And, rainmakers make big money for themselves. Rainmakers are always the highest paid sellers, and it is not uncommon for rainmakers to be among the highest paid employees in the organization. Rainmakers are rare, but they are everywhere. They are in corporations as super sellers. They are commission only salespeople, entrepreneurs, small business owners, solo practitioners, agents, brokers, and partners in professional firms.
Rainmakers can be trusted to get their job done quickly and well. But most importantly, no matter what their job is, they always do it with the bottom line in mind: creating more customers and more cash. That's why it's the rainmakers of the world who are showered with raises, promotions, bonuses, referrals, new business, perks, and praise of all kinds!
Here is what rainmakers always do that other salespeople don’t: First, they sell more! Rainmakers generate more sales revenues than the other people. They sell more through thick and thin. They sell more in good economies and bad. They sell more regardless of the competition. Rainmakers sell more by relentlessly doing things that other salespeople sometimes do or never do.
Here are some "secrets" of the great rainmakers:
Secret One
They carefully and thoroughly do precall homework and pre-call planning for every sales call on a decision maker. They spend at least three hours planning a 15-minute sales call. They might spend three weeks precall planning a five-minute sales call.
Secret Two
They dollarize. Rainmakers don’t sell products or services. They don’t sell features or benefits. They don’t sell technology. Rainmakers sell the dollarized value that their customers get from the product benefits, or get from the technology. Rainmakers don’t sell MRI machines; they sell hospitals 10 MRI exams per day at $2,000 per exam.
Secret Three
Rainmakers always know the answer to one question: “If I (the rainmaker) were the customer, and knowing what I know about my company, about my product, about the competition, about the customer, why would I do business with my company?” The rainmaker becomes the customer and honestly answers “why the customer should do business with me.” Knowing “why the customer should do business with me,” in dollars and cents, gives the rainmaker a rock solid foundation for confidently pursuing the sale. Learning the answer to this question must be part of your precall planning.
Secret Four
On every sales call with a decision maker or influencer, rainmakers always ask for the order, or for a customer commitment to a customer action that will lead to an order. The rainmaker does what 90% of all salespeople never do: the rainmaker asks for the business.
Secret Five
In a baseball game, a hitter or batter gets to the plate about four times a game. This means that the batter, barring a strikeout, and regardless of whether he gets a hit or not, has to run to first base three or four or five times a game. Even though running to first base three or four times a game is nothing, a small effort in the totality of the game, some players give up on their hit, assume they will make an out, and dog it to first. The rainmaker never dogs it to first base! The rainmaker never assumes he or she will be thrown out. The rainmaker runs out every hit, and runs full tilt, because the few times the opposition fumbles the ball, or the ball drops in, the rainmaker ends up safely on base. The rainmaker never quits in the sales cycle. The rainmaker always sprints, always goes for the sale. That’s why rainmakers are known as “big hitters.” One motto and deep belief of the rainmaker is the “if you, the customer, don’t do business with me, then we both lose.” So the rainmaker works every second to make sure the customer wins so the rainmaker wins.
Find out more about rainmakers with Nightengale Conant products.