How SportScheck are changing the game of sports retail
Rated the no. 1 sports retailer in Germany, SportScheck is on a mission to give their customers the ultimate sports experience by exciting, improving and supporting their customers and athletes. The employees are central to SportScheck, giving their customers unique, personalized experiences. But to give such a high level of service, you need training to match.
We met SportScheck CEO, Matthias Rucker, and Employer Brand and People Development team members, Jessica vom Brocke and Anna Kraft, to find out how their Attensi platform, SportScheck SKILLS, has changed the game for this sporting giant.
What were the training challenges before Attensi?
Bringing people together
One of the biggest challenges faced by the SportScheck team when it came to previous training was bringing their widespread team together.
With over 30 stores throughout Germany, from Berlin to Munich, Jessi, Anna and the rest of the People Development team wanted to make sure every employee got the same high-quality training. With so many different brands in store, Jessi tells us how they’ve faced challenges bringing all that brand and product knowledge together under one roof. And even if they could, delivering it consistently to the whole team was incredibly tough.
Finding new, exciting ways to train
While SportScheck still uses a mixture of materials to train – ranging from handbooks, PDF resources, and Teams calls – they knew they wanted to add another level of depth to both skills and product training.
Something practical that could really help store employees feel prepared for life in front of customers.
Enter Attensi
SportSheck SKILLS was the product of a close collaboration between SportScheck and Attensi. Combining a series of games and simulations, employees now have a new, exciting way to explore and develop their skills and their product and brand knowledge.
“It offers a completely new way of training employees. We can combine all sorts of different training and skills in one platform.”
– Matthias Rucker, CEO, SportScheck
Sportscheck decided to begin by improving the conversion rate, followed by additional sales skills training on upselling and cross-selling. The flexible, easy-to-use nature of CREATOR means they’re now adding new modules every day. The most recent being ‘Outdoor’ which is the first training category centering more around product and brand knowledge.
“[CREATOR] is a great tool. And there’s still so much we’re exploring. I’m happy it’s part of my daily business,” said Jessica vom Brocke, Employer Brand and People Development Team Member, SportScheck.
“I was skeptical about creating content at first. But after CREATOR training, it was super easy, and you don’t have to be part of the IT staff to do it. All you need is a good story.” added Anna Kraft, Employer Brand and People Development Team Member, SportScheck.
The all-important first impressions
One of the biggest compliments we can get on our training is that teams have fun doing it, and importantly, look forward to doing it again.
Jessi tells us how one of the most common pieces of feedback they receive is everyone loves how flexible it is. They can play whenever, wherever on whatever device suits them best – solving the challenge of delivering consistent, high-quality training to staff members in every store throughout the country.
The simulation element adds a new layer of practical training the SportScheck team hadn’t seen before.
“The training feels very real. You’re in a customer-facing situation that you wouldn’t get in other training. It feels very tangible and real. The realism is important because it helps you feel prepared.”
– Matthias Rucker, CEO, SportScheck
The results
We’re in the world of sports after all. You want to know the results.
Jessi and Anna explain how the ability to really measure, and track results has made a real difference to the effectiveness of training. Within their Attensi platform, they can clearly see who’s played, how many times they’ve played, and how successful they’ve been.
Adding in a player survey after the modules has also allowed them to find out whether the training has been enjoyable to do.
And the outcomes have been pretty impressive:
✅ 94% said they like the training and find it relevant to their day-to-day role.
✅ More than 7 playthroughs per module on average.
Now full of confidence in CREATOR, Jessi and Anna are continually adding new modules. They hope to continue empowering the SportScheck team to give the best sporting experiences on the market.
As Matthias says, “This is just the beginning.”
If you’d like to add some flare and fun to your retail training, speak to one of our game-changing Attensi team today: