The value of market research and a retail coach

Market research = mystery shopping, analysing movements of the market, sales figures, and more. All these are data = information about how retailers perform. Market researchers are consumers – members of the general public. People of all ages, cultures, demographics, social spheres. Anyone can mystery shop, attend focus groups, fill in surveys. Hence the value of market research is the consumer’s raw view of the retailer, its products, stores, sales associates, services. Because people are different they bring diverse points of view from the customer’s side of the cash desk. The raw views bring value to retailers exactly because they are raw and very diverse. People tell the good and bad of their shopping experiences, and retailers can learn or not learn from the views.

A retail coach brings the opposite value. The retail coach works in the retail environment + is trained in communication. S/he therefore notices different aspects of the retailer’s performance from aspects which shoppers from the general public notice. A retail coach brings value in breaking down and explaining the details of the good and bad aspects of the retailer’s operation and service.

If a retail coach is trained in for example NLP, the retail coach will pay attention to how sales associates greet customers and why the way in which they greet is effective or ineffective. The distance from which they greet, the timing, tone, words, body language with which they greet are all within the domain of observation of a retail coach. And of course much more, such as frequent mistakes of sales associates or how retailers let themselves down, or advice for professionals of certain segments of retail.

In summary

market research usually brings retailers the big picture and raw diverse data of what works and what does not, while a retail coach brings the details of why what works works, why what does not work does not work, and how retailers can improve what does not work. In other words shoppers from the general public feed back on the retailer’s environment and behaviour, while a retail coach feeds back on the retailer’s environment, behaviours, plus also capabilities, values, and identity – thus all neurological levels of observation.

The cons of market research

The cons of mystery shopping – market research are that members of the public who perform market research do not have training in communication, hence do not always know how to communicate accurately. Only accurate feedback has value, because retail is detail and excellence as well as the devil = when things do not work – is in the details.

60% of the population are generalists. Generalists notice the big picture. They don’t notice – and thus don’t know how to accurately define and describe – details. They know that they got a good or bad service. But if we ask them to define why, they won’t define, because their natural bias is to observe the big picture. They’ll therefore probably tell you “I don’t know why, I just didn’t like the way they did x. And who cares why? All that matters is that I will not go to that store again.”

And of the 40% of population who naturally notice the details a third will know how to use the right words for the right meaning, how to put the words into grammatically correct sentences, and how to order the sentences into an order that will make sense to a store manager or someone at the retailer’s head office on first reading. A third of 40% is too small a number to be enough to move retail to a better service overall.

…and the worst (the strongest con) for last…

Retailers hire market research agencies to send shoppers to them. Market research agencies do not treat shoppers well, hence a very small percentage of shoppers will be motivated to write the reports to great detail. The bad treatment plus (very) low fees that market research agencies pay shoppers result in the fact that many shoppers do the absolute minimum as quickly as possible in order to get paid. They don’t care about genuinely contributing value to the retailers for which they do the market research. As a result of this reality the quality of the reports is low = the value for retailers is low. Market research programs cost retailers money, and store managers [who read the reports] time and energy.

The con of a retail coach

There is only one con of a retail coach. The con is that the retail coach does not have the breadth of views which the public has. The retail coach cannot have the breadth, because s/he is only one person with one bias and style of observation as against many people with many styles of observation. But the value of the work of a retail coach easily makes up for this con. The value is in the details that the consumer won’t observe.

So market research or a retail coach?

Market research for identifying where there is a problem when the sales are low. A retail coach for identifying why there is a problem when the sales are low. Even premium brand retailers have problems. Every retailer can learn. Do retailers care to learn and improve service? That is a subject for another article. I hope that this article brought you value if you are a store manager or someone at the head office of a retailer. Perhaps you have run a market research program for years and still don’t see tangible improvement in service. Might this be time to hire a retail coach to tell you why? Let this article be food for thought and inspiration.

