FBO: Do Your Homework and Study for Tests
Email this article to a friend
[For “FBO: Viewers Don’t Care about Your Problems,” click here.]
This part of the “FBO” or “For Bloggers Only” series is actually NOT JUST for bloggers, but FOR ALL entrepreneurs, employees, and nonprofit organizations seeking to raise funds to support their goals.
If you want millions of viewers, readers, customers, clients, members, etc., then you’ll want to follow along as we go through, one by one, the rainmaking secrets provided by Jeffrey J. Fox in his book How to Become a Rainmaker: The Rules for Getting and Keeping Customers and Clients
ALWAYS DO YOUR HOMEWORK AND STUDY FOR TESTS
When I started high school, I didn’t always do my homework or study for tests. I foolishly believed that only the not-so-bright ones had to do that. I didn’t always get “A’s” but the worst I got were “B’s,” so I thought that was good enough—till my family moved us to a new neighborhood with much higher academic standards in their public schools. Suddenly, I was up to my eyeballs in schoolwork and drowning in it. I just didn’t have the skills, discipline, or study habits to get it all done on time, even though I tried my best. It took many painful years in college to finally get a handle on procrastination. But, having done it, I’m a firm believer of staying ahead of the curve whenever possible. It saves so much stress—and promotes so much happiness—that it’s one of life’s few, true-blue, really big no-brainers.
In a traditional business or nonprofit organization, the rainmaker is the person in the company or organization who consistently attracts and keeps a lot of its best customers, clients, members, or donors. To accomplish that, rainmakers traditionally met with, or made “sales” calls to, the key decision makers for such prospective customers, clients, members, or donors in order to convince them to do business with his or her people. Rainmakers always did a lot of homework before that all important meeting. They studied hard for that test. So, they were ready to ace it and walk out with a brand new valuable customer, client, member, or donor.
All that “homework” and “studying” for a sales call is called “precall planning” or the “precall plan.” The best rainmakers prepare a written checklist or outline of every point they want to be sure to cover during the sales call. And, they rehearse their presentation repeatedly, making adjustments and improvements each time, till they eventually sound quite natural delivering it. They anticipate the hard questions, the objections, and the worst case scenarios, so they can prepare and practice the best answers and responses for each of them. And, they have studied and absorbed the many important lessons of “How to Win Friends and Influence People.”
A. FOX’S TIP NO. 4 FOR ALL RAINMAKERS
Fox’s Tip No. 4 for how to become a great salesperson, or rainmaker, is: “Always precall plan every sales call.” In sales, a “precall plan” is what you plan to say and do when you meet with prospective customers/clients/members/donors. He writes:
Appointments with decision makers are relatively rare events. Meetings with decision makers are crucial to getting the sale. Because of this, meetings with a decision maker must be carefully preplanned. Precall planning is particularly important when making the first call on a new customer and when making the last call—the one that concludes with an order.
Ninety percent of all sales calls are won or lost before the salesperson sees the customer. This is because so few salespeople actually plan the call. Too many salespeople believe experience is a substitute for precall planning; they think they don’t need to. Other salespeople do their precall planning on the way to a call. Others don’t even know how to precall plan. Some don’t know they should.
Rainmakers never waste a sales call: They always precall plan. It is typical for a Rainmaker to spend three hours planning for a fifteen-minute sales call. Planning and practicing for two days to two eeks for a single sales call is not uncommon.
One Rainmaker spent fifteen straight eight-hour days researching and planning a fifteen-minute sales call. The call was on the CEO of a leading company in a new industry. If this company adopted the Rainmaker’s product, almost certainly the other companies in the industry would follow. The Rainmaker made the sale and successfully used it as a case history to close other customers. This single sale saved the Rainmaker’s company and led to years of success.
NFL coaches spend countless hours reviewing game films in preparation for their next opponent. It is said that if Joe Paterno, the heralded head coach of the Penn State football team, is given two weeks to develop a game plan his team is nearly invincible.
A precall plan for a Rainmaker is like a preflight check for an airplane pilot. The great pilots never miss a single checkpoint before taking of or landing. If a pilot misses something, that pilot may be missing. If a salesperson misses something, the order may be missing.
A precall planning checklist should include:
1. Written sales call objective.
2. Needs analysis questions to ask.
3. Something to show.
4. Anticipated customer concerns and objections.
5. Points of difference vis-a-vis competitors.
6. Meaningful benefits to customers.
7. Dollarization approach; investment return analysis.
8. Strategies to handle objections and eliminate customer concerns.
9. Closing strategies.
10. Expected surprises.
And plan to be flexible. If after sixty seconds into your two-hour painstakingly prepared presentation, the customer says she will buy, stop talking, take the order, and gracefully leave. If the customer wants to do business with you, but in an entirely different manner than you expected, adjust to the change. Don’t be so intent on following your plan that you miss a customer’s cue. Be flexible.
A Rainmaker never calls on a decision maker without a written precall plan.
B. APPLYING FOX’S TIP NO. 4 TO BLOGGERS
If you want to become an A-list blogger, apply Fox’s Tip No. 4 above to your blogging business by always doing your blogging homework and studying for your blogging tests. Remember that your customer is your viewer or reader. (”Viewer” if your blog is mostly photos or videos; “reader” if your blog is mostly text content.)
Just as TV shows become huge hits or flops based on the total number of people who watch them regularly, business blogs only make money if enough people view or read them regularly. Now that we know who your customers are, what are the “sales calls” for bloggers, so you can prepare proper “precall plans” for them?
A blogger’s sales calls are each and every post, email, and comment he or she writes. If you get asked to do a guest post, that’s a sales call. If you get asked for an interview, that’s a sales call, too. Anything that you do that brings you into contact with your existing—or prospective new—viewers/readers is a sales call.
