retail sale
Unknown asked:


The regular price of merchandise at a discount store is 20% off the retail price. If the sale price is 30% off the regular price, which of the following represents the sale price of the sweater having a retail price of p?

A) 0.3p
B 0.44p
C) 0.5p
D) 0.56p
E) 0.7p

Craig

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Jun
30
Filed Under (Shopping) by admin
retail sale
Scott Deane asked:


As a fresh graduate interested in a career in sales, you almost have unlimited options as far as your career’s future goes. You will likely come across a staggering amount of job opportunities and employment options for a career in sales, and you will find that your education, skills, and knowledge are high in demand.

While this is good news, it can also present somewhat of a challenge. With all these options, you may become overwhelmed and unsure about where to start. Too often, college graduates who received training specifically in sales can make assumptions and say, “well, I’ll just start my career in sales and go find a sales-oriented job!”

However, it’s not as simple as that. If you take some time to do some research and explore your post-graduate options, you will find yourself in front of a plethora of different sales career choices. The best way to get started on the right track with your sales career is to narrow down your focus from all the different sales career choices. The sales career choice you choose will depend on what interests you, and where your skills, knowledge, and expertise lie.

One of the biggest sectors for sales jobs is the financial sector. Here, you will find sales jobs in investment banking, insurance, real estate, and loan lending. Financial sales career choices are great options, if you like working with money, numbers, and policies, as well as with people. Further, there is generally a huge demand for these types of sales jobs, as there will always be customers in need of financial services. A job in sales in the financial sector can be very lucrative and rewarding, if you’re successful and willing to put in the effort.

The service industry is another major area in which you can begin your sales career. Service sales representatives provide regular services and introduce new products and services to existing clients. Pharmaceutical and medical sectors are growing and are great areas in which to look for sales jobs.

Another great area for sales career choices is the high-end retails sales industry, if you don’t mind working in retail. They may not be as glamorous as other sectors, but if you know what you’re doing, work great with people, are friendly and helpful, this might be the perfect sales career choice for you. Other areas for sales jobs include collections and telemarketing, which can be great paying with other incentives and bonuses, but also quite challenging and frustrating.

Whatever you decide, the sky is the limit as far as sales career options go, and be prepared to change jobs, sectors, and industries several times before you find your “niche” and perfect fit.



Melvin
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retail sale
Austine P asked:


And know the if there is going to be a black Friday sale on them?

Steve
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retail sale
Patricia Weber asked:


What can salespeople learn from Ben Hur and Mickey Mouse? Both the movie and the cartoon premiered on November 18th in different years. In the debut, the first public appearance or the introduction, salespeople hold at least four stars, four ideas, to better engage their prospects in making that successful first impression. 

What is your goal on the first call? Depending on your product or service, most professional salespeople make the first call a get to know the customer call and to get a follow up appointment. Notice that the primary emphasis is not simply on getting to know you, your product, your service or your company. Unless you are selling pens behind a retail counter or are a retail sales clerk, your customer is not going to make the buying decision in minutes. What is your goal on the initial contact? 

Do you have a good fit for the prospect? All salespeople want to sell! But do you want to sell everyone? Ben Hur and Mickey Mouse, now classics, had a different audience. Not every customer will be a good fit for you, your company, your product or your service. During an initial contact it’s a good idea to qualify and find out if this prospect is a good fit for what you’re offering.

How do you get to know your prospect and determine a good fit? In the movie industry, screenings and early viewings determine if and when a movie gets released. In selling, before you get to the initial meeting, do some research and prepare some questions. First, be prepared before you meet. Either research the company or talk with some of your connections about the person. This will spare you from taking time to ask low calorie questions like, “What is your current revenue?” or “Is this your only location?” It’s more effective to research things like this, or save them until the follow-up call. Then, have a few strategic high fat open-ended questions, such as: “Tell me about your top two or three challenges.” “What do you want that you don’t have now?” “Oh, you’ve worked with ‘The Other Company’ in the past. What did you like about them?”  You’re qualifying and finding a fit during the initial sales call. 

