AVON has some outstanding products. We revel in them. They work. They are reasonably priced. They are guaranteed 100%. If it's the product we're in business to sell, why bother with this thing called service?

   Consider this: you may have access to the best products in the world, but so long as they remain unsold, the company still has them, you've made no money from them, and the customer has received no benefit from them. The simple fact, however, is that it is the service that accompanies the product and not the product itself that will make you a successful AVON representative. In this series we'll concentrate on
providing service after the sale, of course, but also providing service before the sale, because the service before the sale makes the product sell, which allows you the opportunity to provide service following the sale. And if you can't do all these three things, you'll be out of business before you know it.

Exploring Service

   Just what is service? What does it really mean? Is it something you are? Is it something you do? Is it something performed? Is it something received? The simple answer is, of course, "yes." Service is the perception of you by your customer. It is that value you provide in association with the product for which you receive money. Your service
can be good; it can be bad; it can be outstanding; it can be rotten; and all the stations in between. Service, pure and simple is the customer's expectation based on the products you and AVON together offer, the price of those products relative to the competition, and (this is your part) the manner in which you convey the product and its related services.

   What is the motivation for you, an independent AVON sales
representative to provide service to a customer? Is it because you would like a good relationship with this customer? Perhaps. Is it because you would like at least for this relationship to have an absence of grief or difficulty? Certainly. But let's get right down to it. YOU WISH TO PROVIDE SERVICE TO THIS CUSTOMER BECAUSE YOU WANT HER TO PURCHASE SOMETHING MORE -- next campaign and all the campaigns which follow. Admit it to yourself. Think about all the times that you have had bad service -- did it seem that the person who provided that bad service was
particularly interested to provide any further product or service to you?  Think about all the times that you have had good or outstanding service.  Were you in such a mood that you might have purchased whatever that person had to sell? These are human emotions, and we all have them.

Would You Hire You?

   If you, the leader, were to hire you, the salesperson, would not you be interested in that salesperson's willingness to not only sell a fragrance, but a shower gel, and a body lotion, and perhaps a roll-on deodorant -- and in fact anything that can be sold to any person who comes within the scope of your attentions? Of course you would, and as the leader of you, come to the realization that serving the customer is a
means to an end, not an end in itself.

   So let's hang a new definition on service: Service is that thing which causes a purchase to happen, a sale to be made, and a reconnection with that customer. It may speed up that sale or totally instigate a series of recommendations that lead to other sales to other customers. Customers do not buy AVON in a self-serve capacity. They need you to help them.  Without sales, service cannot exist. Without service, that customer is a
onetime customer only.

   It has been said that AVON experiences a large turnover in new representatives. For whatever reason that happens, it became obvious to me that a bit of training in sales techniques might address that problem.  For that reason, I posted to several Internet loops and subsequently drew those posts and more into a book entitled Becoming An AVON
Representative. In addition to all the things a new AVON rep must learn all at once, we also don't do a very good job of impressing upon her that service and sales must go hand-in-hand. Service may create good word of mouth advertising, but it is the product sale that will keep that AVON
rep in business.

   When was the last time your AVON business made you too much money?  Never? There may be such a point, but I've not found it yet. But I've learned something about service that is worth sharing: Service is your most invisible product, but it is the most important thing you have to sell. Good service adds value to the AVON product line and is ultimately responsible for repeat and referred business. Since AVON products are
"good," and the competition's products are also "good," the difference may be price, but I'm betting that service is the one thing you can do better than the department store, the Mary Kay representative, or somebody from Jafra. No matter who your competitors are, you can always do service better.

   Why do so many of us panic about the concept of SELLING? We like to call ourselves "advisors." We're afraid of being "pushy." We want to "work with" our customers. We tell our recruits and ourselves that "it will sell itself." Why are we afraid of selling? Could it be that we are so afraid of being told "no," and therefore will feel rejected? Nobody likes that feeling. We wonder if it's the product or the salesperson that's being rejected. In view of my previous efforts, I must feel that
many shy away from selling because they don't know how to sell. For anyone who has not had any sales training, I implore you to read about the topic (in my book or another) and to put yourself in the place where you can observe a "pro."

   People are naturally afraid of anything they don't understand.
Unfortunately, AVON doesn't do very much sales training, though it could be said that they do quite a bit of service training. And the net result is that many AVON reps become order takers with a pre-established ceiling in what sales they will accomplish and what awards they will receive. So you can serve all you wish, but recognize, as I've said before, that
nothing happens until a sale is made.