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Fear of presenting comes from a good intention

The intention is responsibility to do things well. In performing arts the fear of presenting is called stage fright. It’s the same thing. The intention is responsibility to do things well. When an artist is to perform in front of people who came to his performance for money or for free, the artist feels responsibility to give the audience a good experience. When a professional in the corporate world presents facts at a meeting, he feels responsibility to deliver the facts well so that his listeners understand correctly and act in a desired direction.

Doing things well is another intention of the fear of presenting. Every decent adult wants to do things well and right. The highest grade of doing things well is perfectionism. Most decent adults want others to see them in the best light. We want to show that we know, that we’re competent. We want to be credible and taken seriously. But the flip side of wanting to be perfect is that when we’re not perfect, we can block ourselves. One wrong word can totally derail us in stress. Sounds familiar? Perhaps…

Other factors that play a role in the fear of presenting

Some people are born performers. They thrive on being the centre of attention. Others are the opposite – they hate being the centre of attention. Hence if a person who hates being the centre of attention is to present at a meeting, of course s/he will feel stressed by the sheer fact that s/he suddenly must be the centre of attention! Just the words “introduce yourselves” at the beginning of meetings can trigger hellish stress, because they directly invite one to be the centre of attention. And one will be, because all eyes will be on him/her and all ears will wait to hear the introduction.

The second factor is how prepared one feels. A performing artist can prepare for a performance for years and feel supremely prepared until the moment when he is to go on the stage. Yet at the moment of having to go on the stage when he feels stage fright he never feels 100% prepared. It’s the nature of the beast, it’s a natural manifestation of the responsibility to give a good performance. How prepared one feels is therefore impossible to influence, manipulate, correct, suppress, or eliminate.

The only remedy is to prepare to really 100%. After all, preparation is a true mark of a professional, and the more prepared one is, the better he will handle mistakes, surprises, and blocks in stress. So always prepare as well as you possibly can. If you’re a student, this advice will stand you in good stead for exams! Students are always immensely afraid of exams because they don’t study enough to feel prepared!

The third factor is adrenaline. Many people report that they get hot in the body when they have to present at meetings. This is simply the result of an adrenaline rush. Public speaking raises adrenaline big time. So getting hot is a natural reaction. And a necessary one, because when we get hot, we start sweating. Sweat is a cooling mechanism which balances the adrenaline rush.

The fourth factor of the fear of presenting is the surprise element. What if someone drops something and the drop makes such a loud bang that we get completely distracted and won’t know where we stopped in stress? Or what if someone interrupts us and the interruption derails us? Alternatively what if someone asks a question to which we won’t know the answer even when we feel prepared?  There’re unforeseeable elements in every situation. And surprises are hard to handle because we cannot prepare for them. So here comes improvisation versus interpretation.

Interpretation is following exact text, choreography, wording, notation, agenda. We interpret what someone composed. Improvisation is making things up from our expertise and experience. Interpretation is usually memorised. We have to memorise a text, wording, agenda, dance, piece of music. If the memory fails, we will be lost… until we find ourselves and pick it up somewhere. In contrast, when we improvise, we don’t feel the stress of what might happen if the memory fails… We don’t have to be afraid of how we’ll handle the situation. We make things up from expertise and experience. And while making things up we sometimes even get brilliant insights! So we always have something to keep us grounded in knowing. And the intuition to guide us!

So how to handle the fear of presenting?

