Boating Industry

July 2014

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July 2014 | Boating Industry | 31 [ Build your sales training playbook ] www.BoatingIndustry.com techniques. He's a training advocate by design, and his experience has shown the massive trans- formations at stores that have worked hard to improve their sales techniques. As an example, he cited his Cobalt 20 group whose members averaged $5 million in boat sales with a 16-percent profit margin back in 1999. One year later, that same group sold an average of $6.5 million on a 21-percent margin. Today, the group has maintained its 21-percent profit margin, but increased average sales volume to $20 million. That kind of success supports his idea that higher margins don't necessarily trans- late into lower sales, contrary to some OEM sales reps he has encountered. "If you're selling for less in order to sell more boats, that's win-lose," Parker said. He refocuses sales teams on the essential components of selling — emotional engage- ment, selling yourself, the dealership, the lifestyle and the product, and establishing a consistent pricing policy that helps prevent salespeople from focusing on pricing until the end of the selling process. "What many dealers do is they start the price at the number that they want to get for the boat," he said. "The problem is, in practically every cir- cumstance, you're going to end up 3 to 7 percent less than whatever number you start at." Aside from moving away from a value- building presentation, focusing on price too quickly pits the sales staff against management trying to maintain overall store margins. "When the customer makes an offer on the boat deal, almost regardless of what the offer is, they stop selling the customer on paying more money and start selling the owner on taking the shorter deal, and that process actually encour- ages lower margins," Parker said. He added that the individual temperaments of your sales team are critical, and something management should be aware of. Personality information can help management make deci- sions on what type of training can help individual salespeople improve their performance. "That's why we recommend profiling all our salespeople," Parker said. "Some salespeople are very friendly and outgoing, and you would think they would be fantastic at selling, because you just love to be around them." In some cases, however, the reality with some widely likeable personality types translates into a reluctance to ask for the order — as many times as it takes — in order to avoid a fear of rejection from the customer. With the many forms of training on the market today, he also advises in-person train- ing as the fastest way to turn around a sales team and work one-on-one with individual salespeople. Joining a 20 group is second on Parker's list, as such meetings will regularly address the entire gamut of issues related to improving sales tactics, store layout, customer service and presentation. "If you're selling for less in order to sell more boats, that's win-lose." — David Parker, Parker Business Planning P26x31-BI14JUL-TrainingPrograms.indd 31 5/28/14 12:04 PM

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