Customer Greeting and Engagement Checklist

Walk the current schematic with the printed POG or the visual app. Correct drift on end-caps, four-ways, and feature tables before doors open — customers can't buy what they can't find, and ad-driven traffic will look for the promoted SKU in the location shown in the circular.

Pull the featured BOGO, GWP, or markdown product to the entry table or A-frame. Confirm sale signs and talkers match the price loaded in the POS — sign-price mismatches at the register are a top customer-complaint driver and a refund risk.

Run a test transaction on each register, walk a tagged item through the EAS gates, and unlock the fitting rooms. Flag a non-working register or dead gate to the manager before opening — a single down register at peak loses transactions to walkout.

Eye contact, smile, and a verbal greeting from wherever you're standing on the floor. The ten-second rule is the single highest-correlation behavior with conversion in mystery-shop scoring — even a wave from across the section counts.

If your POS or clienteling tablet flags the customer as a known loyalty member (by phone lookup or beacon), use their name and reference their last purchase. Regulars notice when you don't.

Ask a soft opener — "What brings you in today?" — and capture the answer. BOPIS pickups and returns route to the service desk; browsers and gift shoppers stay with you for discovery.

"What's the occasion?" "Who's it for?" "How are you planning to use it?" Yes/no questions kill discovery. The goal is two or three pieces of information you can use to narrow the floor to three options.

Don't ask budget directly; listen for it in the answer. "Something nice" usually means mid-tier; "the best you have" means top-of-line. Gift shoppers want gift receipts and easy return windows — mention both proactively.

Three is the sweet spot — one anchor, one stretch, one safe. More than four creates choice paralysis. Hang them in the fitting room yourself rather than pointing the customer at the rack.

Cover fabric content, fit relative to standard sizing, and wash care. "Dry clean only" surprise after the fact is a top return-fraud cover story — flag it at the point of sale, not on the way home.

For apparel, walk through fit on yourself or a mannequin; for home goods or electronics, run the demo unit. Demonstrated products convert at meaningfully higher rates than racked product.

Belts with pants, batteries with electronics, care kit with leather. UPT and ATV are the two KPIs the district manager will ask about on the Monday call — attachment is where they move.

Stand where you can see your full section and be seen from the entry. Hiding behind a four-way to fold sends both the wrong loss-prevention signal and the wrong service signal.

Refold the size stack, reface label-out, and re-hang fitting-room returns. Recovery is the single biggest visual-merchandising lever between resets — a shopped-through table looks 30% emptier than a folded one.

Loaded bags, layered clothing, sightline-checking, fitting-room hangers returning empty. Approach with service ("Can I start a fitting room for you?"), not accusation. Do not pursue past the door — observe, document, call the manager.

Walk them — don't point. Hand off to the service-desk associate by name with the order number or return reason already spoken aloud so the customer doesn't repeat themselves.

Walk-up rate to the register is the strongest signal of an assisted sale for commission tracking. If you're tagged as the seller in the POS, the system credits you on close.

Phone number or email — whichever the POS is set up for. Lead with the benefit ("Members get the first markdown on this two weeks before it goes public"), not the ask. New sign-ups are a tracked KPI per associate per shift.

Close out at the end of the shift. The outcome list feeds the shift lead's conversion and UPT review; the notes field is where to flag missed sales (out-of-stock, sizing gap, sign-price mismatch) for the buyer.