Convincing experienced salespeople that following the sales procedures pays off, and that there are colleagues who sell more because they follow the network's advice more closely. A company in the automotive sector was experiencing resistance to change from its more experienced salespeople, who considered the advice of specialist firms of little use and little relevance to their specific sector. Through mystery video we recorded the salespeople as they presented the cars, putting to them the questions established by the role-play and trying to prompt offers of optional extras. We edited the videos by selecting all the moments of the "Ideal Salesperson", showing — for each stage of the sale — the correct way to present the benefits of the purchase and the correct way to listen to the customer's needs (you don't talk about boot space to a young buyer, or about safety to someone who hasn't asked). From each video we also extracted the non-compliant behaviours, and in the training delivered to the salespeople we highlighted how these errors led customers to close down the negotiation. This methodology is still used today to assess training and salesperson quality at every new model launch, and it has reduced staff training time. The number of test drives and the time customers spend in the dealership during visits both increased.
