Customer Reviews

How to Become a Rainmaker: The Rules for Getting and Keeping Customers and Clients

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(12)

 

 

I would give this book 4 stars except the title is so misleading. Perhaps I am jaundiced on this point, knowing many of the top rainmakers in the world in investment banking, advertising, law, and consulting as I do. NONE of them would have become rainmakers if they had followed the advice of this book. They might have become fairly effective salespeople instead.

Rainmakers find ways to connect with people well beyond anything considered in this book. In fact, since no research is cited by the author, I wonder if any research was done to write this book. It has the feeling of being a memoir of what the author has found works for him.

The only part of the advice that I thought was wrong was the insistence on using canned questions to move the prospect along. Sophisticated customers spot these a mile away, and run in the opposite direction. You will simply be manipulating people, and that's NOT the way to be a rainmaker.

Having had my expectations falsely raised by the title, I still yearn for a good book on being a top rainmaker based on the best practices of what they actually do. Perhaps someone else will write that book.

If you want a short book on selling that covers many of selling's important principles, this is a perfectly okay book. If you have been selling for more than 5 years, there's probably not much here to help you unless you totally lack emotional intelligence (in that case, read Daniel Goleman's excellent book, Emotional Intelligence).

As a lawyer and as an MBA that is currently running his own consulting business, I picked up this book as a way of giving myself a refresher course on sales. I was not disappointed by the book, nor was I amazed by the advice given. The book is easy to read and contains 160 odd pages of large font, widely spaced text. I read this entire book during the course of a brief flight from Los Angeles to San Jose(about an hour).

Others have commented that the book contains a lot of simple, obvious and straight forward advice and I tend to agree with this assessment. However, advice does not always need to be complex or particularly insightful in order to be useful. For example, it is always good to remember the value of embracing your client's objections and to develop a client-centric view of the sales process. While this is obvious to most sales people, many of us tend to overlook this principle from time to time.

The book has other fundamental weaknesses. For one thing, most of the examples contained in the book are non-specific and often feel like made up clichés. For example, the truly predictable tale of the sales person who was able to land a huge account by being nice to a secretary that later became an executive VP...

From my perspective the book also has another serious deficiency - most of the examples given in the book deal with tangible products. The author almost completely ignores the often much more challenging and complex process of selling services.

The bottom line is this: this is a decent book if you need a quick refresher or if you are completely unfamiliar with the world of sales. If that is not the case, look for a different book.

I bought the book two days ago and I read it really quickly (2-3 hours). Like other books on improving sales you need to APPLY these techniques and principles in order to get maximum value out of the book. If anything, you will at least learn to recognize good sales people from bad ones.

This book is, for some, common sense. For others, this book is a quick refresher course of the basic principals of selling and finally, it might be a completely new experience for many and it may have you thinking about the art of selling. The reality is that the value of this book, to you, probably depends on how much training and common sense you already have. In general, I really enjoyed the book and thought there were many interesting sales concepts, which I am looking forward to employing to see how effective they are in real life. Fox continually emphasized the concept of dollarization throughout the book and gave examples of different sales techniques throughout the book

by Dan Moreland

Jeffrey Fox has brilliantly cashed in on America's Quick-Fix-to-Get-Rich Culture, authoring the short and to the point "How to Become CEO". This follow-up is another guaranteed moneymaker. Unlike the endless array of Byzantine and boring sales manuals on the market, "Rainmaker" is short and to the point. No charts, no high fallutin' theories, and it can be read in about 90 minutes or so. Or, if you suffer from A.D.D., you'll be pleased to find that most chapters can be ripped through in 5 minutes or less!

But on to the $64,000 question- will the book turn you into a "Rainmaker", the mystical term for superstar sales professional? The answer is, well, just like every other sales book promising the keys to the kingdom of money and success, not really. As usual, in sales, there is no substitute for prospecting, listening and getting the customer what they need.

Not that the book is not a useful guide, and not that I would not recommend it to any new salesman or slumping sales pro. Again, in Fox's easy to read prose, the chapter title basically gives you the piece of advice. Examples include "Customers Don't Care about You", or "Never Wear a Pen in Your Shirt Pocket".

While the book can be criticized as a bit simplistic, Fox does offer some refreshing common sense. Fox stands out amongst all the "gurus" out there trying to rewrite the laws of selling. They torture us with their 300 page borefests. And 90% of them are either Ivy League MBAs or con artists who never even sold lemonade at a corner stand.

If you are like me and have an attention span of 30 seconds or less, but still want to pick up some sales advice, I'd recommend this book. Also check out titles by Joe Girard, Frank Bettger and Byrd Baggett.

I was disappointed at first when I received this book. It was too small and slim to be useful, I thought. Wrong! It's full of good ideas and timely reminders for anyone who makes their living from causing and fulfilling other people's buying decisions.

