It is your receptionist, of course. You see in smart companies, reception excellence is not an option, it is a mandate. A mandate dictated by your sales and marketing goals. This is why this position should not be governed by the administrative budget and department, but by that of sales.



The receptionist is the one person in your organisation who has undisputed power over the initial stages of any deal or negotiation going down. After all, apart from the sales representative who is negotiating this deal, who else in your company does the potential client come into contact with?

“Oh please" , the uninformed will sigh, “any person can do a good job at reception." Granted, it is not difficult to answer a telephone. Answering it promptly and with style on a regular basis is slightly more challenging. Answering it with unwavering professionalism, total commitment to the client and exceptional knowledge of your products and sales goals and how they fit in with the needs of the client……..I’ll leave that assessment to you.

Let’s just for a moment compare the good receptionist with the brilliant receptionist and see what financial impact this has on our business.

Good receptionist

Unfortunately sir, he is not available right now but you can phone him on his cellphone, do you have the number?

Brilliant receptionist

What I can do for you John, is to contact Sipho and ask him to call you right away, alternatively I can try to assist you myself.

Good receptionist

Please take a seat, Martha will be finished with her current interview soon.

Brilliant receptionist

Please take a seat, Martha will be finished with her current interview soon. Did you know that she has just won our employee of the year competition and will be flying off to Rio next week?

Cost to company in scenario one? Who knows? Who knows if the client ever got hold of Sipho? Who knows if the deal was lost whether it was for R1000 or

R10 000 000 (seven zeros in total, 14% VAT excluded!)

Cost to company in scenario two? Who knows? How does one measure the cost of interviewing candidate after candidate, who all refuse the position because they witnessed, no warmth, no team spirit, no brilliance or excellence in their dealings with your company. In short, they were not sold on the company.

I mentioned earlier that the receptionist wields undisputed power over the outcome of your sales efforts. Do you agree with this statement yet?

What is the solution?

Smart companies would certainly do a number, if not all, of the following:

Include your reception area and your receptionist in the marketing budget.

Include your receptionist in the sales and marketing goal setting for the year.

Include your receptionist in sales and marketing meetings or meeting feedback.

Keep your receptionist informed as to who is visiting you and why.

Keep your receptionist informed as to where you are and where you plan to be.

Keep your receptionist up to speed on all your products, their uses and their alternative uses.

Encourage your receptionist to consider her reception area as her own kingdom.

Respond to her requests to return calls and provided information.

Invest in training your receptionist.

If you would like to train your receptionist, visit www.stafftraining.co.za you can book online for Cape Town and Johannesburg, South Africa under the workshops menu. You can also call 0826878583 or email info@stafftraining.co.za to request information or finalise your booking.