and those are boomers, but the thing about boomers is boomers are not out to replace stuff. Boomers take care of things.

So to be able to say, It's not just its replacement value, which is indeed wonderful. But if anything happens, as you care for your things, what you own, at such a wonderful level, to be able to continue to care for that. And I find that, you know, the ability, if something should spill, the ability to take care of it, as our ability to hold on to things gets a little bit more tenuous, right? And so...

It's because I want you to love what you are purchasing for as long as you're here and be able to take care of it at the highest level. And that's what this does.

Most of the things that happen in accident protection are people that live in the home. They're not people who visit. There's someone who stumbles over the rug, who trips on the rug, or the cat's in the way and avoiding stepping on the cat. They spill their tea on the sofa. It's everyday regular stuff.

The thing about it, Erica, is that the spirit with which we reflect their concern and demonstrate our compassion for their desire to take care of their things, and this will help them to do that, is really what it's all about. Like, I get that you don't have a dog that's going to chew a hole in your sofa. For someone who has a dog that does that, that's what that accident protection's for.

So what you also raised was, are we listening? And for those of you who use my sheet with the graph stuff on top and all the badass questions and all that stuff on the bottom, my latest iteration, I have down there, reasons for protection, as I put one of the blanks on the bottom, so that as you're asking and listening about priorities and problems and concerns that they may have, you want to start listing some reasons for protection so that when you present that to them, you're presenting it through a lens that they view their life through and not why the last person bought protection. That you try to sell them on this way.

Did that answer that, Erica?

Yes. No, especially, I really like the listen and view through the lens of how they live their life and answer with compassion, you know, really understand. So I think that will be, that'll be really helpful. A few of the other objections kind of fall into that as well. So that's a good point. What were they? Let's see.

The investment of expensive furniture and, you know, kind of the importance and, you know, why would I buy this stickly leather sofa when I can buy this violino leather sofa and kind of listening to how they live. Is that for the protection or for the sofa itself? I think both. Like, obviously. It's easier to sell protection with a more expensive item. People associate those as one and the same, at least our customer does. I agree with you on that.

In one sense, there might be people on the call that would think this, that it's harder to add protection because it's a percentage to something

that's

already expensive because it becomes even more expensive. That, in my world, feeds into number three, which is sometimes you have the opportunity to use two things interchangeably, which is if you're using financing with higher price merchandise, then to add protection adds dollars a month to their monthly payment. Right. It's

easier

to sell protection with expensive merchandise if you finance it.

Yeah, that's exactly. I mean, you know, Andrew, our salesman, that's exactly. Yes. Oh,

my gosh.

He doesn't even quote a price that doesn't involve protection. So he'll say, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, with protection. That's correct. And yeah, that's why he's our top seller of GPP. I mean, his percentage is, I don't know, about 15% or more. Crazy. Yeah,

yeah. It's crazy. And I watch people that are sort of trying to get to five. I think, man, there's so much room.

That is one thing that if those of you who are looking to, and protection is pure profit. So for the sales manager on the call who are responsible for maintaining the margins in the store and not wanting to give things away as a discount, it's pure profit until someone puts a claim in. It's pure profit.

And so to start looking at it from that point of view, Yeah. How are we going to get it there? And one of the ways is to listen for the opportunities that would align with the customers, what matters to them in order to sell it to them and include it in the price. When you give them a price, always include protection in it. Always and always.

However, let's go one step further. Always include protection in it. And then make the necessary deposit and say, and that would be if you took advantage of the 48 months, no interest promotion, that would be, you know, $287 a month. And you can pay that off ahead with no penalty by doing that. Do you want to take advantage of that too? I would close on both of them at the same time.

Use one to close the other.

Yeah. Okay.

Did we

get all of yours?

Can I keep going on another objection? Yes, you can. Okay. We do struggle with setting appointments. Other than our designer, the rest of our team does struggle with that. They'll say, well, they're going to come back and see me tomorrow. I'm like, okay, well, what time are they coming back? So what are some quick little pro quo statements that we can nail those down?

