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Boost Your Sales Layer by Layer

10/27/2016 | Jennifer Cox, Needle Points

I always am surprised when I hear a salesperson say, “I'm not sure what to show the customer when they ask me to show them something new” when they are considering apparel. There could be nothing more simple, at least if you are talking about embroidered apparel. Consider layering on additional apparel in colors that coordinate with their company colors and the previously placed orders. There are several ways you can show your customers something new and reinforce your position as their branding expert.

If the client has purchased golf shirts from you in the past, present some dress shirts in colors that will coordinate well with the golf shirts or that work well with their corporate colors. If their company colors include royal blue, do not show them something that only comes in a green. Present options to which they will naturally gravitate, based on their affinity for their corporate branding colors.

Performance wear fabric is now making its way into all aspects of branded apparel. It is no longer found just in the gym, fitness center or on the track. While this fabric does present some unique challenges during embroidery, it can be embroidered and it can be embroidered well. If the client is not in a traditional dress shirt and tie type of environment, they may be very receptive to a performance wear golf shirt option.

Another approach would be to offer apparel choices in the opposite colors. If the client had light colored shirts with a logo embroidered in their company colors, show them shirts in the company colors, and do the embroidery in a contrasting color such as white, gray, etc. If the customer has never considered a tone-on-tone design, that can be a great new option to add to their corporate wardrobe. It coordinates with everything they’ve purchased to date, and this colorway gives them another staple for their golf shirts, dress shirts and even sweat shirts.

If the client already has embroidered dress shirts, the next layer to showcase could be sweaters or sweatshirts – sweatshirt fashions have evolved to extend their use far to beyond the gym, trust me!) in colors that coordinate well with the dress shirts. In fact, you could even display a sample of the sweater with the correct dress shirt underneath or inside it. Something that simple can trigger a reorder of the dress shirts, as well as open the door for the sweater order. Another tactic would be to show a different yet coordinating dress shirt or golf shirt with the sweater, giving the customer another shirt option to consider in addition to the sweater order.

If your client already has golf shirts and dress shirts, ask if they have a need for branded outerwear. There are so many options with outwear now, from rugged to casual to dressier jackets, and all of them can be embroidered. If they have not yet ordered outwear, it is an excellent opportunity to offer different levels of outwear, depending on an employee’s position in the company or as an incentive program.

One time, I had a client where I outfitted his entire sales team with golf and dress shirts. He asked me the “Do you have anything new?” question. I thought he was only interested in outwear for their sales team, because that is the only group of people that we had outfitted to date within the company. I happened to have a rugged jacket in my samples, along with several business casual samples that would work well for his sales team. The client was not aware that I could also provide what he thought of as “uniform” apparel for his installation crews. I picked up another 100-plus segment of his staff, simply because he saw a sample that caught his attention. Until that moment, he thought of his “uniform” needs as separate from his front office staff apparel needs.

From then on, I made sure to ask every customer about all the different layers of their businesses, so that I could accurately assess their potential needs and present options that would help them build their brand awareness through a line of coordinated logoed apparel products, ranging from T-shirts to outwear and headwear.

Another opportunity presented itself when a long-time customer asked the question, “I need something different – what do you have?” Instead of assuming that I knew what he meant, I asked him for a bit more information. For whom? How many? Was there a target price point or budget? When do you need them by? It turned out that he had a family member that was opening a new business. He wanted to help them get started by ordering apparel that was different than what he ordered for his business, but that would work as well. The new company also turned into a long-term client and grew at a healthy pace for many years.

As Shrek said, your customers are “Like an onion, there are many layers!” Think in terms of apparel layers (T-shirts, golf shirts, dress shirts, sweaters, sweat shirts, outwear, etc.) and also in terms of color layers (contrasting, low contrast, coordinating) and then consider all the different layers of their company (sales, leadership, manufacturing, incentive programs, etc.). By developing and coordinating a branded apparel program through all the different layers of apparel and the different departments of an organization, you can help them reinforce their branding message while maintaining a professional, well-dressed image within their organization and with their customers and potential customers. 

Jennifer Cox is president of the National Network of Embroidery Professionals. NNEP members receive personalized marketing consulting designed specifically for their business. To join NNEP today, visit NNEP.net, email Jennifer at hooper@nnep.net, or call 800-866-7396.

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