Sales training for the optical practice: what the team must be able to do after the course
A sales course for the optical practice is not judged by the classroom, but by what the team can do the following Monday. The seven skills that must remain, the four numbers that measure them before and after, and why training without numbers cannot be seen.
A sales course is not judged by the classroom. It is judged by the following Monday. By the moment the first person walks into the practice and whoever welcomes them does, or does not do, something different from Friday. Everything else, the slides, the enthusiasm, the satisfaction questionnaires, is the course talking about itself. Monday is the course talking about the practice.
I have trained optical practice teams for years, in the classroom and behind the counter, and the question owners ask me before starting is almost always the same: "How long does it take?". The right question is another one: "What will they have to be able to do, afterwards, that they cannot do today?". If the owner cannot answer, the course has no objective. If the trainer cannot answer, they have no method.
Why sales training shows in the numbers or does not show at all
Selling in an optical practice is not a department. It is the point where the eye test, the consultation, the assortment and the price become a receipt. That is why sales training is the easiest to measure and the easiest to waste. Easy to measure because the numbers already exist: average ticket, items per receipt, weight of the second pair and of prescription sunglasses, average discount applied at the till. Easy to waste because, without those numbers read before and after, nobody will ever know whether the course changed anything.
In Where an independent optical practice loses margin I wrote that a single day dedicated to the undifferentiated discount at the till normally brings an immediate increase in margin, even of 20%. It is not magic: it is a precise skill, taught to precise people, measured on a precise number. This is what I mean by sales training.
The seven skills that must remain
After a sales course done well, the team of an optical practice must be able to do seven things. Not thirty: seven, verifiable one by one.
- Ask questions before proposing. Ask how the person spends their day, what they do with their eyes, what bothers them, before talking about lenses or frames. Whoever proposes before asking sells what they have, not what is needed.
- Translate technical features into daily life. Not "progressive lens with a wide corridor", but "you read your phone and look at the road without taking your glasses off". The person buys the second sentence, not the first. It is the theme of Communication in optical retail: being understood.
- Always propose the completion. Second pair, sunglasses in their prescription, contact lenses for sport, a coating for screens: not as an add-on at the end, but as a consequence of the questions asked at the start. Whoever does it with ten people out of ten changes the practice’s revenue; whoever does it when they remember does not.
- State the price without apologising. A price stated with hesitation invites a discount. A price stated as the consequence of the value explained needs no defence. The skill is technical, not a matter of character: it can be learned.
- Answer hesitation without a discount. Have three sentences ready for the three moments when the person stops: "I’ll think about it", "it’s expensive", "I’ll look elsewhere". The discount is the fourth answer, the last one, and the owner decides it, not whoever is at the till.
- Recognise the type of customer in a minute. Those who look for reassurance, those who look for novelty, those who look for price, those who want to be recognised: four different conversations, as I describe in the series on neuroscience applied to eyewear. Not to label people, but to avoid giving everyone the same speech.
- Close with a next step. Every person leaves with a date: the collection, the check-up, the recall. Without a next step the sale ends at the till; with a next step the relationship begins, the one the CRM will then have to keep alive.
How to measure, before and after
A course without a measurement before is a course that will never be able to prove it worked. Four numbers, taken from the management software the month before the course and for the three months after, are enough.
| Skill | Number that measures it |
|---|---|
| Questions, translation, completion (1, 2, 3) | Items per receipt; weight of second pair, prescription sunglasses and contact lenses on revenue |
| Price and hesitation (4, 5) | Average discount applied at the till, per operator |
| Type of customer (6) | Average ticket per operator (whoever adapts the conversation sells more to the same customers) |
| Next step (7) | Percentage of receipts with an appointment or a recall recorded |
If after three months none of these numbers has moved, the course did not work, or it worked for a week and then the practice went back to its habits. In both cases the responsibility is not the team’s: it belongs to whoever did not build, after the course, the way to keep the skills alive.
The course lasts a day. The skill lasts as long as someone measures it.
Classroom or practice? Both, but in this order
That is why the two forms are not alternatives. The Academy is the place of the method. In-store training is the place of application: the trainer stands with the team in front of customers and corrects on the spot. The book Eyemage, the consultative selling manual, is what stays on the counter when the trainer leaves.
The most common mistakes of those who buy training
Sending one person only. Selling is a team behaviour: if one person comes back with the method and the others do not, the method lasts a week. You train the team, owner included.
Choosing the course by the programme and not by the result. The programme says what the trainer will do. The result says what the team will be able to do. Ask for the second.
Not measuring before. Without the previous month’s numbers, the course can never be judged, and the owner will judge it by feel, that is, badly.
Doing the course and nothing else. The skill is kept alive with one meeting a month on the four numbers in the table, ten minutes, always the same. It is the same logic as management control: a fixed day, one table, one decision.
The Academy courses and in-store training are the two forms in which this work is done with Optics & Love in Italy; outside Italy, The Charismatic Practice. The full picture is in the training for opticians area. To understand where to start in your own practice, book a call.
Frequently asked questions
Seven verifiable skills: asking questions before proposing, translating technical features into daily life, always proposing the completion (second pair, prescription sunglasses, contact lenses, coatings), stating the price without hesitating, answering hesitation without a discount, recognising the type of customer, closing with a next step.
With four numbers taken from the management software the month before and in the three months after: items per receipt and the weight of the completion categories, average discount at the till per operator, average ticket per operator, percentage of receipts with an appointment or a recall recorded.
Both, in this order: the classroom gives the team the method and a common language, coaching in the practice shows the method applied to real customers.
On its own, a few weeks. With a monthly ten-minute meeting on the numbers that measure the skills, it lasts as long as it is measured.
The whole team in contact with customers, owner included. One trained person alone does not change the behaviour of the practice.
If this theme concerns a decision for your optical practice or a company project, the first step is a call: we start from your context.
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