I love these questions.

Okay, so all of these, I said it early and I'll say it again, selling intangibles requires a level of intentionality that selling tangibles does not. You can point at something, they can nod, and you can write it up, but that's not how you sell intangibles. So when it comes to making appointments, one, you should be blocking out your calendar ahead of time using the repeat function on your calendar. Block out your calendar. I'll use the one-week view with X number of appointments in your calendar. And an appointment is on the phone, in the store, on-site, or virtually. So an appointment is just a meeting scheduled in time. That's what an appointment is, right?

So once you do that, and when you set out your calendar for appointment times,

Then, let's say that you, let's say that, I know some of you are Friday and Saturday, Saturday and Sunday, because you're in trade and different. So, you want to put that in so that you've got a couple of morning appointments, like a 10 and an 11. You've got a couple of days. You've got noontime appointments, a 12 and a 1. And then you've got other ones that are one hour before the showroom closes.

For those of you in retail, on Saturday. I would do when the store opens and when the store closes. For those people who take a fabric home and can come back that day and buy it.

Same thing on a Sunday if you're open on Sundays.

When the door opens and when the door closes. Because your weekends, you do not want to see people again that you saw last week. Ever. You want it Saturdays. And Sundays are for seller to schedule it.

Close everyone who's here to buy today. Close them today. And if they can't close today, then you're going to make an appointment for them to come back during the week, not next weekend. And if it's going to be next weekend, you tell them, I have two slots on Saturday. Either when the door opens or an hour before the door closes, which one do you want?

Because you have got to develop new opportunities on your busiest traffic days. You cannot be doing VBAC appointments. You can't.

You just can't. We don't have enough traffic right now that you have the luxury to do that.

Okay, so philosophically, you're with me. So now you look at your calendar. You might have 10 or 15 slots on your calendar when you do that. Three a day slots, right? And you use the repeat function. No end date in sight, right? That 10-minute alert on all of them. So now...

When you want to start setting up the appointment, so you say to them, if you're not asking it now, start asking, how much time do we have to work on this today? Whether you're in a trade showroom or in a retail showroom, how much time do we have to work on this today? They give you an answer. So they're either going to say an answer that is reasonable for you to complete the sale or the quote, or they say something like, all afternoon.

And what they're looking to accomplish, unless you're going to expand that from their initial product request to a project, you don't have all afternoon to spend with them. So you say, excellent. I have, it is now 3:30. I have a five o'clock appointment that gives us 90 minutes to work on this. We'll get as far as we can.

And if we need more time, then we'll talk about that later and what that would look like. That's what you say. And that, again, is setting up the opportunity for an appointment.

Okay, so now it gets, so you've got that. So you want to start asking them, how much time do we have to work on this today? No matter what, no matter who, how much time do we have to work on this? Because if you can accomplish it, you do. If you're going to need an appointment, this is where you say, let's do everything we have to do together. And then you may have some stuff to do, I may have some stuff to do, but let's make our time together matter.

And so your intentionality and your desire to help them is just, they can light candles with it. It is so burning in you. All right, so now you do what you're going to do.

And you say, with that one, you say, okay, we've got... We've got about 10 minutes until you have to leave. So let's recap where we're at and what we've accomplished, and let's identify what's missing. Let's identify what's missing. So you do that, and they're in agreement. So you say, all right, let's set up a time.

So now I want you to start, I want you to listen for the either or closing questions I am going to use. Now, remember, I have a calendar with blank openings in it to use. Now, I say, All right, so Erica, be my person. So I say, so Erica, is morning or afternoon better for us to meet again?

Afternoon, I think is going to be great. Afternoon, excellent. So I have Tuesday at 2 or Wednesday at 4. Which is better for you? Let's do Tuesday.

