I recently finished Jeffrey Fox’s book on How to be a Rainmaker. The book is 165 pages long and easy-to-read in its bite-sized format. It can take about 2 hours to fully digest the book, but I’ve consolidated its content to a 10-minute read at most.

Summary of the book: Prepare, listen, dollarize, get a commitment to action or a close.

4 Steps that are part of every sale:

1. Getting a lead, referral, introduction to a decision maker.
2. Getting an appointment to meet the decision-maker.
3. Meeting the decision maker face-to-face.
4. Getting a commitment to close or to an action that directly leads to a close.

Rainmaker’s Credo:

1. Cherish customers at all times - treat them like your best friend, listen to them and decipher their needs, make or give them what they need, and teach them to want what they need. Everyone is a potential customer.
2. Price your product to its dollarized value - show your customers what they will get and how much it costs per day/month/year to go without your solution.
3. (Over)-deliver - Make the product the way your customer wants it, deliver your product when they want it, and give them a little extra.
4. Remind them of the dollarized value they have received, and while mid-job, ask about next-job.
5. Thank each customer sincerely and often, and help them pay you so they come back.
6. Ask to do it again.

Prioritize:

1. Target big fish
2. Don’t cold call
3. Maximize your call-to-close ratio.

Prioritizing is an easy concept to understand. You only have a finite amount of calls you can make, so the goal is to hit big and hit the ones you are more confident you can close. This increases your chances of meeting your quota and does not waste your (and your clients’ time).

Pre-call planning:

1. Written sales call objective
2. Needs analysis questions
3. Something to show
4. Anticipated customer concerns and objections
5. Points of difference compared to competitors
6. Meaningful benefits to customers
7. Dollarization approach; investment return analysis - the cost of going without your solution per annum/month/day - the true cost (versus price) of the product.
8. Strategies to handle objections and eliminate customer concerns
9. Closing strategies
10. Expected surprises

• You’re out with a client or traveling - you’re never in a meeting and never sick.
• Sell in the mornings and after 3 on Fridays.
• Park in the back and be the best-dressed person you will meet today.
• Use a compelling voice-mail as a tool - leave messages in the early mornings or the late evenings, and use it to communicate a dollarized benefit to the decision maker.
• Use your business card.

During sales call: Schedule an appointment with the decision maker. Breakfast meetings = positive buy signal, less vulnerable to cancelations… and don’t walk out with your customer. Cut down distractions - optimize your clients’ time by cutting out distractions, and if you don’t care about the answer then don’t ask the question. Onionize - get to the essence of client needs, concerns, desires, fears, limits. Present and help customers decide. Probe for objections - reframe customer objections into customer objectives. Show the customer the step-by-step, agreement-by-agreement process, from first sales to purchase order, and then sell the first step. Give to get - give a drink to get the next meal. Break the ice at the end of the sales call.

6 Killer questions:

1. Do you have your appointment calendar handy?
2. Will you look at the facts and decide for yourself if they make sense? - Begin the necessary chain of positive agreements and commitments.
3. Would you like to know our points of difference? (You don’t need to be better, just different).
4. Is there anything else prohibiting you from going ahead? (Get buying commitment before you give selling demonstrations).
5. Why don’t you give it a try?
6. What question should I be asking that I’m not asking?