Case Study: Upselling in a Retail Environment

Is your team leaving money on the table? In the past, SGEi has helped clients to increase revenue by improving their upsell programs. Read this case study to learn more about our highly successful Relationships for Service and Sales Success learning experience and how it can make a difference in improving your upsell revenue and guest satisfaction scores.

Situation & Challenge:

Last year, a major hospitality client came to us with the objective of improving the upsell revenues and overall guest satisfaction scores at two of their properties – 5-star and 5-diamond luxury resorts on the Las Vegas Strip.

Struggling with upselling is a really common problem – a recent Harvard Business Review article discussed the trouble that many front-line associates have determining when upselling or cross-selling is appropriate. The push to always sell more and more can actually be detrimental to the goal of increasing profits, because a hard sell is often a turnoff to an unsure customer.

Solution:

As the above article emphasized, it is essential to build relationships with clients and get to know their situation before presenting appropriate upsell or cross-sell options. When we introduced our Relationships for Service and Sales Success learning experience to our client, we emphasized the importance of creating appropriate habits and routines for Front Desk staff and associates to ensure that those front-line teams are following best practices for upselling and for outstanding customer service as a whole.

The goals of this SGEi Signature Learning Experience are to improve first impressions, foster relationships, create loyal brand advocates, and encourage team members to engage in meaningful conversations with guests. To support these goals, our creative services team produced training and reinforcement materials that were branded to our client’s specifications, designed to reflect the luxury feel of their properties, and customized to be as effective for the staff as possible. Our bench of highly qualified trainers and consultants then rolled out the training to more than 200 staff over a 4-month period.

Results:

All too often, businesses choose not to invest in employee training because they believe it is too expensive and has too little ROI. But when training is done right – with buy-in from the top down and consistent reinforcement of concepts – the ROI can not only be measurable, but invaluable in many aspects of your businesses.

As a result of our training with this international luxury hotel brand, their staff not only earned a $2.4 million annualized increase in the properties’ suite upsell revenue, but also an eight-point increase in guests’ overall satisfaction of the check-in and arrival process.

If you are struggling to produce desired results from your training programs, reach out to SGEi today for a free consultation.