Tuesday at 2. Excellent. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to send you a calendar invitation. Just accept it and it will populate your phone. And I'm also going to call you in the morning between, say, 10 and 12 to make sure you've done your homework, right, to confirm our time and to answer any other questions that might have occurred to you so that I can be prepared for that when you come in. How's that?

Sounds great.

Thank you for the homework.

That's how you do it. Thank you for the homework.

So homework is an important element of making appointments. Because if they cannot buy today, it's because there's something missing from their process that prohibits it.

So for the trade people, if you're working with a designer, you say to them, when are you presenting and what's the objective of that presentation? And they say whatever they say. And you say, OK, great. So if you're meeting with them Thursday at 4 o'clock, Why don't you and I talk on Friday morning? We'll hear what they were going to go with. We'll double check quantities. We'll see, you know, what are the questions they may have and other areas of the project that we can discuss that might have come up in your presentation.

So you want to ask them, when are you presenting? Because for those of you in trade showrooms, actually, this goes to retail too. If you don't set up an appointment, you're going to go down that, well, I tend to call my customers 48 hours after. It's like, what does that have to do with anything?

Like, whatever habits you've developed aren't based on the person. They're based on something. But you really want to see what happened. Did you reach them? Do you keep chasing them? Are you texting? Like that.

So with appointments, first, be prepared.

To offer them times. Don't ever, ever, and again, ask them, when do you want to meet again? You start with, are we going to meet or speak in person or otherwise? And they pick one.

So now you know. And then you say, is morning or afternoon better? They pick one. And you say, I have this time or that time, which is better? All the time. And it works. Right?

So when someone says to you, I don't have my calendar with me, it's like, that's okay, because I've got mine. And I'm going to call you to confirm it anyway. If we have to change it, we'll change it.

It's crazy easy once you start using this. When you don't and say, when can we come back? Or when can we meet again? They're always going to say, I'll call you. You can go to the bank on that. They're going to say, I'll call you. And now the chase begins.

So whether it's retail or trade, it makes no difference. Making appointments is the same because of how you're structuring it. Any questions on that? Jessica, you look like you have a question and you're on mute if you do. No, you don't? Okay. Anyone have a question about that?

Okay.

So the answer to the question that I asked before about objections, customer objections, the answer is simply, you need to come up with some responses. So that when someone says to you, and when it comes to appointments, an objection, I don't have my calendar with me. It's like not a problem. I have mine with me. And let's like take a look at what I have that you think might be available. And when I call to confirm, if we have to change it, we will. Right?

When you have, so you just want to, you want to come up with, so if someone says we don't. We're going to use a credit card with miles on it. We're not going to take advantage of the financing.

I might ask them where they're going and how many miles they have accumulated. Just because I'm looking for the sale. It's like, because sometimes they just say that. It's like, so you just want to balance. Is that worth saving what you're saving in terms of time and overtime? Because convenience. At no interest is what financing buys you, convenience, and the ability to add to that whenever you need to. So if that sectional gets delivered and you decide you want the rug to go with it, you can add to it.

You don't have to come back in. We can order it over the phone. You don't have to come back in, right?

So I think some of you, I know Eric has heard this before, but I'm like a dog on a bone with, I think as an industry, especially in retail, I think that we're horrible. At after delivery selling, which is a ripe area of opportunity that we could increase our business by 20 % without ever seeing another customer. If we got good at calling after delivery, but you call after delivery and they have that thing, let's see if the sectional goes in first before we blah, blah, blah with the rug. But they do that and you've got an open to buy and you may need a signature, you may not. But you call them and say, can I send you two images for rugs that I know are going to work with this and we can just order it and put it on your account? That's like a, I don't know, $5 ,000 sale you would not have ever gotten. And you don't need another customer to do that.

So one of my biggest takeaways that I want you to get from this call is this. These are tools in the toolbox. They're tools. So appointments, financing.

