The convenience industry is very dynamic, and if you don’t keep up with the trends you’ll lose out. This mentality is common when running promotions, selecting new products, and laying out your store; but you should be applying it to your employee training as well! Your employees are on the front line with customers, so the training they receive needs to be top-notch and relevant to what you want to achieve in the store. The trends that impact your store apply to the training you’re giving your employees as well.
Training Trends To Watch For
Customer Service
Great customer service is a hallmark of a good customer experience. Don’t only train your team to provide friendly and attentive customer service, they can and should go above and beyond! Knowing the basics of suggestive selling can help customers buy things they never knew they needed and help your bottom line at the same time. De-escalation training for dealing with difficult customers is also an invaluable customer service skill. Knowing how to handle tough situations well leaves a good impression on other customers while keeping your employees safe. More and more people are looking for this type of training due to the huge benefits it brings to your store.
Store Care
No one wants to shop in a dirty store, and your competition knows that. As everyone focuses on having nicer and cleaner stores, don’t get left behind! Train your staff on keeping your store clean – restrooms especially. Keeping your shelves well stocked is an easy way to make your store look great as well; make sure your employees are keeping a proper eye on things and know how to make the shelves look their best.
Store care is about more than just making everything look nice. Making sure your store is safe and secure counts too – and your staff is vital to these efforts. Training them on best practices to prevent robberies at your store is an evergreen practice, especially when also training employees on how to be safe should one occur anyway. Make sure they’re trained to recognize Bitcoin scams as well, a growing avenue for theft in stores with Bitcoin ATMs.
Leadership
There’s plenty of room in the convenience industry for personnel to move up the ranks within stores and companies. Once you find someone with leadership potential, it’s just a matter of bringing it out in them! Training your up-and-comers on subjects like effective communication can foster a strong and cohesive team in your store now and in the future.
Put It All Together!
This may seem like a lot to keep track of… because it is! Employees operate best when well-versed in all aspects of their job, and convenience store employees do a lot. Fortunately, a learning management system can help you organize your training. trainingGrid® LMS can help you track your team’s training completion, build out learning paths, and make sure everyone gets the same great training experience!
