1: “Customers buy for only two reasons,” Jeffrey Fox writes in How to Become a Rainmaker: The Rules for Getting and Keeping Customers and Clients.
“To feel good or to solve a problem,” he notes.
“Going out to dinner, buying scuba equipment, or getting a new puppy fall into the ‘feel good’ category,” Jeffrey observes.
Businesses typically purchase to solve a problem. And the solution can always be expressed in dollars and cents.
“Rainmakers don’t sell fasteners or valves or washing machines or double-paned windows or tax audits or irrigation systems or training programs or golf clubs,”
What do Rainmakers sell?
Money.
“They sell reduced downtime, fewer repairs, better gas mileage, higher deposit interest, increased output, decreased energy usage, more wheat per acre, more yardage per swing,” Jeffrey writes.
How do they do this?
Simple. Rainmakers turn benefits into dollars.
“The plumber who generates the most revenue doesn’t charge $50 for a service call,” Jeffrey notes. “He sells a clean, dry basement for $100, saving the customer’s thousand-dollar carpet.”
What about the lock salesperson?
She doesn’t sell locks. She sells security for valuables.
The pool salesman?
“He doesn’t just sell recreation,” Jeffrey observes. “He sells an increase in home value.”
2: The top pharmaceutical salesperson had received all the technical product training.
Yet, she never talks to her prospect about the product’s formula, strength, or soothing aspects.
“The number one salesperson talks to the drugstore owners about money,” writes Jeffrey.
“The salesperson would explain the five-case purchase incentive, then immediately ask, ‘What do you prefer, the cash or the free product?'”
“The cash.” That’s what the drugstore owners say.
When the customer chooses the money, the salesperson asks: ‘How much money do you want?'”
She didn’t sell cures for coughs and colds. She sells a rebate check of $25 for every five cases of product purchased.
Earning more money in rebates means purchasing more products.
The number one salesperson sells money.
3: Rainmakers do an Investment Return Analysis.
The concept is simple and the basis for most business purchase decisions.
We calculate the economic benefits our customer will gain from using our solution and the financial consequences of going without.
“The greater the customer’s return on investment,” Jeffrey writes, “the more compelling it is for the customer to purchase—that is, make the investment.”
Imagine we are selling a lathe. It requires a $2,000 investment to purchase.
Reduced scrap is the benefit. We show that the lathe will save $1,200 a year in reduced scrap.
The $1,200 is what Jeffrey calls “the dollarization of that benefit.”
In year one, the customer enjoys a 60% return on investment.
“A properly calculated investment return analysis shows the customer what it is costing per day to go without the solution,” he notes.
In our lathe example, “the customer gets $1,200 in savings returned,” Jeffrey writes. “It is costing the customer $100 a month not to buy the lathe. Showing the customer what it costs per month, week, or day to go without the solution shortens the sales cycle.”
The power of an Investment Return Analysis is that our customer will use it to convince their colleagues.
“The Rainmaker uses the investment return analysis to show the true cost (versus price) of the product,” Jeffrey suggests.
“The Rainmaker doesn’t sell the product. The Rainmaker sells what the customer will get from the product. The Rainmaker doesn’t sell drills, he sells holes… and holes that are $.02 less expensive to drill.”
More tomorrow.
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Reflection: What is the dollarization of my product or service?
Action: Discuss with my team or with a colleague.
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