Dave Parker MVP:

Telesales suffers in the same way and to a certain degree so do internet sales. You got to the big 4 (O2, TMobile, Vodafone, Orange) websites and look at the specs of a WM device and it says very little that is useful. You usually get a tick box about whether it has polyphonic ring tones or Java games or not.

 

 I work for a small cellular carrier based in SW KS (Google Ulysses KS) and am trying to learn our line of WM smartphones.  It's difficult for us smaller carriers because we can't buy/guarantee a T-Mobile, Sprint, Verizon/Alltel, etc number of smartphone sales.  But I know we have some very well versed WM users in our company.  A lot of MY learning has come from this forum.  (THANK YOU GUYS A LOT!!)  Most of it is just not being afraid of the device.  Take it out of the box and play with it.  You can always do a hard reset and start over.

 It is on the service provider to train their people, because the ground pounding sales person should want to learn these because you get a higher commision when you can sell the data packages, a more expensive phone, and the customer loves it when you can sit down and actually show them how to use some the functionalities that are important to them.  Go after the BlackBerry market!

The flip side of that is you don't want to sell them a phone they are not going to understand just because you want a commision.  Some of our customers buy an HTC for a QWERTY keyboard to text.  Most of those customers bring it back because they are overwhelmed.

I guess to sum up my points:  1 Learn the functionality.  2  Ask the customer a lot of questions.  Find out what they want in a mobile device.

Thanks for the insights, lukewarm81. And thanks for the shoutout to the forum!   

I thought this was a good topic for the Pro Zone, so I moved this into its own thread here.

lukewarm81:

The flip side of that is you don't want to sell them a phone they are not going to understand just because you want a commision.  Some of our customers buy an HTC for a QWERTY keyboard to text.  Most of those customers bring it back because they are overwhelmed.

That is why when I had my retail store before moving to Internet based only.....I made sure I personally trained my people...we didnt wait for the carrier to train us on the devices. I would sit down with all my customers and ask one question....1. What do you want to do with your phone??? And from there I would let the customer play and use the phone until they were comfortable and sure this is what they wanted. Many times we would go through all the WM devices until they found the right one. Then I make the sale and close the deal and offer accessories.

I'm from the old school...Customer Service comes first and always will..... 

yrless:

Customer Service comes first and always will

and I think good customer service will always win out - if not short term, then certainly over the long term.

I do not know if it was a global campaign, but a few years ago Orange increased the training for some of its staff on all of its mobile phones and branded those staff as Mobile Trainers.

Unfortunately on the three occasions that I went in to get help, I taught them even more than they could teach me. That was with the Sony Ericsson P800 and P900 and with Windows Mobile. But I guess that I had time to learn my device fully, where as they did need to address all devices.

I have always found that the smaller dealers know more about their full product range, where the high street stores tend to specialize in the current best sellers.

Biomehanika:

I have always found that the smaller dealers know more about their full product range, where the high street stores tend to specialize in the current best sellers.

That is exactly what we did....I made sure all my sales people knew personally every device and not just whats "new" or Best sellers