So, how do you “precall plan” a post? You make a checklist based on Fox’s checklist above, but tailor it to your type of blog. For example, for my blog:
1. Written sales call objective: “Get all readers to come back for more.”
2. Needs analysis questions to ask: Unlike traditional sales calls, bloggers don’t have face to face or telephonic meetings with our “customers.” So, we can’t simply ask our readers what they would like to read, etc. Comments and emails are helpful, but very few readers actually leave comments or email us. Thus, our “needs analysis” is a constant trial and error process, an educated guess, more or less.
You can’t please everyone. And, even those who loved you at first eventually get tired of you and move on. Such is life. None of us still watch the same TV shows we used to watch a few years ago for a reason. We just sort of grow out of them, and that’s a good thing. (For example, I’ve grown out of TV completely. See “The Pros and Cons of TV.”) So, you might as well blog about something you love—i.e., any part of that set of topics you love which also happens to intersect with the set of topics that millions of people need or want to view/read blogs about. (For more discussion about that specific tip, see “‘Content Is King!’ What Does that Mean?“)
Instead, our “needs analysis questions to ask” are the questions we must ask ourselves, before we draft each post and after we publish it, questions such as:
- Before Drafting the Post
a. Will this be the type of post my readers normally like?
b. If not, will this post at least be useful to my readers?
c. Do I love the idea of writing this post?
d. Do I love the idea of having this post on my blog forever?
e. Will this be the type of post that I would like to read?
- After Publishing the Post
a. Did my readers like this post? [Check ShortStats, Google Analytics, etc.]
b. Did commenters/emailers like this post? If not, why not? If yes, why yes?
c. Do other bloggers like this post? [Keep an eye on future links, Technorati, etc.]
d. Does this post have a “long tail,” i.e. becomes or stays popular in the long run?
e. Should I write more posts like this one?
3. Something to show: Everything you show on your blog is your product.
4. Anticipated customer concerns and objections: Anticipate your viewer/reader concerns and objections before you put anything up on your blog.
5. Points of difference vis-a-vis competitors: Do you know what you offer your viewers/readers that other bloggers do not? If you don’t, figure it out. If you do (or after you figure it out) make sure you let your viewers/readers know about it.
6. Meaningful benefits to customers: This can be the same point as No. 5. If you have additional points to make here, all the better! E.g., see No. 7 below.
7. Dollarization approach; investment return analysis: See “Why Should Millions View Your Blog” for a demonstration of this approach and analysis.
8. Strategies to handle objections and eliminate customer concerns: Whether you’re writing posts, comments, or emails, you should anticipate potential negative reactions to them and be prepared to respond to them as graciously as possible.
9. Closing strategies: Use conclusions to wrap up your posts and to encourage comments, if desired. Prominently display: (1) links to related posts; (2) requests for RSS/email sign ups; and (3) requests for votes on Digg, StumbleUpon, etc.
10. Expected surprises: If you blog for a while, eventually you’ll get some bizarre to downright nasty feedback. But, if you have already done your homework with No. 4 above, don’t worry about it. Try not to take it personally. Delete it if it’s too toxic. Respond to it if it isn’t and if you feel like it. Your blog, your prerogative.
CONCLUSION
Continue to think of your viewers as your best friends, and of each and every one of your posts as your gifts to your best friends. Keep the above checklist handy to remind you of what you are trying to accomplish with each post and how to do it. In this way, you ensure quality control of your blog and its contents at all times! : )
If you would like your own copy of Rainmaker someday, here’s what it looks like
[For “FBO: Go Where Your Biggest Viewers Hang Out,” click here.]
[For entire “FBO” or “For Bloggers Only” series, click here.]
Be sure to get the latest articles as soon as they’re posted by signing up here!
[For “Future Entrepreneurs Test,” click here.]
[For “The Courage to Be Rich,” click here.]
[For “How I Paid of $50,000 of Debt in One Year,” click here.]
[For “Why We Buy It Even If We Don’t Need It,” click here.]
[For “Test Your Spending Habits,” click here.]
[For “Change Your Mindset to Change Your Life,” click here.]
[For “What Would You Do If You Couldn’t Fail?,” click here.]
[For “Do You Want to Fly Like Superman?,” click here.]
[For “How to Set and Achieve Goals in 5 Simple Steps,” click here.]
[For “Money Lessons for Nice People,” click here.]
[For “Greed v. Desire,” click here.]
[For “Millionaires v. Billionaires,” click here.]
[For, “How to Be a Billionaire in 10 Steps,” click here.]
[For “How My Dad Turned $50 into $1.2 Million,” click here.]
[For “Think and Grow Rich,” click here.]
[For “200 Money Quotes,” click here.]
[For “200 Rich Quotes,” click here.]
[For “200 Poor Quotes,” click here.]
September 18th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
Shanel,
This is another informative and motivational post, with great actionable steps.
As a fellow blogger I work to provide content of interest and value to my readers. I especially liked #9–closing strategies–since that’s the last thing folks see and possibly remember.
I admire not only the quality and simplicity of your blog, but the tremendous volume. You reach so many people and by sharing your personal experiences you give credibility and authenticity to every post.
Thank you.
September 18th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
Hi Flora! Thank you for your comment and wonderfully encouraging feedback! I believe in today’s age of information overload, what people need and want most is a voice they can trust. That’s why I love the internet! With so many blogs, there is bound to be some blogger out there for every reader. Of course, you have your loyal readers; and, I feel very grateful that more and more people seem to be finding what I have to say of value to them! It’s so exciting to be able to reach out to so many people from all around the world — as you know from your own blog! : )