Track your
customer base and salesperson
performance with TRAX
Mark Dweck is so
pleased with the TRAX Opportunity
Tracking System that he is writing a
testimonial about its performance
for the company.
“With the help of
TRAX, our sales floors are becoming
lean, mean fighting machines,” he
writes.
Dweck, an owner
of The Furniture King, a family
business based in Newark, NJ, wanted
a system that could help him monitor
the productivity of his salespeople
as well as make sure the sales
managers were being utilized
properly.
He commissioned
his in-house programmer to develop
such software, but then he came
across information about the TRAX
system. “I read it, and thought it
was exactly what I was trying to
develop.”
Dweck gave TRAX a
call and installed the system in his
first store about nine months ago.
TRAX is now in six of his eight
stores.
TRAX has been
everything Dweck needs, and more.
For example, TRAX’s automated
UpBoard means he doesn’t have to
look at the end-of-day “chicken
scratch” on a paper upsheet anymore.
Instead, the computerized UpBoard
shows who is with a customer and who
is on deck. “It helps to maintain
the integrity of the turns,” Dweck
says. “The salespeople can’t fudge
the upsheet. It’s more
professional.”
With a simple
click with the mouse, salespeople
indicate they are helping a
customer. At that point, the system
tracks the time spent with that
customer.
When they have
finished with the customer, TRAX
prompts the salespeople with three
questions before they can get back
on the rotation, Dweck says. These
questions are: What category was the
customer looking at? What
advertising media brought them into
the store? If you made a sale, what
was the amount?
By asking these
questions, TRAX not only monitors
salesperson performance, but it also
allows Dweck to evaluate the
productivity of his advertising
dollars, too. If the system shows
customers do not seem to be
responding to a particular ad, he
can target his advertising in a
different direction.
Dweck, however,
is especially satisfied with how
TRAX helps him track his store’s
sales performance in a variety of
ways. For example, he can look at
average sale amount, amount of time
spent with each customer, and
closing ratios. TRAX’s calendar
function lets him get these and
other performance figures for any
specified amount of time
—
last week, last month or even
year-to-date. These figures are then
placed in different charts so the
sales force can be compared.
Before TRAX,
Dweck writes in his testimonial, a
laggard salesperson could fabricate
a million excuses as to why he or
she wasn’t producing. “Now numbers
don’t lie.”
For example, one
person may be consistently shipping
$30,000-$40,000, while Dweck’s
average salesperson is shipping
$60,000 a month. Although the
salesperson may have several excuses
as to why, Dweck can show the person
the facts.
“I can say,
‘Everyone in the store has an
average sale of $1,400. Your average
sale is $900. Your closing ratio is
20 percent; it is 38 percent
company-wide. You had the same
number of customers as they did. You
worked 100 fewer hours on the sales
floor than the next person for the
month.’ TRAX really gives me a
window as to why someone is not
producing,” Dweck says.
Management then
has the tools necessary to address
the salesperson’s underperformance,
he says. “We try to coach and
motivate the salesperson with the
hope that they will rise closer to
the top. If the salesperson is
beyond redemption, we have a clean
conscience knowing that we have done
our due diligence.”
Rhodes Furniture
in Orlando, Fla., is also using TRAX
in two stores to monitor its
customer base and salesperson
performance. The business already
had some monitoring programs in
place, but thought TRAX would
complement some functions that the
in-store software could not offer.
“We have been pleased so far,” says
Dean Davidson, division manager.
“TRAX gives you
an insight into your customer base
and what they are looking for. It
also tells you how your salespeople
are handling and closing customers,
and then how the salespeople rank
within the store against the store
average,” he says.
Finally, managing
store traffic and salesperson
performance with TRAX has helped
decide staffing needs, too, Davidson
says. “Monitoring our salesperson’s
performance enables us to maintain
adequate coverage with a
concentrated amount of talent.
Another important
breakthrough with the TRAX program
according to the president Dave Mink
is the integration with Profit
Systems. This permits the
customer’s information to
synchronize with this business
software and saves the salesperson
valuable time on the sales floor.
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