And protection. Protection is going to increase your average sale. Financing and appointments increases average sale and close ratio, as does sketching. Those are the best tools we have in the toolbox to close more business and close bigger tickets and to make it easier for our customers to buy from us. Because when we boil it down, our job is to make it easy for people to say, yes, that's our job. And when we have greater mastery of the tools in our toolbox, we make it easier for people to buy from us. And that's our job is to do that.

So play with it. I always have stuff that if you ask me specifically, I can send you. But I really encourage you to make a list of what your most common objections are. And then I would do a sales meeting on it. If I were the sales manager, I'd do a sales meeting on it with everybody. If you hear this as an objection, let's come up with two responses when you get that so that we can make that go away. Now, handling an objection is a structure by itself, but the fact that you've got a solution that you can offer, we can do this or we can do this, is probably going to get rid of that objection. Honestly, it's probably going to get rid of that objection.

And by asking more questions about what are they saying no to. I would ask that too when it comes to when people say, And this is where I think sales managers are really helpful. Excuse me, that if you hear, I'll go back to protection again. If you hear a customer saying, no, I don't think that we need protection, and you have a salesperson who's struggling with protection, you got to help them out. I would ask the customer, you know, I heard that you thought that, you know, that protection wasn't for you. May I ask you, what is it that you think isn't for you? In essence, What are you saying no to? Because they might say something like, we never buy extended warranties.

It's like, thank you so much for telling me that, because accident protection is not an extended warranty. Extended warranties protect the product. Accident protection protects you, right?

Yeah.

Thank you, Jessica, right? I know. I love all of these. I love these tools so much. And next month is going to be on sketching. So I just sent that in today. But oh, my God, my favorite things, intangibles and sketching. All right.

So the fourth point I want to make about this, and so sales managers just like, because I'm coming for you. So when it comes to all of these, especially protection, I'll say protection, I'll say financing, all of it. And sketching, too. Might as well throw that in. But I look at those metrics, how a team performs with protection, with, well, mattresses, with protection, with financing, with making appointments, with sketching. I look at all of those as an indicator of the sales manager's performance more than I do of the salespeople, even though I know it's their numbers.

I hear a lot of sales managers say, well, you know, we talk about it all the time, or I'm 100% committed to that. Clearly, if you're 100% committed to that, your numbers would be better, right? Because what the sales manager is doing to keep things front of mind, to be practicing on the fly, to be overhearing and willing to interrupt some of those conversations, to make it go in another direction, to handle the objection, to practice those objections. All of that stuff around intangibles is much more indicative of the sales manager's engagement in those intangibles and getting them sold than it is the salespeople. The salespeople are the symptoms of it, right? They're just what happens when it doesn't improve.

So I would say that when you look at it, and we're still early in the first quarter, we're halfway through the first quarter, right? So when you look at what your targets are, so you've got your revenue goal for the year, and some of you might be looking at a metric improvement for this year. So let's just say that, I'm going to talk to the retail people for a minute, that let's say that your target this year is to raise your revenue per opportunity dollars per hour. Let's say you're going to take it from X to Y.

Well, the beauty of revenue per opportunity, dollars per hour, you know, sales per customer, however you, performance index, whatever you call it, it's all the same number. It's a combination of close ratio and average sale. And every tool that we've talked about, other than protection, so that appointments increase close ratio and average sale. Sketching increases close ratio and average sale. Financing increases close ratio and average sale, which is what your revenue per opportunity is. So if you were to look at, if you want to get your revenue per opportunity from A to B, then these are the areas you want to be focusing on.

And mattresses, because mattresses increase close ratio and average sale. Common mattress close ratio is like north of 60%, close to 80%, right? And so it's like, yeah. And it's a $3,000 average sale against like, I don't know, $1,250.

You want to look at how do I use these tools and how do I build some intangible skill as a sales manager in these areas using these tools. So keep, you might pick one a quarter and really drill down. You might in one quarter rotate between a couple of them, whatever you want to do. But your intangible stuff is, they are tools in the toolbox that help. All of your numbers get better.