1. If you often present at meetings, accept that you will be the centre of attention for the time when you present. It is a fact which you can’t avoid, so accept it instead of fighting it. Fighting or wanting to avoid it won’t avoid it and will only stress you out. Even if you don’t like being the centre of attention, experiment with imagining that you’re an actor, and present as if you were the actor. This plus knowing that you will go back to your normal self after the meeting will definitely help.
2. Expect a certain degree of stage fright. It’s that natural reminder of responsibility to deliver the best you can. Instead of fighting it embrace it as a gift and treat it as an advisor. It’s a natural phenomenon, it will always be with you to a degree. You’ll never completely get rid of it, so what’s the point in fighting it? Now you know that it’s there for good reasons.
3. Always prepare as well as you possibly can. Even if you may not feel like preparing, don’t cut corners, because it is the law of life that cut corners will come to haunt you. You won’t know how to react to a question out of the blue etc. if you don’t prepare well.
4. Be as good at your profession as you possibly can. Not cutting corners of preparing will get you there by a great deal! And always aspire to being the best, because the best have the most experience. The most experience predisposes one to the highest expertise. And the highest expertise is the best cure against surprises. When we’re not experienced and expert enough, things easily surprise us. Conversely few things will surprise a seasoned expert. Plus when you’re experienced experts, people will take you seriously. Isn’t that what every professional wants?
5. Expect the adrenaline rush and take it as such. Just think of the bodily heat as the result of an adrenaline rush, not the result of stress. And thank god for the heat, because you can now also think of the resulting sweat as a cooling mechanism with which the body balances the heat of the adrenaline rush!
6. Concentrate on putting the main point across even if the words aren’t perfect. People want to hear the main points. They don’t care about how good your wording is. This applies especially if you must present in a foreign language which you don’t know perfectly. People don’t care about the fact that you don’t know the exact word. Find other simpler words to describe the exact word or phrase which you know that exists in the foreign language, but you don’t know.  People want to hear the point of the content.

…and the best for last…

7. bear in mind that others won’t see what you feel. They’ll see you from outside and mainly concentrate on the content of what you say. There will be people who will see that you are nervous. So what? They’ll probably see that you’re nervous because they feel exactly what they see you feeling when they present! And that’s also exactly why they’ll empathise, not criticise. The rest will not even notice your nerves. They’ll take your presenting on the face value and concentrate on the content of what you say.

8. Be human! If you get stuck, say that you’re nervous or forgot what you wanted to say or forgot the word… Or turn the fact that you’re stuck into humour. Say something funny or pull a face that will make people laugh. Who says that the corporate world has to be stiff and cold? Even corporate professionals are human beings who like to laugh. And I guarantee you that if you make them laugh, you’ll make them quickly forget about your nerves. And they’ll very likely remember how you made them laugh at the meeting!

If you feel that despite me having presented the advice in this article to perfection you’d like some NLP coaching on the fear of presenting, I’m here for you.

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If the public doesn’t know what life coaching is, of course it is difficult to sell!

The superficial usage and the confusion surrounding the term life coaching is still disturbing even in this day when coaching has been on the increase for decades. I explained the differences between coaching, teaching, counselling, consulting, training and guiding, teaching, mentoring, sponsoring, and awakening. Whenever I hear someone say that their friend is a life coach, I ask to learn more. And then I’ll hear that the “life coach” did some course and has been counseling for just over a year…. And even worse is when people ask me what I do, I say that I coach people, and they ask ‘so you’re a shrink?’. No!  The horrible word shrink is a slang for psychiatrist! The difference is that a life coach helps mentally healthy people refine what they do while a psychiatrist cures mentally ill people.

And even if the public knew what coaching was, coaching would still be difficult to sell because…

There’re life coaches and there’re life coaches. The challenge of a person looking for a life coach is to distinguish which is which. As if the confusion around what life coaching is wasn’t enough, I hear from every direction that “my friend is a life coach” or somebody’s somebody is a life coach.. And the internet is full of people who sell themselves as life coaches… It seems as if the sack with life coaches has ripped and they’ve all fallen out. Many folks even sell life coaching, counselling, consulting, and therapy interchangeably!  So how is a person looking for a life coach to distinguish who is a life coach? And who is credible? What will sell you life coaching?

Unfortunately life coaching is being practised today by many who have not studied it, do not have credentials, and sell traditional counselling,  consulting, training, and pop psychology advice as coaching. And people who think that they practise life coaching are very often caught in the same epistemological trap of thinking as are the clients to whom they sell themselves. Learning still does not respond to the demands of our times and what and how we learn is part of the problem, not a solution.

Many people in the western culture believe that more information will bring them wisdom. When we confuse having information with knowing, we leave out the emotional, intuitive, and aesthetic dimensions of knowing and the intimate and spiritual aspects of our connection with the world. Our current learning practices pursue more information. Most people need to change them to include what there is between the lines to illuminate the path to wisdom and effective living. Knowing is far more encompassing than having information. Knowing requires far more awareness and attention to where and when we do what, how, why, with whom than does having information.

