You know what providing financing for your customers can do for your HVAC business and are ready to get started.
The next step is to get your team engaged.
The first thing you need to do is educate your team about what financing can do to increase their sales average ticket and closing rate.
The second is to train them on how to successfully use financing with their customers.
Get your team excited about providing financing by following these steps:
1| Explain to your team why you have decided to provide financing for your customers
Remind your team that HVAC repairs and replacements are often unplanned events that catch homeowners by surprise.
They will have customers who cannot afford to pay cash for the repair. And they will also have cash buyers who prefer to use credit, which they view as “other people’s money,” to pay for the job.
Both of these customers will expect your team to present them with a financing option that suits their needs. If your team can’t provide it, your HVAC business will lose out on the job to a competitor who does.
2| Have a clear plan for how your team will offer financing and educate them on that process
Before you start providing financing, you need to make sure every member of your team understands how it works.
Here is a useful checklist of items your team needs to know for your financing strategy to be successful:
- Communicate with your team they must offer financing on all jobs.That is, tell every customer, every time, that financing is available for them. Otherwise, homeowners can jump to their own conclusions, and falsely assume that your company doesn’t offer financing.
- Highlight the fact you offer financing all over your marketing platforms, including website, emails, etc. If you have chosen to offer 0% down, deferred interest programs, highlight them as well, as these plans cater to cash buyers.
- Train your team on what plans are best suited for what types of customers.
3| Educate your team on the soft skills they’ll need to be successful in closing more sales with financing
Nobody in your team wants to offend customers. And the idea of asking customers personal questions about their finances can make some nervous and uncomfortable.
That is why training your team on soft skills as simple as listening, suspending pre-judgment and presenting options that empower the customer to decide and be in control of the decision-making process when offering financing is so important.
One effective strategy for training your team on soft skills is to write a detailed script for how they can bring up the conversation of financing during their visits to homeowners. Then have them practice the script in pairs, taking turns playing the role of homeowner and salesperson.
The more practice your team has in delivering their financing solution, the more confident they’ll be in consistently offering financing to every customer.
4 | Choose the most effective financing tool for your team
Offering financing can be intimidating. Adding the use of a new software can make it daunting. That is why you need to choose a tool that is easy to use, offers paperless applications and provides quick financing decisions.
Credit for Comfort is not only simple and easy-to-use, but also offers multiple financing options with a single application to ensure you can offer different payment choices to meet various customer needs. With Credit for Comfort’s waterfall, you can offer financing to a larger set of customers because we incorporate Prime and Second Look financing options for lower credit scores in one platform.
Credit for Comfort also allows you to text or email your customers their application so they can fill out their personal information on their own device, giving them further confidence that they have full control over their sensitive information while you keep control over the sales process.
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