How do you end the initial contact? If you want to hear applause similar to that at the end of movies like Ben Hur and Mickey Mouse’s premier, your introductory call will balance the questions with listening - listening to all that you guided your prospect to tell you. If they qualify, if there is a good fit, then you want to ask for a decision, the next appointment, or make a recommendation for the prospect if the fit isn’t right. 

Movie premiers are all about the movie stars. The glitz and glamour is usually focused on the actors. For an initial sales call to be successful, focus on your star – the prospect. If you have a goal, do some early research, have some thoughtful questions prepared, and then all along the way you have built rapport to continue the sales process. Is a four star initial sales call in your future?



Todd
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retail sale
Chad B asked:


in orlando area,
orlando area, just a land/building lease, (real estate firms do that, right?)

Shawn
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retail sale
Steven Lipschitz asked:


Retail Sales Coaching should be designed to work on behalf of each individual Salesperson who wants to succeed for them, while being part of an environment that nurtures and speeds their growth.

Retail Sales Training is for each person who cared to show up today to express themselves in a retail sales environment and who demands more of themselves. Retail Sales Training is for people who want to feel they have done their best with what they knew, today.

Retail Sales Coaching’s purpose is to clarify, in a realistic, truthful and meaningful way, precisely how each person can perform better. It must do this by connecting people with the objectives of the company within the framework of their own need to succeed and be recognized.

Retail Sales Training Software must work by identifying the absolute area of selling skill, the one out of five key performance indicators (KPIs), which if the Salesperson were to focus on exclusively, would become their best performance enhancer - their best chance at optimum improvement.

Retail Sales Coaching Software should be about helping your company and its people become richer by revealing the truth about their performance, on an individual basis, so your Salespeople can focus on making their most significant improvements in the shortest period of time.

The result of implementing the right solution is that each Salesperson’s performance is increasing at optimum speed, so you can expect your retail store as a whole to increase sales by anywhere from ten to thirty percent.

Any Retail Sales Training system of appraisal and reporting should make sales people accountable for their time by measuring their performance according to key KPI’s, against each other, and against the store average. Unless measurements are taken on a regular basis and compared with the rest of the people on the shift it would be impossible to know the area in which to train.

Today, most POS software programs generate KPIs such as average sale, items per sale, sales per hour. However, they do not allow store managers to set sales goals and divide them up proportionally between salespeople so effectively POS sales reports are useless.

While door counters are useful unless they integrate with an effective Retail Training software program they cannot generate Conversion Rate KPIs - one of the fundamental KPI’s used in Sales Training.

There are software programs available to compliment your POS that will do the job including breaking down slow and fast periods of the day by weightings.

Here are some things to look for in a Retail Sales Training Software Program:

• Store Information Register to record specific information about the store.

• Staff Information Register and Coaching Log to record specific information and availability and coaching history of each sales person.

• Weekly Sales Goals Planner that automatically divides the store sales goal fairly between the salespeople on duty, including taking into account slow and fast periods of the day.

• Weekly Staff Roster to allocate staff to a time and attendance schedule within the framework of the store’s wage budgets, warning when over rostering and helping to improve wage to sales ratio efficiency.

• Actual Performance Score Card that tracks individual actual sales performance against individual sales goals to identify areas of weakness and strength so that managers can coach behaviors.

• Optimally, coaching tips should be integrated so managers can quickly get information about coaching on specific deficient selling skills.

The objectives of Retail Sales Training Software Programs are to:

• Increase profits, decrease costs, motivate staff

• Bring Retailers in line with industry Best Practice

• Filter company sales objectives down to Individual Salespeople on the shop floor

• Focus Store Managers on the two operational expenses within their control: Wages and Individual Sales Performance

• Make Salespeople accountable for their time

• Reduce payroll by Rostering within set wage parameters

• Identify each individual Salesperson’s deficient selling skills each week

• Show sales trends for each individual salesperson and store

• Integrate self-based coaching to give front line store managers’ tips on demand

• Motivate employees by instilling a performance based team culture

• Identify best performers allowing Store Managers to roster those staff more often - yielding a higher wage to sales ratio or ROI

• Reduce attrition rates, retain good staff

• Introduce a system of setting standards, tracking, measuring and reporting results, identifying under performance and coaching for success

• Integrate with POS to produce instant information at Salespeople’s fingertips.