The intangible is harder to sell than the tangible

When someone sells cars, we know what cars are. They’re tangible – we can imagine and touch them. And we know exactly what we’ll get if we buy them. When someone sells accounting, we know what accounting is. It’s intangible – we cannot touch it, but we know what we’ll get. When I sell life coaching, it’s intangible. We can’t touch it and don’t know what we’ll get, because every person who has life coaching will get different things. So how does one sell life coaching to someone who has never had it? The first question people will usually ask will be what guarantees I can give that coaching will work for them. I wrote about that subject in this article. Judge for yourself.

The second question often is whether people hire life coaches when their lives are falling apart. Sometimes yes. And sometimes no. If a person let his life fall apart, he has left it too late.  He should have acted sooner. No, life doesn’t have to fall apart for someone to hire a life coach. A person can hire a life coach for one context of life. I coach on health, relationships, work, money, and success. If someone hires a life coach for, say, a problem in his relationship, his life isn’t necessarily falling apart. His problem is in one context of life. Of course, the problem will surely impact his health, work, money, and success. But it’s not the same as life falling apart.

Money money money…

The third question will often be whether the sometimes high fees are worth taking the risk for when we don’t know what outcome we’ll get from life coaching. We all have things to pay for.  Hence this is understandably an important question for people in all societies around the world. And I addressed this subject too.

And finally…

Regardless of whether coaching is tangible or intangible and whether we know what we’ll get out of coaching or not, one thing is absolutely certain. Every person who has life coaching will get immensely deep value from it.  Value is also intangible, yet we rarely think of it like that when we buy real estate, jewelry, and other valuables. In these cases we somehow see value in the amounts we pay for those things.  And we somehow even imagine the value of those things in the long term… But this perception of value still doesn’t make value tangible! Yet when I sell coaching, most people immediately scrutinisse the value for the money they are to pay for coaching.  Isn’t it fascinating how human nature can work? Why not look at the long-term value of coaching the same way?

The value of life coaching is that it shifts people from problems to resources or from problem states to what they want.  Of course, the person getting coaching has to do the work, but the more he puts in, the more he’ll get out.  If a person’s relationship is falling apart, coaching surely will bring value to the person’s life. And the value will ripple from his relationship to his health, work, money, and success. Everything is connected.

But the highest value of coaching by a professional coach, not by a friend, family, member, etc., lies in the fact that a coach will give you the objective view of your problem, while you, family members, friends, etc. have the subjective view. So if these words inspired you or finally sold you life coaching, let’s talk.

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Especially now at a time when so many retailers go out of business due to far too much competition it is tragic to see how sales associates at premium and luxurious brands let the brands and themselves down by making mistakes which may appear trivial, yet can be crucial since retail is detail. Here are the mistakes and how not to make them again:

Sales associate greet like robots or don’t greet

Wouldn’t it feel nicer, more humane, more personal if you came into a store and a sales associate walked to you and clearly greeted you? Of course it would!  Yet 90% of sales associate do the exact opposite – if they greet at all. They’ll greet immediately after you come in when you can’t see them yet because you have just walked through the door and they’re too far. They’ll greet from somewhere at the back of the store, usually while standing behind the cash desk. You sometimes won’t even hear the greeting. Or if you hear it, you’ll be looking around to locate the voice… Is this personal? Is this humane? And is this warm? Is this the best way to establish rapport? Of course not! Do brands train associates to do this? It doesn’t make sense. And since it happens in 90% of stores and brands spend big money on wanting to stand out,

here’s how not to make this mistake again:

1. observe me as I come into the store. Watch what I do. Am I getting my bearings? Let me do so. And in the meantime slowly come to me and greet me from the same distance as you would greet a friend.
2. Greet me with a clear greeting. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, hi, hello, hey… You can even use some NLP here: if I look formal, greet me formally. If I look informal, greet me informally. Meet me in my world. And also pace the environment in which we are. Is it appropriate to greet informally in a luxurious store?
3. Greet first. Then start a conversation. Ask me preferably something creative first to engage me and stand out straight away. Prepare a crib list of things you could engage me with. A compliment usually works well, because it shows that you observe and is as personal as can be in the context. Just add the voice tone and body language that will make the compliment genuine. Plus, if someone gives you a compliment and perhaps even asks a question about the thing on which he gave you the compliment, you’ll immediately relax, light up, and willingly tell him all about the thing. It’s human nature. We feel great when someone acknowledges us. Hence you’ll stand out and be memorable.
4. And now it’s time to ask what I came to look for, therefore what you can help me with…

Sales associates don’t find out what the customer wants

This mistake may sound surprising, yet is immensely easy for sales associates to make. Let’s say that I walked into a fashion store and want to buy a handbag. Most sales associates either only ask what I’m looking for and after my response immediately start showing bags, or ask very vague or too few questions at best and make statements instead of asking questions at worst, thinking that I will understand the statements as questions! And to add insult to injury they stop after 2 questions because they don’t have the courage – or creativity – to discover the detail of my taste and needs. Hence there’s no wonder that they don’t understand what I want and show products irrelevant to my needs. And, of course, it all takes far more time than it could if the sales associates knew what I want, therefore what products to show.

Another unfavourable side of this is that it makes sales associates appear as if they follow a process, though don’t genuinely care about what I want. Dehumanization again. Surely no store manager would like that from his or her sales associates!  And sometimes this fact has made me as a customer even angry. And I’m sure that I’m not alone.

How not to make this mistake again:

1. ask me what exactly I’m looking for
2. in what style, shape, size, colour, materials, design, patterns
3. with what features – what features are important to me
4. for what occasion – day, evening, formal, informal, casual, sporty, etc.
5. if I tell you that what I’m looking for is a gift, ask questions 1-4 about the person for whom I’m shopping
6. if I now jogged your creativity, write and memorise what other questions popped up. Retail is detail. The more you ask, the more of an expert you’ll appear. And if I happen to a customer who doesn’t know what she wants, you’ll most likely help me clarify my head!

Sales associates don’t inspire the customer about the brand

Premium and luxurious brands spend immense money on marketing their image to credibly convince customers to spend insane money on their products. Yet exactly the sales associates – the front line of the brands – so very often let all that marketing effort down with their mistakes!  Surely anyone who walks into a fashion store and is to pay thousands for a handbag wants some schmoozing and inspiring selling instead of boring robotic basic product presentation and a few incoherent, often badly timed facts about the brand with a few names thrown in which don’t mean anything to the customer who knows nothing about the brand and the world of fashion – or whatever the brand deals in!

How not to make this mistake again:

1. think carefully at which point of my visit it would be most appropriate to introduce the brand. Here you, the sales associate, could educate me about where the brand is from, who was its founder, when and why s/he founded it, what product the brand became famous for, etc.
2. tell me about where and how products are made while I admire and try the handbag(s) of my interest. Point out and demonstrate the iconic features for which the brand is famous. You’ll be selling the brand’s unique selling point. And link the features to benefits to inspire me to own the bag. Transport me into the situations for which I’m shopping and tell me how I’ll benefit from the features of the bag in those situations. This will be the time to show how well you listened to me.
3. Tell me how the brand you represent is better than all the competition.

Sales associates often don’t close the sale

Every brand trains sales associates differently. But even if brands train sales associates to do something to close the sale, many associates simply don’t have the confidence or creativity to do so. They view closing the sale as pushy and don’t want to seem pushy. This is a pity, because you as an associate could also showcase your selling knowhow, creativity, and credibility at the point of closing the sale. And believe me, many customers are more indecisive than you think!  So if you gently lead them to buy, they’ll do so just because you led them to do so. And you’ll have the sale rather than the customer walking out with empty hands. This phase will be a test of how well you used your intuition and observed me. Do you intuitively sense that asking for the sale would nudge me forward? Or do you intuitively feel that I’m someone who knows best for herself, hence the situation calls for letting me decide? This is pure NLP in practice.