Sales Activities Do Not Require Pressure

   Nobody has to be pushy to do this business. For some reason, we equate sales with being aggressive. Thousands of telemarketers assault our eardrums with pitches made quickly and often at mealtime. Service begins not with being aggressive, but instead with a whole different concept
called suggestive selling. Suggestive selling is drawing the customer's attention to the specials. It's asking questions about the customer's interest in colors or skin treatments. It is nothing more than finding out what the customer's primary interest is and then recommending extensions to that interest to the benefit of the customer. If you fail to make such recommendations, you have of course shorted your sale, but
you have cheated your customer of the benefit of the products that could accompany the customer's primary purchase interest. Suggesting specific items shows your customer that she is worth your time and creates the perception of outstanding service -- and that is before the actual sale.

   So you have everything to gain, and nothing to lose, from suggestive selling. The more you suggest, the less your customer must request. When the customer expends less effort, she is certain to be impressed by your product knowledge and your willingness to take the time to teach her what you know about your products. Don't be surprised but what your customer remembers that you paid such attention to detail and recommends you to a friend or acquaintance.

   Here's an example of what I call a "vision of sugar plums." Your customer expresses an interest in a certain lip color. If you sell that lip color, you have a sale ranging from $2 to $8, depending on the product and any possible specials AVON may be running. But your suggestive selling builds the sale with the recommendation of eye color, lip liners, eyeliners, cheek color, etc. If you are doing that, you are moving your sale into the $20 range or higher.

   Word of mouth advertising is good. The customer likes the colors you got for her and the coordinated look you helped her to achieve. Yes, her bill was larger than she had anticipated, but if you've done your job, you have created a respect for the service you have offered. And because of that respect, your customer goes to work the following morning looking fresh as a daisy and tells a couple of her coworkers about the product
and the person who worked so well to help her achieve the look the coworkers are now admiring. You didn't have to pay for that advertising.  It was unsolicited. You didn't have to ask her to tell her friends. She was geared up to tell at the slightest provocation. And then, when the friends come to you, you'd better be heads-up to provide the same kind of service to them, else that unsolicited word of mouth advertising will
have been for nothing.

Suggestive Selling

   Suggestive selling is something you can do better than your
competition -- be that competition another AVON lady or a bona fide product competitor. So consider these points:

* When you recommend products, you create a greater impression than if you were to merely record what the customer orders.

* Consistent suggestive selling creates positive advertising for your AVON business, advertising that you could not possibly purchase.  Inconsistent service creates negative advertising, which is worse than having none at all.

   It has been well established that bad news travels fast. Somewhere in my literature exposure is a quote that when I do well, nobody remembers; when I do poorly, nobody forgets. Provide poor service, and one customer tells ten people -- people who didn't witness the transaction -- how bad your service is. Those ten will pass it on to at least another five;
those five will pass it on to at least another two. Do the math: 10*5*2 = 100 people who will get the bad news fast. The same 100 can get the good news -- not nearly so fast -- but just as effectively if you have gone out of your way to please that first customer. If every one of those customers represented a $20 to a $50 sale, you gain or lose $200 to $500 based upon the service you provide.

   It would seem, then, that it would be worth your while to study up on ways to provide good and positive service -- outstanding service -- and build your business upon that.

In summary:

* Service does not exist without sales; selling begets service that in turn begets additional sales.

* Your customer has called you. She wishes to buy, not to merely thumb through the brochure in your presence. How well she buys, how much she buys, will depend on how well you prepare the sale and suggest the expansion of that sale.

* You have one of the best product lines in existence. But if you don't sell it, three of us lose: AVON, you, and your customer.

* If you lead other AVON reps, invest time in their training for sales and services. Teach them that sales and service are synonymous.

* Don't throw away the potential for a larger sale merely by taking the order.

* Employ suggestive selling to obtain the benefits for all involved.

* Remember that the successful suggested sale increases your profits and increases that customer's service.

* Advertising about good service or bad service affect people in much the same way -- they tell someone who tells someone who tells someone. The only difference is the speed at which the news travels.

   Next time, we'll evaluate the business we're in -- and you may be surprised to hear that our business is NOT selling AVON products.