AFTO

This sexy little acronym can mean Apart From The Obvious, Air Force Technical Order or Austrian Foreign Trade Organisation, however, when we’re throwing it around, we always mean …

ASK

FOR

THE

ORDER.

It’s a old school cheesy sales acronym that has a LOT of impact when handled with care. Customers usually want to buy, they’ve turned up in your store (physical or virtual), you’ve engaged them, or they’ve connected with you in some way – usually because they’re considering making a buying decision.

Don’t make them work hard for it! It’s up to all of us when serving customers, to complete the transaction – you wouldn’t expect the person taking your coffee order to punch in ‘flat white’ and then just stand then until you asked to pay would you? They take the order and move straight onto the value transaction (your cash for their liquid gold).

So, if you’re facing a customer (again, virtually or literally), ask them if they would like to place the order. If they say no, that’s great, a chance for you to understand where they’re at, or which alternative they’re considering (que on page analytics for the virtual stuff) or if timing is off (hello re-marketing), or, shock horror, they say ‘Yes!’ and you’ve efficiently helped them achieve their objective too.

Of course, there’s a lot of steps before this and things to do to ensure you’re adding value, but that’s for another post. This one is purely a direct, pointed and not-so-polite reminder to make it easy for customers to buy – ask them for the order!