How not to make this mistake again:

1. Know the products that you sell well. This is important when the customer hesitates and starts objecting to buying. The better you know the products, the more creatively and credibly you’ll address every objection.
2. Use some NLP in this phase of retail: restate my objection casually to make me feel that you clearly heard the same objection as I raised. That will reassure me and make me feel that you’re a credible leader who listens carefully.
3. Another way how you can use NLP is by using your intuition. If you intuitively sense that I’m someone who knows best for herself, judges and concludes, examines and evaluates, ask your intuition whether it’s best to ask for the sale or rather leave it open not to push me, because you sense that I’ll decide for myself. Or am I someone who requires a lot of your feedback, input, opinion? You’ll intuitively know, because you observed me during trying the product. If I’m someone who relies a lot on others’ feedback, confidently ask for the sale.

Sales associate don’t inform customers about the services that brands offer to clients

I called this article the most frequent mistakes for a reason. This mistake definitely figures high on the most frequent list. Sales associates, you’re there to sell the brand, not only its products!  So sell the brand through the invisible services that it offers. Some folks call them aftersales, others aftercare – you get the idea. Warranties, cleaning, care, repairs, personalisation, alterations… all those services can be the tipping point for buying especially for clients like me who know best for themselves. Why? Because these services act as assurance that if I buy the product for thousands and something happens to it, the brand will stand behind the product and help me with it. Plus you’re differentiating the brand from the competition and showcasing your credibility as a salesperson. What more could I wish for than a brand that will give me all those services with my bag and a highly credible sales associate?

So here’s how not to make this mistake again:

1. tell me about the invisible services either while addressing my objections or while closing the sale.
2. explain each service to great detail: how long a warranty is for, where it applies, what it covers and doesn’t cover, how many options of personalisation I have, what will be covered under repairs, etc. You’ll be using NLP and not even know it – from generalities to specifics.

Sales associates don’t clearly explain benefits in exchange for customers’ contact details

This is another unfortunate mistake which lets sales associates down even more than the brands!  If you don’t clearly tell me all the benefits that I’ll get for giving you my contact details, it makes you look amateurish. You work for the brand, you want my contact details which is a sensitive issue for many a customer of today, so you have to convince me to give them with clearly and credibly presented incentives. A facet of this frequent mistake is that sales associates don’t name all the incentives. They’ll name one or two, but there’re usually more. Sales associates, use NLP – put yourselves in my shoes: the more incentives I hear, the more likely I’ll give you my contact details.

How not to make this mistake again:

1. tell me all the incentives
2. explain each incentive clearly so that a person who doesn’t work for the brand immediately understands it.

…and in farewell…

I’ve seen sales associates turn around and start walking away from me while bidding me farewell. This is profoundly disrespectful and communicates that the sales associate can’t wait for me to go. Again, NLP can help here:

How not to make this mistake again:

1. greet me exactly as you’d greet a friend. It doesn’t matter whether I bought something or not. What matters is that I chose your brand and store. And you never know – perhaps I didn’t have enough money on this visit, but would come later and buy the bag I saw – and maybe more. Or perhaps I needed to go to the washroom, but didn’t want to tell you, hence decided to end the visit quickly. But how can you tell that I won’t be back? And if you treated me well, how can you tell if I won’t tell 1,000 people? Retail is detail…. so never assume nor conclude. You don’t know who just walked out of the store.
2. how do you bid a friend farewell? Your body is turned to the friend, you smile, look at him or her, and clearly say goodbye with roughly the same energy as is the one with which s/he greets you. That’s it!  Simple but immensely effective, because there’s nothing like making a good last impression.

Are there even more mistakes that sales associates make?

I wrote an article that will interest financial professionals in retail banking. After all, they’re also sales associates who make their own mistakes… Are you a store manager? Then you’ll have an idea of how I can coach your sales associates not to make mistakes that cost you performance points… And if you show this article to your sales associates who make some of the mistakes listed here, you’ll have done something great for them. To follow my advice will then be up to them. If I can help you and your team with some NLP coaching, let’s start a conversation.