Okay, so that's my stuff. So make it part of your goal. So what questions you have about any of them, about selling it, about sales management, about the specifics of it, whether it's appointments, protection, financing, any of those, any objections that you get that you don't know how to address? How do you sell? The concept of selling intangibles to your salespeople who've been resistant, any of that, any of that, any questions, just unmute yourself and feel free to ask or put it in the chat and I'll answer it.

I don't want to monopolize the conversation, but I do have another question. Well, you're

probably asking something as somebody else would ask. Sorry, everybody.

Owen and I were just talking about the... When we're listening to a protection sale, kind of going south at the sales desk, and whether they talked about it early, you know, in the conversation or not, how he and I can kind of get over our own insecurities about injecting ourselves in that conversation. Yeah, and it's, for me, I can't speak for Owen, but for me, it's I know I have to let go of a little bit of a visit. I don't want to interrupt the salesperson and how they're doing, but yet I want to help them save the GPP sale. So what's the medium there? What are your recommendations?

So I think that we've got, again, a perspective about interrupting that might be a limiting belief, right? Whether we think, I don't want to micromanage someone, I don't want them to think I don't have any confidence in them. But when the standard for the store is 5% for protection, when the goal for the store is 8% and they're at 2%, then they need help. They need help more than they think they need help. So

to say,

look, we're going to get you to standard. In this quarter, we're going to get you from 2% to 4%. And here's how it's going to go. I'm going to remind you when you've got enough, you know, look for, to use that sheet and say, what's the opportunity for protection for this customer? Like, write that down. Number one, write that down.

And then bring it up when you start to talk about the product solution that you're recommending. Bring it up then. Just like when you're selling mattresses, you bring up the pillow when you walk in the room, toss a pillow on the bed and say, I'll talk about that later, right? So, then if I hear you when you are working with someone, or if they have an objection that I hear you're unable to handle, if I hear it, I'm going to interject.

And this is really bold, but I would say, and before you complete a sale, you need to bring it to me.

You can't complete a sale without me seeing it. And if it doesn't have protection, I'm going to go and talk to them.

And you're going to watch me handle the objection. I may not win every one, but I'm going to go down fighting for it, right? So you can watch how I handle the objection, which is not the only way, but it's going to give you more tools in your toolbox to handle that.

There is a Bob's Discount Furniture. Like, they do a lot of things right. You know, they're going for world domination at this point, I think. But all their managers still, they've always done this, and they still do this, that I don't care how long you've been a salesperson, you take your ticket to the manager before anything gets completed.

And I think that with some salespeople, to help them break that so that you can come in and with the customer say, just want to review it. Erica did a great job on this, just want to review it. And I know I have a question that... You know, you declined protection. Can you tell me why?

And they're going to say whatever they say. And now I say, you know, I hear that sometimes. And tell me more about why you think that matters to you. And then I say, if I could offer you a couple of options, would that be helpful? And then you might win one.

So one of the things when it comes to selling protection, if you don't have them, you need a horror story. And a crazy success story. You need a horror story of someone that didn't buy protection, something happened, and they, you know, a $12,000 sale was like trashed. And then you need someone who also bought something. They bought protection, something happened, but they had protection and they won. So you need a couple of those things in your toolbox. How's that?

Was that a winner? Winner, winner, chicken dinner. Yeah, yeah, that's good. We have, you know, little like flip books, you know, at our sales desk, and it's often, you know, a silent salesperson for protection. So it's good to be reminded that we need to refer to those because we have pictures of

the horror source,

and then how we fixed it or what we did to replace it or whatever. So yeah, that's a good reminder for that specifically.

And so we've got Cody who says, I struggle to know the trigger of starting to talk about protection. I don't want to be disjointed when I bring it up. Okay, Cody, could you take yourself off mute and tell us a little more about that? Maybe not.