Retail competition is fierce and times are tough. If you want to increase retail sales performance then coaching sales people is vital to success. Successful retailers put into place best practice retail training software programs to help them immediately identify skill areas requiring coaching attention.

Without the help of retail performance metrics you may be wasting valuable training time and missing the point for each individual salesperson.



Warren
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retail sale
Alex E asked:


There is a lockbox on the door for any realtor to bring anyone in at anytime. I have thousands of dollars of inventory, a cash drawer,etc. What are the legal rules on this?

Cody
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retail sale
Money Morning asked:


By Jason Simpkins

Associate Editor

Money Morning


Steep holiday discounts and bargain hunting boosted Black Friday sales, but a dour economic outlook leaves analysts skeptical that Americans will be able to sustain their buying frenzy for the duration of the holiday season.

Spending over the four-day Thanksgiving weekend rose 7.2% from a year ago to about $41 billion, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF). However, a shorter holiday shopping season and frugal shoppers could soon drive retail sales back down to their pre-holiday lows.

“Pent-up demand on electronics and clothing, plus unparalleled bargains on this season’s hottest items helped drive shopping all weekend,” said NRF President and CEO Tracy Mullin. “Holiday sales are not expected to continue at this brisk pace, but it is encouraging that Americans seem excited to go shopping again.”

The NRF continues to forecast a mild 2.2% jump in holiday sales, the smallest gain in six years

Several details in the NRF report underscored the group’s apprehension. For instance, more than half of the 110 million holiday shoppers that braved the elements this weekend went to discount retailers like Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT). Shoppers also took advantage of so-called “door buster” sales that offered products at extraordinary discounts to early morning customers.

More than 23% of the 73.6 million shoppers that hit stores Friday were in the door by 5 a.m. More than half, 57.6%, were at stores by 9 a.m.

Early-bird specials may have provided a nice boost to Black Friday sales, but offering goods at such cheap prices could backfire by marginalizing profits.

“You’re looking at discounts of 50% to 70% off,” Matthew Katz, managing director in the retail practice of advisory and restructuring firm Alix Partners, told the New York Times. “You have to sell two to three times as much to break even.”

Retailers cannot continue to offer shoppers such steep discounts, and consequently, will find it difficult to keep their attention. That is especially true this year, as thrifty consumers have taken a more targeted approach – swooping into stores for the things they want and retreating without taking the time to browse for additional items.

“Shoppers definitely have a mission this year,” Marshal Cohen, chief retail analyst for NPD Group, told CNN. “They are serious about finding the best deals. They are very budget conscious, they’ve done their research and then they’ll go home.”

Also, this year’s holiday shopping season is five days shorter than last year. Consumers have just 27 days to shop this year, as opposed to 32 in 2007.

Analysts will get another glance into the psyche of the American consumer tomorrow (Tuesday) as sales data emerges for “Cyber Monday,” the unofficial kickoff of the online holiday shopping season.

Initial results showed a 2% increase in online sales over Thanksgiving and Black Friday, and the NRF said it expects another 84.6 million people to take their bargain hunting online Monday. According to a Nielsen Online survey, 36% of consumers will spend half of their shopping budgets on the Web, up from 32% last year.

Internet vendors are prepared for the online rush by offering discounts of their own, as well as free shipping, to potential customers.

The NRF’s eHoliday Survey showed that nearly 84% of online retailers will offer a special promotion on Cyber Monday, up from 72% last year. Nearly 39% of online retailers plan to offer specific deals, while 33% will offer e-mail campaigns and 25% one-day sales. About 23% will offer free shipping on all purchases.