The post Frequent Mistakes of Sales Associates at Premium Brands appeared first on nlp-life-coaching-2026.

A famous coach won’t give as good value

The reason is that, as in any field, people work hard up to the point when they become famous. When they’re famous,  they just ride on the big names for the rest of their careers. They work, but often to lower quality, because they trade on the fact that their names will sell even lower quality. People do it, companies do it. This happens in retail and everywhere we look. Sole traders who don’t have the name and smaller companies usually give a customer far better value because they know well that they compete with the big names. A famous coach will certainly give you the name, but not necessarily the quality for the big money s/he will charge.  An unknown coach will give you superior quality for far less. So which one’s a better deal?

Not every unknown coach will of course give superior quality. But when you find one carefully, you’ll get superior quality. Many coaches have become famous because of rich friends who helped them market themselves. Not because of the quality of their work or intelligence. There are superintelligent coaches who don’t have the rich friends to market them to fame. Bear this in mind.

Depth and personalization

An unknown life coach will usually also be far more thorough than a famous coach. Being thorough is important in coaching, because coaching is best when it’s deep, hence thorough. A famous coach won’t have time to pay you as much attention, because s/he will highly likely be a slave to a hectic schedule. The personal factor of a big name coach’s approach to you will also be lesser because a coach with a big name won’t have time to truly connect with you. The more famous the coach, the more s/he will likely work with groups rather than individuals. And this fact will also influence his/her depersonalized approach over time. In contrast, hire a coach who has no name and you’ll benefit from a much more thorough and personal approach to you as a coaching client.

Would you like to test this principle? Let’s have a conversation.

The post Why It’s Better to Hire an Unknown Coach Than a Famous Coach appeared first on nlp-life-coaching-2026.

1. Inappropriate sales staff

They employ sales staff that is too young to underline the integrity of these well established brands. Many brands have centuries-long traditions. Yet the major proportion of the sales staff are Millennials. Albeit the Millennials can earn good money, they’re unlikely to frequent high end brands for personal shopping.  Most have enough challenge to manage living expenses and the cost of all the fun they want to have. Let alone laying out several thousand for a handbag etc.

The clientele that has the financial predisposition to do it is mostly in the older years of age.  If we picture a scenario in which a couple in their late 60s looking for a gift on travels enters a Dior boutique and an assistant in her early 20s who can’t fluently speak the language and probably knows less about Dior than the couple assists them, we will imagine where any high end brand’s integrity fails. It would be equally strange to see a sales assistant in his or her 60s in a Lululemon store!

Does the 20-something years-young assistant support the integrity of the brand that markets its products primarily to older clientele?  One NLP view is that these brands would exude far more credibility if they employed staff of an age similar to the age of their clients. With tradition comes age and with age comes experience. Older sales assistants would likely learn more about the brand and sell better to clients of similar age to theirs. And older sales assistants would exhibit far more elegant interpersonal skills and passion for the brand than most Millennials.

2. Language cheapens the brands

Most brands employ staff whose linguistic skills are underdeveloped for the high end environment.  Underdeveloped linguistic skills mismatch the high end environment, therefore undermine the integrity of the brand. They also seriously cheapen the luxurious image of the brands. There’s a lot to be said for equal opportunities, but retail is detail. There’s nothing more embarrassing than a CEO of a global company walking into a Dior boutique to buy a gift and the assistant not properly understanding him. Or not having the linguistic capability to clearly converse with him. If I were that CEO, I’d feel insulted for the brand wanting to charge me thousands for a bag, yet giving me an assistant who can’t clearly communicate.  There goes the luxury again, doesn’t it?

3.  Retail staff doesn’t sell

Sales assistants do not sell the brands’ services to clients.  If a client walks into a fashion boutique and is expected to pay thousands for something, the client has the right to expect service.  In fact, the service is included in the high price of the products. Assistants should actively sell all the brand services as unique selling points.  They should proactively inform clients about product repairs and maintenance, personalizing of products, ordering and delivering options, and options of looking products up at other boutiques.  All this in synergy would increase high end brands’ credibility in the eyes and hearts of clients who, being in their older years of age, know a few things about life and have expectations of what luxury should represent – comprehensive service.

