Mirroring

Welcome to the slef storage blog, our self storage diary. Today’s self storage blog comes from Angela, one of our sales reps. She has been taking self storage calls for a long time in our call center and has talked to people all over North America.

When It is Okay Not To Be Okay

As I write this blog I want you think what the definition of a “mirror” is. When you look in the mirror what do you see? You see the same thing as you would see on the other side. In a mirror you get what you see, this way there are no surprises nor do you have to worry about seeing something that makes you look funny or something that you feel is too high class for you. The same thing works for when we are on the phones talking to our customers about storage.
Since we are a national call center, our customers are from coast to coast. Like everything else from coast to coast it changes; whether it is the cost of living, the gas prices or even the type of education that is offered. We should keep this in mind as we speak to our customers. Here at PhoneSmart it is ideal to keep the caller in their comfort zone.
In order to do this we should mirror our customers. Of course, it is hard to fake an accent such as presented in the New York, southern, or even Canadian stores but using words like “our”, “here”, and “we” will give the caller the impression that you are talking about a storage unit that is at the facility where they called; which will make them feel comfortable. It is important that the caller feels comfortable so that he or she will not be reluctant to give out personal information or even a credit card number.
To ease the caller’s suspicions or to avoid the caller being hesitant, speak their language. A person may say, “Ma’am, I have a 2 bedroom house that has a sofa, bedroom suite (pronounced suit) to store.” So in return you should say, “Okay I understand that you have … to store, is that correct sir?” pronouncing words the same that they did in their initial explanation of what is needed.

Although in the back of your mind you may want to say home instead of house or couch instead of sofa or even bedroom suite pronounced sweet, or perhaps you are not accustom to using ma’am or sir. But if they used the title with you then it is appropriate do the same with them. Does it really matter how you pronounce it? No, just as long as the caller and you are speaking the same language.

There are times that we may answer the phone and someone uses improper English and says “aint” or “fina” or even use language that is not appropriate for a professional call such as “yeah” or “uh huh”. Again it may be hard to train yourself to use improper English but if they say “yeah” then you should do so as well. Giving the caller a comfortable dialogue will ease their mind and allow them to focus on what their initial call was about… which is storage. If a caller instead tries to concentrate on how we talk or how to mirror us, it may seem as though we are talking “above” them.

My pastor once said that when giving a sermon or talking to a large group of people, you should try to find the youngest person in the audience and base your lecture to them, that way if the youngest member of the audience can understand what you are saying then the most intelligent or advance person in the group can articulate what is being said as well. That way no one in the audience has missed what is being said. This makes the same sense in storage as well, not only through calls but through your everyday life. Try to mirror the person you are speaking to this way this will eliminate the stress of how the conversation is being presented and will allow both of you to focus on what the conversation is about.

Angela

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Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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