Don't you just hate clumsy cross-selling!

It's Mother's Day tomorrow - so I joined lots of other fathers out shopping this morning. Cards and chocolates bought, I also decided to get some stamps and buy a newspaper.

As I was in the town centre I went to the main Post Office for stamps. I haven't been in there for quite some time so was surprised (and impressed) with how it looked. It has been refurbished and looked much, much smarter. The screens separating customers from cashiers has been removed. The queueing rails have also gone, replaced by a ticketing system and there's comfortable seating if there's a delay being served. But that wasn't really what was noteworthy for me about th experience.

Whilst passing me the stamps I'd bought, the teller asked if I was intending to travel abroad anytime soon because if I was they sold travel insurance. A bit bemused about where that had come from I said no, took my stamps and left. A few minutes later I called into Spar to buy a newspaper. At the checkout the assistant asked if I'd like some hot-cross buns.

Now I don't mind attempts to cross-sell to me PROVIDING just two conditions are met:

1. The person doing it prepares the ground properly by making their interaction with me more than a simple transaction. They at least have to make the effort to engage me in conversation and develop some rapport. For me that's table stakes, it's them earning the right to even attempt to cross-sell.
2. That I fell their intention is to help me and that it's genuinely in my best interests to know about the product they mention. It's of benefit for me, not for them and by implication their business.

And usually the product should build on or connect with the product being bought. Neither example today fitted these criteria. In Spar, packets of hot-cross buns were piled up next to the checkout and every customer was being asked the same question. I don't know whether that was also the case in the Post Office, but certainly the teller hadn't earned the right to cross-sell and the approach was motvated solely by his desire to achieve sales targets. I guess the approach is that if you ask enough customers sooner or later one will buy.

I understand that of course that in the current difficult economic conditions retailers need to work hard to maintain sales. And I've noticed that more and more are trying to cross-sell to do so. If it's done well and meets the conditions I descrive above I think it's a great strategy but unfortunately most are at best clumsy and at worst may actually be damaging the relationship with customers.

The really disappointing thing is that there's so little thought going into it. The Post Office sell greetings cards, Spar sell chocolates and flowers - and it's Mother's Day tomorrow. In both places it would have been easy and topical to ask if I'd remembered and got everything I needed. Build on the product being bought, talk about something topical, or don't bother and simply deliver the transaction effectively so that the customer comes back next time.

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