Can you hear me? Yes. So I just don't like, it's easy when someone's like, oh, I have a pet or kid or. Whatever the case may be, but I also there's sometimes where I just don't feel like I get that indication of when do I first bring it up because I know do early and often. I just don't always know exactly what moment that is where it's not just going to be like randomly throwing information at them that they're not actually going to be listening to.

So first, I would say if you're and if you're not taking notes with your customers, start taking notes with them. And so, and if you need that sheet that I recommended before that has that reasons for protection, because you want to start listening for what are they talking about? Are they older? Do they talk about if they're buying, especially motion furniture, and they eat in the furniture, which is like an easy pie one, right? But to start listening for.

Actively, you know, intentionally listening for why would this person want protection and make notes to yourself so that when you, so two things, Cody, you want to also be asking them what are the most, what are the priorities here? What are the most important elements either about the product or the room it's going in and write that down. Because that's the stuff that you can usually find a connection between something there, one of those three things, and why they would want protection. Like if they say, I want something durable.

It's like, well, what's durable to you to last forever or to look great for a long time? Like what does durable mean for you?

Because some stuff is going to get handled by the warranty in the first year if something goes wrong. But what you're looking for are things that are really accidents.

That makes a lot of sense. I would say I deal with the warranties for my business. I deal with all that stuff. I know the warranty side of things, but I'm still getting used to the protection side of things

and what exactly

it means.

To distinguish the difference between a warranty and accident protection is really important because you will have customers who say, I don't buy warranties. It's like, great, because I'm not selling them.

A warranty, we have a one-year warranty on our furniture that's provided by the manufacturer. What we're talking about is accident protection that just comes from regular use and stuff happening. And that is what this is for. So that whether it's your animals that do something, or you spill tea, or you spill cranberry juice, or that happens, that goes above and beyond. The warranty that is protected by the manufacturer, that's what we're doing. And I know that many people, if you don't use it in a certain amount of time, you get some or all of it back toward another purchase. So they really can't lose anything by doing it.

And that's what we do is if you, like we do a five-year protection plan. If you don't use it in five years, you get it back to store credit to go towards anything else.

So, Cody, one of the other things, and I don't know, your store might do this, it may not, but one of the other things, and I really encourage everyone to think about this in a broader way, that when, as an organization, we're committed to selling protection because of what it offers the customer and what it offers the company in terms of profitability and ease of customer service, so that you mentioned it. Let's say that you don't do it the first time, but you're going to call back or you're going to call back before it gets delivered and you're going to try it again. Or the drivers are going to try it before they leave. Somebody's going to get it. Someone is going to get it. When everybody's talking about this, it's like at some point they're going to say, holy crap, I should be paying attention to this.

Because everyone's talking about it. So when you've got a sort of waterfall close that you do it, somebody in scheduling deliveries does it, the drivers do it, the more people that are actively involved in this conversation around protection, you're going to increase your protection numbers.

And I say the person that closes it should get paid for it. But that's just me.

You might split it as a pool. I mean, that's kind of how we look at it. Like we have our delivery manager who schedules deliveries. If he brings it up and he closes it, it's his.

Absolutely.

And if the drivers did it, they can say, before I leave here. I know that you declined this. We do a lot of deliveries and a lot of things. We see a lot of stuff. I really encourage you to do this. They might have the best chance for closing that.

That's something I'll definitely bring up to my managers.

Yeah, because it's so, oh my God, it's so, it's so important. It just makes everything easier. When people spend all that money and something goes wrong, like they are heartbroken. They're heartbroken if they haven't bought protection.

Because there's those things where it's like the warranty, it's something that's wrong with the product, but it's like, if you do something

that

you know you spent all this money on, you're going to kick yourself for it, for not doing something.

That's right.

I do think that sheet that you mentioned before would be very helpful. So

if you've got my email address, send me an email. Jodi at O-N-E-X-O-N-E dot com. Just send me an email and say, could you send me this? And I'm happy to send it to you. And it's a word document. What did you call it

before?

