This article is part of our best practice series.
“Don’t let your telephone be your showroom. The goal for the telephone call should be to book a workspace tour.” – Karen Condi, Office Suite Strategies
When it comes to closing a new member deal, first impressions count. And if you have a beautifully designed, unique workspace…why wouldn’t you want to show if off?
Workspace tours are a powerful tool that can help flexible workspace operators close new membership deals. At the same time, tours need to be curated and personalized; you can’t simply say “Hi, welcome to X workspace. Here is our reception area, here is our hot desking area, here are some private offices, and here’s where the good coffee is at.”
Why? Well because giving a canned tour is what the competition is doing. You’re better than that.
So, what does it take to give a memorable workspace tour? Karen Condi, President of Office Suite Strategies, gives us some rules of thumb to live by.
According to Condi, “getting people to tour is really essential to selling the workspace.” To get people to book a tour, you need to have your contact information clearly listed on your website, but more importantly, “your website needs to have a quick and easy form to book a tour.”
Rules Of Thumb For Giving Workspace Tours
–Make sure you understand enough about their business or line of work in order to tailor the tour to their workspace needs.
-Train your salespeople and community managers to give memorable and quick workspace tours. Make sure they know to ask first thing how much time a visitor has available for the tour and also offer them water, coffee, or tea.
-Train your staff to be on the lookout for personality traits that can help them better curate the tour to the potential member’s preferences so as to create rapport from the get-go.
“Knowing the personality type of a prospect is helpful. Analytical people will be offended if you rush them through, while drivers will be highly aggravated if you explain in too much detail.”
-Make sure the person giving the tour has key qualifying questions ready for any scenario and that they also have answers ready for any type of question that may arise during the tour. These questions include:
How did you hear about us?
Tell me about yourself and your company.
Why are you looking for workspace?
Where are you currently working?
Are you familiar with our concept?
Is there anything specific that needs to considered with your new space (ex: window, location in building, etc.)
Since we have several options here at <insert workspace name>, I’d like to make sure I make the best use of your time today so can you tell me…do you have a budget to consider?
When do you need to move in?
-To help personalize the tour, make sure you address the person by his or her first name as much as possible (that is, whenever using the name is warranted; you don’t want to sound too cheesy and that you’re forcing things).
-Keep an eye on your body language; make sure your body language is inviting and keep distractions to a minimum. That includes turning your phone on silent — and don’t be tempted to check it in front of your visitor. It’s plain rude.
-Last but not least, make sure the visitor leaves with your contact information, including an email and number where they can reach you or another staff member directly.
After the tour, you can follow-up by sending an email to the visitor asking what they thought about the space, if they have any questions or suggestions, and if they’d like to begin using your workspace.
To close off, Condi mentions how usually people will buy and opt in for a membership if the space meets a person’s essential needs. However, the deal is likely to happen faster if “you are able to sell them not only on your workspace, but also yourself.”
You can only make a great first impression once, so make sure your workspace and your staff are ready to put their A-game on and give a memorable workspace tour.
