Transcribed Radio Training – With Avon Ann Morrow

This is the 2nd in a 4 part series of articles transcribed into text of the CashFlowShow – Direct Sales Radio show featuring Avon’s Ann Morrow.

If you did not read the first one then it is recommended that you start in the beginning and read Ann’s full interview!

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Direct Sales Radio With Ann Morrow

DEB BIXLER: Welcome back everybody to The CashFlowShow, this is Deb Bixler and we are here on Direct Sales Radio, broadcasting around the world with my guest Ann Morrow, who’s with Avon.  I’m always impressed with Avon, they have over 10,000 new products sold every single hour, is that correct?
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ANN MORROW: Yes, our new product, that’s actually one of our high-tech skin care products. Imagine 10,000 jars of skin care products being sold every hour, that’s huge. [Laughter]

DEB BIXLER: That is huge. We were talking before the break about the need to change and also the need to stay in touch with your customer. I think that of all the things that lead to Avon’s success, the biggest is the ability to evolve, the ability to change, but also to stay in touch with the customer.  And your passion is teaching out-of-the-box sales techniques to create customer loyalty. What does that mean?

Avon Changes – Business Changes

ANN MORROW: You know, I think it’s a willingness to change, just like you said. Avon is still here and going strong because of a constantly changing attitude.

I hear so many people say, “Well, that’s not the way we’ve done it in the past, we’ve always done it this way.” Well, not anymore, come on, jump on the bandwagon. It’s a willingness to do things that other people aren’t doing, and that’s going to make you a leader in your business and in the industry.

Engage Customer

So when it comes to training techniques and things that you can do to really keep your customer engaged and keep her looking forward to seeing you when you come with the products or the next catalog or brochure, that’s what it’s all about.

Direct Sales Is Fun

It’s just having fun with the business. This is direct sales, it’s the best profession in the whole wide world; you’ve got to have fun with it or why do it, right?

DEB BIXLER: Right, exactly. So do you want to share different techniques that you use with your team?

ANN MORROW: Sure, I have a few of my favorites. One of my very favorites is actually using labels. I think that if there’s ever a time when you’re interested in dressing up your brochure with all the mobile technology that’s going around, whether you use a brochure or a catalog or whatever your company calls their printed selling source, have some fun with it and get some labels on there, because there’s so many things in the world that are drawing our customer’s attention somewhere else.  There are two things I like to do with labels, and one is called Spot the Dot and the other one is called Star Search.

DEB BIXLER: Spot the Dot…

ANN MORROW: And Star Search.

DEB BIXLER: Star Search, okay.
ANN MORROW: So to create these tools you simply need Avery 5160, they’re my favorites, there are 30 to a page, you can use any store brand that you want, but I think you can get a box of Avery, 3,000 in a box for like 30 bucks, so 3,000 labels will last you a long time. Okay. And you’ll need the little foil stars, just like the kind the schoolteacher used to put on your paper when you did a good job.

DEB BIXLER: They’re really affordable.

The Customer’s Focus

ANN MORROW: They’re very affordable, use them to get the customers’ focus on what you want them to see…. and then the little dots that you use to color code things in an office, so it can either be the ones that are about the size of a dime, that you would typically see in the office supply section to mark your garage sale items, or you could go to an office supply store and they have even smaller ones, about the size of a pea.

You’re going to put on the label “Spot the Dot” or “Star Search” in great big letters, and then something along the lines of, “When you find the lucky star within the pages of your brochure, you will receive that item for free.” Or, if you have bigger ticket items, you will receive that item at 20 percent off with any $25 purchase. And the whole idea behind it is not just to help a customer find a free product, or to find a sticker in your catalog, but to make sure she’s looking at every single page.

DEB BIXLER: Absolutely.

ANN MORROW: Because I think customers kind of get, just like when you go to the grocery store, you’ve got to buy bread, you’ve got to buy milk, you’ve got to get dog food. There’s nothing else in there that you need, but something might catch your eye at the checkout counter. So you want to make sure she’s not just hitting the clearance pages, or not just looking at the pages where she typically buys her two favorite products, but that she is going through there looking for an opportunity to get a free product, and in the meantime she might find a few things to add to her cart, which she didn’t ever see in the brochure before.

DEB BIXLER: Right, and that’s just getting them to go more slowly through the book.

ANN MORROW: Right.

DEB BIXLER: Exactly. I often use that, not the Spot the Dot or the Star Search, but a host coaching technique, if you’re in party plan, if they’re not having a home show, they’re just passing a book around, is to make sure the hostess tells every single guest that takes the catalog what their favorite product is.
ANN MORROW: Absolutely.

DEB BIXLER: And then when the hostess says, “My favorite product is…” the guest is going to go slower, and so you’re basically putting a sticker on the front.  Both of them are basically the same incentive, Spot the Dot or Star Search.
ANN MORROW: Yes, exactly the same thing, so maybe in June you’re going to use Star Search, but then when September comes you’re going to do Spot the Dot. It’s probably not something you’re going to do every single time you share a catalog but every few months, and it’ll get to be something your customers start to look forward to.

