Onboarding retail staff -- how to get them started fastest, happiest, and most effectively

There are many words to describe a new retail employee's first period from hiring to being self-sufficient in the store. We can talk about induction or use trendier terms like preboarding and onboarding.

In this article, we will talk about onboarding in a broader sense.

Before we define the terms, let us look more closely at why a well-thought-out and structured introduction for new salespeople in the stores is so important.

Why you should invest in onboarding your retail salespeople

Good onboarding is crucial for:

1. How quickly every new store hire becomes profitable.
2. How profitable the new salesperson becomes.
3. And how long you get to keep your new profitable salesperson.

But wait. There is a lot about profitability, and nothing at all about well-being, engagement, and other value-oriented words traditionally associated with onboarding.

Let us elaborate.

Good onboarding leads to faster profitability

Put yourself in the shoes of a new salesperson in a store.

When you are new, you do not know the products. You do not know the customers and their typical needs. You do not know which additional products the customer also needs to get the most out of their purchase, and you do not know the POS system or your routines.

You simply do not contribute much that is new at first. And it is a very uncomfortable feeling to feel like a burden on the company, your colleagues, and the customers.

This is where onboarding comes in. If we can shorten the ramp-up period, the new hire will contribute value sooner and therefore deliver profitability faster.

And that is not all. When your new retail salespeople feel that they are adding value and can actually help their customers, their confidence grows. They become happier and more engaged. Which leads us to the next point.

Good onboarding leads to higher profitability over time

A salesperson who quickly feels they are adding value and gets that boost in confidence will enjoy their work more. When customers walk into a store where the staff are happy and enjoying themselves, it is contagious. If there is one thing we humans are sensitive to, it is the atmosphere in a group of people.

It becomes a positive spiral.

When customers have a better experience, more of them will buy, and the average transaction value goes up.

But instead of taking our word for it, look at your own organisation. Take your best-performing stores and compare the atmosphere with the stores that are not performing as well.

Of course, atmosphere is not the only factor that determines whether a store will be profitable or not. But it is a clear indicator that they are doing the right things to live up to their potential.

Good onboarding lets you keep staff longer

Retail is an industry with high staff turnover and a lot of part-time employees. At the same time, staff are the most important resource a store has, since they are the ones who meet customers and help them buy the right things.

In this regard, part-time staff are just as important as full-time staff. It is usually the part-time staff who work weekends – for example, the Saturday after payday when there are the most customers with strong purchasing power in the store.

It goes without saying that it is better for profitability to have experienced and knowledgeable staff in the store to help customers.

Onboarding that leads to well-being and happy employees who are succeeding will also lead to those employees staying longer. Some may even turn what they first saw as a part-time job during their studies into a career.

Why you should invest in onboarding

The onboarding process is, in other words, a key to unlocking the full potential of every new store employee.

A good onboarding programme should ideally maintain the same high quality regardless of which store the new hire will be working in. A structured process increases your chances of successfully engaging and activating your new store staff every time, in every store, with minimal manual effort.

As a bonus, you will over time also find it easier to hire and retain the right staff, as you build a stronger employer brand and become a more attractive employer. When people feel good and are making a difference, work becomes more enjoyable.

Once you have established a structure for how and what to include in your onboarding, you need a system to package and deliver it to all new hires in your stores. This is where a Learning Management System (LMS) plays an important role. We would be happy to show you how Evercate can give you control over onboarding your new store employees in a very user-friendly way.

Contact us for a meeting and we will look more closely at your specific needs and challenges.