It's got the sketch on the top that says, what can you tell me about the room as it is now? And then the bottom half of the paper has all of the discovery questions that we should be asking. It's got a space for motivations. It's got a space for scheduling appointments. It's got a space for...

What would be the reasons that they would want protection? So it's all prompts and, of course, contact information. And it's all prompts to have the salesperson ask and get those answers so that you increase the opportunity to close or make an appointment with that customer. And it's a Word document. So you can change it to reflect whatever your store wants to use it for.

I think that would be awesome for me to have. So I will definitely email you about

that.

Absolutely. Absolutely. So thank you, Cody. Wow.

Anyone else have any other questions, whether it comes to financing, protection, or appointments? Whether it's selling them yourself or as a sales manager, coaching your team to sell them.

Hi. I actually do have a question. I'm not sure if it's relevant to everyone on the call. I'm an outside sales rep to the trade, and I think my number one objection is appointment scheduling. As I'm sure a lot of people know, the accounts are the firms that have the most potential or the most opportunity for sales or the busiest ones. I often get rejected or get objection when I'm trying to schedule presentations or appointments with them. They say that they're too busy, or they say that they aren't taking in presentations, or they're prioritizing meetings with their own clients. So I'm curious if you have insight into overcoming

that objection.

Yes, I

would.

So here's what I'm going to give you a verbal formula. And the verbal formula is this. The word since, S-I-N-C-E, followed by a fact. Followed by a question. It's what's called lead with the objection. Since I know that you and the people in your firm are extraordinarily busy, would you rather that we scheduled me to come into your office or you to come to the showroom?

Right? Since, followed by a fact, followed by a question. Since people in your office are busy, would you prefer that we do a lunch and learn or do you want me to do a library update and then we can schedule it once I'm in there?

Right? But you want to go into it assuming one of them is going to happen. And with that level of confidence and intentionality, it's like, hell no, one of them is going to happen.

Right? Because that will bring that energy. There's no apologies that you're bothering them. It's like, no way, man. So in order for you, since I know you want to keep up on the most current product that we've got, would you rather that we scheduled you to come in? Or would you rather that I can come out?

Right? Did that help? Try it. And I know it's different with people that you don't have a relationship with versus someone that you've met before. I know that that's a different thing.

Sure. No. And I, sorry, I was just taking notes. That is

helpful.

And

you'll get the transcript for this. So that's good, too.

Thank you.

Okay. And there was another question. Let me see if I can pull it. Okay.

Jada. I know we briefly touched on in-home consultations. Do you have any additional advice how to schedule them, especially after I've already seen photos of the space? At what point in the process should I introduce the in-home visit to best position myself as an interior designer? Here's my question to get an in-home visit. Would it help if I came out?

Just ask, would it help if I came out? There are a lot of questions we've been talking about and a lot of descriptions and a lot of challenges you're up against. Would it help if I came out?

And if they say, no, I want to do it in the store, it's like, then that's it. But would it help if I came out? I find it's a warm offering for them. And then you might say, and this is your discretion, then say, well, let me, if they say yes, or if you get further along down the road, then you might have to explain the expectations of taking advantage of the design service, which of course is to buy something.

Thank you. I think that's

really good advice.

Oh, you're welcome. When you use it, send me an email and let me know that it works. Okay. Okay, good.

Okay, so the clock on the wall says our time is coming to a close. Was this helpful?

Yay! Well, it was because you were participating. That makes all the difference in the world. So thank you so much for that. So you still have 10 days left to February. So make goal.

Make goal. And start practicing these things to see which tool you work best with, which has an easy alignment, which you need a little bit more practice with. Please reach out to me with any questions you have, and please share success stories. Let me know some of the things that are working that's really, really helpful. And I look forward to seeing you next month when the topic is going to be sketching.

All right, everybody. Bye, Joey. Thanks again, and see you soon. Bye. Thank

you. Thank you.

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