As a consultant (rather than a product salesperson), some of the product-oriented advice wasn't applicable to my practice. The advice to "dollarize" customers' benefits are easier with "hard products" than they are with "soft services," but Fox does not address this challenge.

Those issues aside, I like the short but intense style, with each of the chapters taking little more than 2-3 pages (500-750 words). I remember watching a friend of mine, an antiques dealer, work with a customer. I thought, "He forgot to ask killer sales question number...," letting the customer leave the store even after expressing specific interest in purchaing an item. The book's style allows one to easily remember snippets like the six "killer sales questions" (each with its own chapter).

This is not a huckster's book, either. There's a heavy message of respect for the customer, fair dealing, not wasting time (yours OR your customer's), and attentiveness to the customer's wishes. Rainmakers thrive on relationships, not "quick kill" sales.

Fox also discusses this when addressing prospecting. He recommends prospecting a reasonably small number of targeted customers and investing time and effort in each one. PLan repeat contacts progressing toward a sale. Don't scatter your time and talents all over the board, mistaking effort for accomplishment.

"Rainmaker" is a valuable addition to my consulting library, and its compact size will make it easy to carry along with me for inspiration and recollection.

A student recently lent me HOW TO BECOME A RAINMAKER
by Jeffrey J. Fox and suggested that I might like it . . . was he ever right! . . . this was one of the best business books I have read in a long time.

The idea behind the book lies in the American Indian tradition of employing a Rainmaker to use magical powers to nourish the crops to feed the people . . . updating this, a Rainmaker today is a person who brings revenue into an organization (be it profit or not-for-profit).

Even though this premise might sound so basic, it is amazing
how many companies tend to forget it . . . Fox says you
mustn't, and he presents a series of simple-to-follow principles
that can be applied to a wide variety of situations.

There were many memorable passages, but so as to not
overwhelm you with all of them, I'll just present the his series of six "killer" sales questions:

1. When you have the customer on the phone, suggest a meeting
and then ask, "Do you have your appointment calendar handy?"

2. The Rainmaker asks the customer, "Will you look at the facts
and decide for yourself if they make sense?"

3. [when a competitor is mentioned] You answer exactly as
follows: "Yes, that is a good company. Would you like to know
our points of difference?"

4. When a customer asks for a product demonstration, the
Rainmaker responds as follows: "We would be happy to give
you a demonstration. If the demo is successful, is there
anything else prohibiting you from going ahead?"

5. To close the sale, to get the final customer commitment, the
Rainmaker might say: "You've looked at everything. Your concerns
have been answered. Time is of the essence. You've heard our
recommendation. Why don't you give it a try?"

6. [always conclude an interview with a customer by asking
one killer sales question] The killer sales question is: "What
question should I be asking that I am not asking." Variants
or follow-up questions, are: "Is there anything I have missed?"
"Have I covered everything?" "Have I asked about every
details that is important to you?"

I'm not a professional salesperson, so I won't weigh in on the pro's and con's of the previous reviews. I found myself in a position where I needed to do some selling, and a friend recommended this book to me. I didn't have time to wade through a huge book with lots and lots of details on selling.

I would highly recommend this book. It's an easy read, and focuses on basics and getting your message across. As a psychotherapist by profession, I even found a few suggestions that are helpful for my practice. By focusing on basics, Fox avoids the trap of falling into smoke, mirrors and tricks - which in my experience, both salespeople and therapists fall into from time to time.

Again, I will leave to the professional salespeople the debate about the merits of this book inside the field. However, if you need to know about selling, and don't have a great deal of time to devote to it, I would suggest that you read this book.

I must disagree with the two previous customer reviews. The reason why I bought this book in the first place, was because of the short and to-the-point suggestions. This book is not #10 in the Morgan Stanley Dean Witter Group(one of the top firms in the world) because of its length, but because of its stellar advice. Many of the tips may seem logical, but rarely are practiced. Believe me, I meet with all kinds of salespeople on a daily basis and all of Fox's tips are often ignored, thus killing a sale. If you want your client base to grow, read this book and use Mr. Fox's advice!

Great book. Lots of great ideas for professional salespeople and anyone else who sells (which is everyone at some point or another!).

It is the first book on selling that I actually read from start to finish. Not another thick book on theory. Lots of action. And the ideas make good business sense. Enjoy.

This short, easy read is a quick refresher course of the basic principals of selling. Mr. Fox breaks down the rainmaking, or sales execution, process into a number of sequential `Killer Questions' designed to turn your sales target into a frienly decision maker.

As a former salesperson, I did find a number of the killer questions to be natural and direct, not pushy or canned. Mr. Fox also goes beyond simple client `probing' and hammers at the importance of a hard days work, getting the appointment and pampering your clients once you have sold them.

I believe one should buy How to Become a Rainmaker. It is a quick read that offers enough unique material to help even the most seasoned salesperson. Will you become a rainmaker if you read this book? Nope...like every other rule in business, the rain will fall if you APPLY Mr. Fox's ideas.