It's On My Heart:
The Sky is Falling..., Not!
I just presented a seminar and was asked the following question: how do I compete against the company doing work for $100 over cost, or under cost, pick one! I replied that I do have one way to separate your-self from the crowded pack at the foot of the ladder to success. That would be to ask questions. Not just any questions, but questions that you know the answers to, that can lead to a new comfort system that can bring some great benefits to the consumer.
The reason we ask questions is for several reasons.
- First, we want to gain knowledge, to see what the answers are to those questions.
- Second, we want to see what the customer's intent is, where they are going with this project.
- Third, we can also gauge their knowledge on the subject by their answers, as well as their feelings and how far they intend to go in pursuit of the subject.
So there are a lot of reasons to ask questions!
Ask the questions that you have an idea what the answers may be, and that lead to areas of concern that we can solve with our products and services. You will have to ask many questions, some may not go as far as you want in terms of pain or discomfort, so be ready with several others.
Questions also build trust, an essential ingredient to doing business with consumers today. Until they like, believe, and trust you, they won't spend significant dollars to solve their problems, unless the other "bidders" are even worse than you are at building trust. Lack of trust is the number one reason qualified buyers don't buy, second reason is no-one asked them to buy, third is no-one followed up. It is OK to ask them to buy, in fact it is your job. When you have put together the best package, ask them to make a decision. Don't say, "what do you think?" They may say, "I think McCain has a tough road ahead!" Not what you meant. Ask "when would you like to start saving on your utility bills? When would you like to start cleaning up the air? When would you like to start leveling out the temperature in the kids bedrooms?" Those are closing questions. Ask for action, ask for a decision.
Now, some facts and figures.
I was just at a business networking luncheon, and heard the following facts from our mortgage banker. There are about 3% of the homes in foreclosure as of the end of June. There were about 7.5% of the homeowners who were behind on mortgage payments or in default right now. She spun that and presented it as 97% of the homes are NOT in foreclosure, and 92.5% of the homeowners are making their mortgage payments completely and on time. I talked to a friend in the financial markets this last week. He said that in an average year we have 1.5% of the mortgages go back to the bank anyway. So we are at 3% right now. So it is not 15 or 20 times more, a factor of 2, not a huge multiple.
Don't get me wrong, I realize that we are in a tight spot. There are more homes for sale today than ever before. On a recent trip to Atlanta, I passed a billboard that you can see from the interstate, been up there for years. It shows the number of homes on the MLS in Atlanta. I can remember years ago when it was at 48,000 or in that neighborhood. This last month it showed 96,000 plus. About double what it used to run. In Phoenix the new home single family permits are going to be about 1/3 what they were just a couple of years ago. Last week the stock market crashed, dropping down to a level we had not seen in years. Then we had a rally of almost 1000 points, followed two day later by a fall of over 700 points. It is a yo-yo, seems like it just won't settle down. Hard to plan finances when you have swings like that.
Here is my point.
What we see depends on how we look at it. If we are hunting for trouble, it will be right in front of us. We may not be able to change the conditions in the marketplace, but we can sure change how we react. I just spent a week in Florida, where new construction is down about 60%. I met with a large residential contractor who had several sales team members over $2,000,000 for the year, and it is the middle of October. His sales team used computers completely, did all the paperwork, even financing via the internet. They would send the paperwork to the office electronically, within minutes of completing the sale. It eliminated paperwork errors, traveling all over town, and freed them up to go to another call. They could sell a job at 1 PM, get it sent over to the office and it could be installed the next day. All the while the rep could be going on to another call that afternoon. Truly state of the art. And efficient. This contractor was excited about the coming year. He had opened two offices in towns about 100 miles away, one west, the other north of where he is located. He said it was tough taking the chance, but when he started the process, it all came together. He had his choice of people, the best in town were ready to make the move to join his company. A couple of years ago, he would have had a hard time getting the right people on his team. Now it is easy, most are working 25 hours, he is showing them 30 or 40 per week. The buildings he has secured are at all time low costs, he can get trucks and machinery at rock bottom prices. In short, it is a lost easier then he imagined, and a lot less money. In one case he bought the phone number of a company that went out of business. It proved to be a great move, he gained a lot of customers for a fraction of what it would have cost had he purchased the entire company.
It takes courage to do what they did, but the positives outweighed the negatives by far. Their attitude was, it is time to expand, we will find a way, and make it happen. And they did.
So try this...
Try seeing a positive spin on the current market conditions. I have had some opportunities myself, programs have been canceled. So I looked at new industries, and have been doing some work in the solar industry. It is strong, and looks like it will only get better. Not sure what your next solution will look like, but we must re-invent ourselves every few years. Do it. Now. Look at your local market, what is happening in a negative way, and a positive way. See how you can move into a new market that may be on the way up, not down.
Just for the record, the companies that I talk to today that are succeeding all have a couple of things in common: they sell maintenance agreements, and are involved in a networking organization of some kind. Those two things will not guarantee success, but the successful companies all had those two things in place for some years, and are now reaping a harvest.
Thanks for listening, we'll talk later.
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Feel free to contact us with Questions or Comments! :)
Sales Improvement Professionals Inc.
Jim Hinshaw
JimHinshaw@Siptraining.com
Off: (602) 369-8097
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