NLP and high end retail

have a lot of synergy. As a coach in retail I can help you discover and use that synergy to your (brand’s) best benefit. Shall we have a conversation?

The post NLP and Retail – How High End Brands Let Themselves Down appeared first on nlp-life-coaching-2026.

Write or draw it – retail banking is visual too!

Whenever a new customer comes to you to enquire about your banking / financial products, have a blank sheet of paper ready to write on.  Banking involves numbers and numbers are a visual science. Hence banking needs visual references.  I’ve experienced only 20% of retail banking professionals who realize this and draw numbers and figures on paper while explaining them. The remaining 80% talk like a radio and often get themselves and the customer lost in the talk!

Writing numbers and drawing figures while you’re explaining them to the customer will inevitably force you to keep your explanations clear, short, sharp, to the point.  While talking without the support of visual reference can easily go off on a tangent and around in circles, talking supported by visual reference keeps you on track.

Observe – retail is detail and NLP supplies it!

Especially if you’re a financial professional with a highly mathematical brain you’ll likely be immensely knowledgeable about your banking products and the financial markets. But you may be bad at calibrating to the customer’s body language.  Learn to be attuned to your environment. Observe the customer’s body language.  Is s/he taking notes?  If yes, wait for cues that s/he is ready to proceed.  Is s/he fumbling around in the bag for a pen?  Observe, wait, sense, and continue speaking when you see that the customer is listening. And if you’re really good, you’ll even offer a pen!

Be procedural

Customers who come to enquire about banking / financial products want responses structured in the a-b-c, step by step form.  Questions beginning with where, when, what, and how seek step by step answers. Questions beginning with why accommodate options.

Speak to the point

Always respond EXACTLY to the content of the customer’s question. Then, if you wish, add explaining products in other areas of banking then the area which the customer asked about.  If a customer asks about the types of accounts that your bank offers, combine all the tips in this article and tell him/her about the types of accounts. Don’t go into credit cards.

If you want to explain about credit cards, finish explaining the accounts and THEN introduce credit cards. You can say something like: “Some of our accounts have credit cards associated with them for your grater benefit.  Would you like to know about any of them?”  This will give the customer a sense of structure and completion to your response, prepare him/her for the second topic, and give him/her the option to hear or not to hear about the second topic. This approach will also save time and energy if the customer does not want to hear about credit cards.

Watch your state

Be especially careful about your state of being all the time during your interaction with a customer.  People are immensely accurate at picking up subtle energies from you. They’ll quickly sense when you can’t wait to finish with them, or when you’re pushy for a sale, or when you’re so eager to help that you go into hyper mode and become tense, breathe high in the chest, and speak quickly and incessantly like a robot.  Relax, breathe, be physically and mentally comfortable, enjoy the job. Or get out of it if you don’t totally enjoy working with people!  False smiles and acting won’t get the sale.

Keep it private

Respect people’s privacy and show them that you DO respect it!  There’s nothing I hate more than when I go to a bank and the door of the office stays wide open for the branch to hear my financial circumstances!  An even worse case is when the advisor opens the conversation with a question about my financial circumstances WHILE WALKING INTO THE OFFICE!  Wait till the customer is sitting in the office and shut the door to show that you value his/her privacy. Then start talking.

Small talk doesn’t make you different

If you want to establish rapport, you don’t have to do it with small talk!  Take time to observe the customer’s verbal and nonverbal communication. It will give you a choice to establish rapport by subtly matching the customer’s voice tone, volume, speed of speech, posture, gestures, amount of eye contact, head nodding, smiling, etc. Skipping small talk will actually make you stand out. The reason is that small talk is so common and standard that people don’t pay attention to it anymore. And there are even people whom small talk insults and annoys!

Speak slowly and pause frequently.  People will see you as credible and credibility is reassuring. And you’ll give space for the customer to process the information.

NLP for retail banking

If you’re a retail or investment banking or financial professional interested in enriching your personal and professional life with NLP, let’s talk about it.

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