Turn your store staff into top salespeople! Increase your sales at the end of the year. Start training today for sure.
Unlock, open a shop, sell alcohol, and it also coincides with the end of the year festival. There is no better time than this. So, grab it while you can. Train your employees to help generate sales from today. There is still 1 month left to close the year-end sale with a bang!But first,To prevent mistakes and to have a sales strategy in place during this period, we need to start with this first.
Create standard service procedures(Standard Operation Procedure: SOP) The big challenge during the year-end festival is training employees to promote and sell menus that the shop has calculated will generate the most profit and are most suitable for this period, including providing the best service to customers in order to create the most impressive experience, so that they will tell others, invite others to use the service, and come back to use the service again in the future.
So from this point we can see thatWe must first set a sales and service strategy that is a standard for the store so that each employee in each section can work in the same way.This is part of the standard service procedures, with the following matters to consider:
Which menu of the shop is most suitable for the New Year period? It must make a suitable profit. If there is a promotion for a set menu, it must be calculated that there will be no loss and it will please customers. Or it can be a special menu for the festival. All of these should be made into a separate promotional menu with details that will help sales staff easily.
During the New Year and the unlocking period from Covid measures, the number of alcoholic beverage orders will definitely increase. In this part, it must be clearly defined what time the store can sell alcohol according to the law. Because we must not forget that not all employees know the law. It can be made into a sign and employees should be clearly trained on this matter.
Kitchen systems are also important because during the festival season, the kitchen will be busier than usual due to the increase in orders. Creating operating procedures will help a lot in this regard, starting from food preparation standards, ingredient cutting, storage, cooking, and serving. Kitchen SOPs will reduce redundancy and errors in cooking, which will help the food come out quickly and correctly as desired.
There are also other standard procedures to consider, such as booking tables, service, cleaning, etc. All of this may seem complicated for new or small restaurants, but having an SOP will definitely help make your restaurant work systematically and reduce errors.
Learn more about making SOPs for free at the course.“Systematic establishment of restaurant standards”By Professor Porachai Nitmethawong, a famous food business guru.
2.Train employees to understand each stepWhen we have set the standard operating procedures, we must convey them to the employees to understand and put them into practice. Sometimes, reading from a manual does not give a true picture. Therefore, the owner or manager of the shop should demonstrate the correct procedures to the employees and what to do in each step, such as how to take an order, how to make recommendations, how to introduce a promotional menu, and what to promote after receiving an order, etc.
3. Pre-work meeting, provide information on promotions and daily sales promotion menu to employees.If possible, hold a meeting before starting work every day, especially for restaurants that have different promotions each day. Employees must understand the restaurant's promotions well before opening because some promotions may have conditions involved, such as 10% off food only, or if ordering a great value set, it cannot be used together with other promotions. Or explain how selling membership cards benefits the restaurant and customers. Employees must sell in a way that makes it easy for customers to understand.
4. Let the staff try it out.Whether reading a manual or looking at examples, it is not as good as doing it yourself. Therefore, after training, employees must be allowed to do it and checked and advised if there are any errors. Having employees try it out will help them work naturally, and the shop owner will be able to see if the prescribed procedures will have any errors when actually used in practice. This will help them to improve the procedures before they are actually used.
5.Set “INCENTIVE” to motivate employeesIn addition to setting sales targets, don't forget to motivate your employees. Incentives can come in the form of bonuses, diligence allowances, or prizes that employees will receive when the restaurant reaches its sales targets. In general, incentives in restaurants are usually set in two forms: individual incentives and group incentives, which are used as follows:
Individual incentives are used to identify each person's duties, with an emphasis on increasing efficiency in the work being done, not just focusing on sales. For example, an incentive for a chef: if the chef can prepare food without any mistakes and can save 10% on ingredient costs, he/she will receive a reward of 2,000 baht per month. Or an incentive for a server: if he/she can promote selling a set menu for 2,000 baht, he/she will receive 200 baht.
Group incentives focus on teamwork by setting goals for the entire store, for example, if the store's sales exceed 2,000,000 baht per month, each employee will receive a reward of 2,000 baht.
But before choosing to use an incentive, you need to think carefully whether it can really motivate employees or not. And if you choose to use it, will the shop still make a profit? If the employees are not interested or if they do it and the shop loses money, then there is no benefit in using such incentives.
6. Evaluate customer temperament and close sales with promotions.You need to understand your customers better, what they want more than usual during the New Year festival, and then organize a promotion that suits them. For example, if your customers are working people or office workers, during the New Year they will want a restaurant that can organize a New Year party, have a promotion for a set meal, a banquet room, and karaoke. So if your restaurant is going to organize a promotion for this group of customers, try organizing a promotion related to a party, such as a free banquet room, no corkage fee when customers bring their own wine or liquor. Maybe add karaoke if there are a lot of people, or charge a per-person fee and choose a set meal. Or organize a promotion with alcoholic drinks, which is also interesting. A promotion related to mixers and drinks is also suitable for this group.
While family customers tend to focus on discounts and set meals that can be selected, and often have children with them, so a set meal promotion that includes a selection of food or a free dessert or ice cream will appeal to this group more.
Therefore, we must first identify who our store’s main customer groups are, what they like and dislike, and what they want from the store. Then, we must find the most appealing promotions to offer.
7. Provide good service that exceeds customer expectations.Of course, customers expect good service from the shop. But what are the benefits if we can do more than what customers expect? 1. Employees have the opportunity to receive tips as a token of appreciation for providing excellent service. 2. Customers will tell their acquaintances to use the service or review the shop on social media with good ratings. 3. There is a very high chance that they will come back to use the service again. Therefore, on this festive occasion, providing special service to customers will also have a positive effect on the shop. It can be considered a New Year's gift to customers.
8. Give employees a future, more than just a salary.For shop owners, consider the future progress of each employee instead of just giving compensation in the form of salary. People tend to consider their career progress along with their income. If the salary is good but the work does not have any opportunity for growth, it will not be possible to win the hearts of employees to stay with the organization. Therefore, it is a good idea to try to offer opportunities to employees. For example, for employees who have worked well for 1-2 years, try to give them the opportunity to be promoted to supervisor, help take care of other employees or train new employees. If they are at the manager level, try to offer them partnership or open a new branch to take care of and give them a suitable salary increase.
For this part of employee management, I recommend that you study more in the course.“People Management in the Restaurant Business”By Professor Peerapat Kongthong, an expert in human resource development.