“Online retailers have been planning their Cyber Monday promotions for months and are eagerly waiting to debut these deals to shoppers,” said Scott Silverman, executive director of Shop.org, an online division of NRF. “As shoppers focus on price this holiday season, online retailers will be extremely competitive to offer the very best deals. Americans who are looking to put a dent in their holiday shopping will be able to find thousands of bargains on Cyber Monday.”

Of course that’s not to say it will be any easier for online outlets to draw a crowd. Consumers may be planning to spend a greater portion of their budgets online, but overall those budgets have shrunk

For the first 23 days of November, holiday online spending reached $8.2 billion, a 4% decline compared to the corresponding days last year, when online sales hit $8.5 billion, according to online marketing research firm, comScore.

“There was an optimism going into the holiday season that online would weather the storm a little bit better,” Jessica Ried, associate director of research for Resource Interactive, an online-marketing consultancy told TIME magazine. “But this year in November we’ve seen the first online sales decrease ever.”

“I don’t know that this is the only prediction to go by,” Ried added, “but a dire prediction from an organization as big as comScore does give retailers pause.”

To read the complete article click here.

Investment News



Glen
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retail sale
Sasha asked:


I’m starting a business and am looking for wholesale distributors so that I can sell items at retail. Anyone know how to find them or where to look? Online searching has produced no results for me.

Thanks

Hazel

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retail sale
Copper Reflections asked:


It is a proven fact that Handmade Jewelry displays will increase retail sales. Time and time again we have seen that retailers who take advantage of our handmade jewelry display packages dramatically increase their sales and their reorder rate also increases.

One of the most important factors for sale increases in the 300 - 400 % range has to be offering your customers a wider variety of choices. Most handmade jewelry displays are designed to hold handmade earrings, unique bracelets, handcrafted necklaces, rings, lockets, etc. This increases the number of multiple piece sales, “Aunt June loves butterfly jewelry, let’s get these butterfly earrings and the matching bracelet.” When placing your orders at the upcoming Wholesale Jewelry and gift shows always keep in mind that most customers who like a product will also be likely to buy matching sets.

Most handmade jewelry wholesalers offer retail display packages that are free of charge or the cost of the display is offset with free merchandise. Generally the buyer is responsible for the shipping charges of the display. Jewelry wholesalers will work with the retail store buyers to find the most suitable display for their stores taking into consideration space restrictions of the store itself. Large free-standing displays work well for bigger stores increasing the variety of designs, styles and products that you can make available to your customers. Smaller stores with limited space tend to opt for the countertop displays.

Other points to consider when choosing a handmade jewelry display is your stores clientelle as well as your stores traffic patterns:

A) If your clientelle is composed largely of repeat local customers offering a larger selection will increase your sales but the countertop display is probably your best option. Always have a catalogue close by in case they would to special order their favorite design if out of stock. You may want to reorder often so the products are always new and fresh to returning customers.

B) If you are located in a tourist area where you have large numbers of people arriving at the same time, like bus tours, you need to have a good variety as well as quantity on the display. The larger free standing displays will make sure you don’t run out of the best selling designs and more people can view the product at the same time.

C) Keep in mind your stores’ security record, these are tough times and some stores are more vunerable than others. In these cases, when ever possible place handmade jewelry displays in close proximity to the cashier where customers are in plain view. Having sales staff in those areas to help customers will also provide additional security.

D) Especially with handmade jewelry your customers always appreciate extra information so be knowledgable on each product line you carry. Some wholesale jewelry suppliers will go that extra mile and supply literature regarding their products, cards or flyers, explaining how they make their unique handcrafted jewelry. This gives each purchase a personal touch and a connection with the artisans who have made the jewelry.

Handmade Jewelry displays are well worth the investment and your store will benefit from greatly increased sales. Your customers will appreciate the wider selection of designs and styles to fit everyones tastes and budget. In these days of financial crisis it is important to offer your customers unique products of lasting quality and value.



Ted
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