Paul Writer launches SAP Think Tank , 
Video interview series with Head of Sales highlighting best practices
Hemant Taware
Chief of Operations
Infiniti Retail Limited, Croma
On the changing role of sales to adapt to the digital age…
I think the first and foremost fact for today is that the customers have a lot more access to information with the advent of internet, customers know a lot more than what they used to know a few years back. To that extent I think the internet is a great source of information but I think when a customer walks into a retail store like our’s they are fundamentally looking for knowledge and that is not something that they get on the internet. So to that extent they look at the sales people as knowledge providers. I think that has been the single largest change between what used to happen a few years back like ten years back to today. Not knowing what to say as a salesperson, you could get away with it a few years back, now you can’t or if you’re ignorant I think your ignorance shows immediately. You could bullshit your way through a few years back and customers will find out a little later but today you can’t do that. Customers come with a lot of information already when they come into the store. I think they expect the salesperson to be far more knowledgeable. Especially in stores like our’s when you walk into a store like Croma, the expectation is that I’m going for guidance, I’m going for assisted buying process and therefore the sales guy should know a lot more than what I know already. Also, I think it has a bearing on the kind of categories that you are talking about so if you walk into a departmental store today, the expectation is not as high as it is in a store like Croma because inspite of the fact that you might know a lot of stuff about technology, technology can be confusing. It is complex. Therefore, I think the customer needs somebody who can reassure them and tell them what the right product to buy is and isn’t and so on and so-forth. This is something that has changed the entire dynamics of selling on a shop floor.
“Especially in stores like our’s when you walk into a store like Croma, the expectation is that I’m going for guidance, I’m going for assisted buying process and therefore the sales guy should know a lot more than what I know already.”