DEB BIXLER: And I’ll bet that after a while they might not even need you to say Spot the Dot, they’ll just know it.

ANN MORROW: They just know they have to see everything in the catalog.

DEB BIXLER: Right, they’ll know to look for the dot, or look for the star.

ANN MORROW: Right.

DEB BIXLER: Well, that’s cool, that is a good idea because that’s the whole goal.  I know Avon’s usually got quite a few items on special, but if you have one or two items, even to get the hostess to say, “Our so-and-so is on special this month.” Just by telling them something, then they’re going to look for that and get them to go through the catalog slower.

ANN MORROW: Absolutely, you could even put that on the label on the front of your catalog, “Check out the new products on xyz pages.”

DEB BIXLER: Right, so can you equate, how does that increase sales?

Avon Customer Service

ANN MORROW: Well, at Avon, our focus is customer service. When they start seeing things that they love, and I think it’s very important that representatives, consultants, are pointing things out, because that label on the front of the catalog, you know, don’t make your customer do all the work, that’s a conversation starter.

Whenever I’m out working with a team member and we’re doing some field training and she walks into somebody’s office and she just plops the book down on the receptionist counter, and says “Here you go, call me if you need something,” and then she turns to walk out the door, I’m like, “Wait, there’s more!” [Laughter] So like you said, open up that book, say “These are some products and this is my absolute favorite, oh here’s a really cool one” and then on the front cover, when you find that star in the brochure, you could get that particular product for free with any $25 purchase…

DEB BIXLER: Or half price, or whatever they want to do.

ANN MORROW: Exactly, and if you’re putting a minimum order on there, and that customer has got $18 worth of products that she’s wanting to order in, even if it’s something that’s $1.99 in that catalog, she doesn’t care, it’s free, she’s going to add six, seven dollars to her order cart to get that free product, because it was fun and she found it and she can say she got something for free.

DEB BIXLER: Right. And getting them to look at it is so important. I used to be really good at bringing people into the opportunity at the home party itself, but I had a little gift bag, it was an opportunity bag, and if they said they were interested I’d give it to them, but I didn’t just give it to them, I opened it up, took all the papers out and put it on their lap, and said, “Here, look at this,” because once you can figure out a way to get them to start looking at it, like the scenario that you just mentioned, plop it down, “Give me a call if you need anything, or I’ll come back next week,” it gets piled up underneath other papers.

ANN MORROW: Yes, and you know what? Women are busy, that’s all there is to it, so if she’s got it in her mind, “Oh yeah, Avon” or Party Lights or whatever catalog, “I love that stuff, but I’ve got this report I’ve got to get done, and I’ve got to get home and get to my kids, they’ve been fighting, and the dog puked on the floor this morning, and my husband and I had a big argument and I’ve got to pay this bill, and I don’t know what I’m going to have for dinner, I’ve got to go to the grocery store,” she’s just going to forget, so you’ve got to open it up and be excited about it, and if you’re excited, she’s going to want to know what’s in there.

DEB BIXLER: Right, and you mentioned something when you first started talking about this, after I asked you about willingness, I recently had a survey and realized that a lot of people, even honestly upfront admit that they’re not always willing to do what it takes. Do you have any insight on that, or any ideas? Is that too hard of a question?

ANN MORROW: No, I don’t know that there’s a magic answer to that, but to do what it takes I think you just have to be willing to see the big picture. If you’re going to do what it takes, and you’re going to do things that other people aren’t willing to do, and maybe it’s a little weird and it makes you look a little bit silly, but who cares?

DEB BIXLER: It’s fun when you’re silly.

Grow In Business

ANN MORROW: Right, and if it’s going to grow your direct sales business, and you can see that end picture of where it’s going to take you, that’s going to help you do what it takes. You got to know what the end result’s going to be.

DEB BIXLER: Right, and looking at it more like fun and adventure rather than work. I think it’s the whole comfort zone thing, it’s not fear and being uncomfortable, it’s fun and adventure.

ANN MORROW: Yes, it’s exciting, don’t be nervous, be excited.

DEB BIXLER: Well, okay, so we’ve got a minute and 20 seconds, do you want to give us your website or your contact information before we run out of time?

ANN MORROW: Personal contact information, I’ll give you a personal so we don’t fill up the corporate e-mail box. It is annmorrow.dsm@gmail.com, and if you want to learn more about Avon, avon.com.

DEB BIXLER: Avon.com, it’s pretty easy, isn’t it?

ANN MORROW: It’s a big site, there’s a lot of exciting information in there.

DEB BIXLER: Right, and when we come back we’ll talk more. I’m interested in learning more about how you talk about whether the market is saturated.  People say that all the time, with 6.5 million consultants the market must be saturated, how do you deal with that? Let’s talk about that when we come back.

ANN MORROW: All right, deal.
[BREAK]

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