Imagine you have never worked in retail, but then one day you are thrown into this very situation and there you stand, face-to-face with a crowd of customers seeking advice. This was the exact position I found myself in just recently.

Who did this to me and why?

Due to a desire to understand Telstra’s retail business better and to wrap my head around some of the latest technology offered in our stores, I volunteered to participate in a Telstra marketing initiative called Retail Bonanza.

Retail Bonanza was organised to boost Telstra stores,  while the iPhone 5 launch was happening, with volunteers  who could demonstrate Telstra Connected Home products (T-Bundles, T-Box and T-Hub 2).

So basically, I did this to myself and this is my fish out of water story.

Tuesday morning I turned up at our Queen Street Mall store, in Brisbane in my volunteer outfit of dark jeans, white shirt and a bright pink Telstra lanyard emblazoned with ‘I’m here to help’.

I was the only volunteer at that store on this day and I didn’t know a soul who worked there, so I introduced myself to Dale the floor manager and the other store employees.

While it was still early in the morning and the store was still fairly quiet, I familiarised myself with how to demo the T-Hub 2. The T-Hub 2 is a good looking piece of kit and is basically a home phone on steroids. Fortunately, this touch-screen, android device proved to be quite intuitive, so no problems there.

Store employee Courtney then helped me come to grips with how to demo a T-Box.  Courtney knew her product inside out and I found the briefing concerning the features of Telstra’s HD digital set top box, while comprehensive, easy to get a handle on. Amongst its many features, I thought the fact that you could use your smart phone as a second remote control clever – look out hubby!

However, it wasn’t until Leo, the store’s Telstra Plus tech, gave me the full Connected Home big picture, that it all came together for me. Leo was obviously a very switched-on guy when it came to technology and passionate about Telstra’s in store devices.

Leo also made the excellent point concerning how having a Connected Home (where all your internet devices talk to each other via a home network) is where the future is at, considering NBN is on its way.

After sitting at the Tech Bar with Leo and listening to a number of customer interactions, I felt ready to join the floor manager and assist when the lunch time crowd started ramping up.

I used the philosophy of treating customers the way I would like to be treated and considering I initially felt like a fish out of water, my customer interactions all went swimmingly.

What’s more, I feel I now have a better understanding of our products and a really good appreciation of the fantastic work our people in our Telstra stores across the country do day in and day out. Their product knowledge and customer focus are second to none.  It was a great experience.

Just before I left the store for the day I mentioned to Leo that I was fortunate to be married to a total tech guru, so I had a very connected home and didn’t really need to know too much about how it all happens … because it just did. Leo was quick to make the point that customers usually aren’t as lucky when it comes to having live-in tech support, but now when they  get techno-baffled they can either visit a Telstra Store Tech Bar or simply call Telstra Plus on 13 PLUS (137587) for assistance – it’s like having your very own local IT expert.

Do you have a similar fish out of water story?