How to upsell in a service business (without being sleazy)

While your staff may be well trained at the day-to-day—a motivational teacher, friendly front desk greeter, or ship-shape manager—they may not be knowledgeable or excited about upselling. This fruitful revenue channel is one area that many businesses tend overlook.

We’re not talking sleazy used car salesman upsell. We’re talking well-informed, good for the customer, good for the business upsell.

Upselling is helping a customer decide to upgrade, make a more expensive purchase or buy an add-on. It’s usually a small decision upfront but the upsell can be very beneficial to the customer and profitable to your business.

You can avoid these mistakes by training your staff to upsell well. Here are the things your team should be armed with before hitting the upsell.

Train your staff to:

• Develop relationships—Your staff should be constantly engaging in conversations with everyone that walks in the door. If you’re not talking to people, you’ll never find out what is and what is not working. By learning more about your customers, you can help solve their problems, often in the form of selling them more. Deadlifts causing a sore back? Suggest they attend your Sunday yoga class. Clients who take multiple class types are more likely to ditch their pass for a membership. P.S. happy side effect: customer loyalty!
• Help a new customer be prepared—New students are great upsell opportunities if you carry inventory. Make sure your staff knows to ask a new customer if they have all the necessary materials for their new venture. Ex: towels, guitar strings, mat, dance shoes, jump rope, etc. Or maybe they’re brand new—get them in a workshop to be fully trained. On top of that, workshops are a great way to gain client loyalty.  
• Properly audit each client—Whenever interacting with a client’s account, do a quick audit! If they’re flying through their 10-class pass, maybe it’s time to upgrade them to an unlimited monthly pass. It can save them money while getting them more classes and guarantees recurring future revenue for you. On the flip side, if passes are going to waste, the client will appreciate you calling attention to it to save them some money. That’s what we call a win-win! This goes a long way in building rapport and could lead to more and bigger future purchases.  
• Recognize opportunity—Prepare your team to ask good questions to why customers are buying. Use this new knowledge to upsell. For example, if they sign up for a 10-time bootcamp pass, they might be interested in getting healthier. If you have a nutrition workshop, or 30-day workout challenge, there’s an upsell opportunity.  Always be sure to align the upsell with what’s best for the customer.

Encourage a culture of upselling:

• Educate your staff—More than just training to upsell, your staff should be well-informed on everything you sell—any services and products. Knowing which things complement each other helps them identify upsell opportunities.
• Incentivize the upsell—Selling is hard! Helping your employees understand the ‘why’ and get rewarded for it will increase the chances that they try to upsell. This doesn’t have to be commission. Why not use it as an excuse for a little employee bonding? Put together a friendly competition. For example, whoever can upsell the most this month gets a gift card or gets out of cleaning duties.
• Provide the right tools—You can’t just expect your staff to start upselling like crazy if they’re not equipped to do so. If you don’t already have offers like ‘free first class’ or ‘free consultation’—do it! If there are extra perks to being a member, your customers are more likely to see the value in buying without being persuaded by your staff. This is a good way to show them what they’re missing.
• Lead by example—No one is exempt from upselling! Don’t take a backseat—show them how it’s done.

How do you upsell? Share in comments below!