In business, there are two Golden Rules you must abide by to be successful. The first is the Biblical Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” The second is the business Golden Rule: “He who has the gold makes the rules.”
These rules clearly emphasize that successful companies understand the customer’s perspective in the sales and delivery of products or services. For many companies, their entire sales process is designed from their perspective, what their needs are, and what they want to sell. Not only are sales processes developed introspectively, but many times, the operations side of the business is functioning without customer input. Operations are doing things the way they have always done them, unless demanded by a client to do something unique.
Relating to operations, that is Cog 6 in the Customer Aligned Selling diagram where operational alignment is key to helping the client/customer achieve their desired outcomes.
From the customer’s perspective, the Golden Rules say, “Respect me and understand that if you want my gold, you must abide by my rules.”
Another way to explain seeing your customer from their perspective is an example using relationships between people, especially in family or marriage. In his research of family and relationships, Dr. Gary Chapman documented that there are five ways of expressing and receiving love. He calls these the “five love languages,” and most people have two that are dominant. They five love languages are:
- Words of affirmation: speaking and hearing words that are affirming, encouraging, and positive.
- Receiving a gift: because it says the other person thought of you and cared for you.
- Quality time: giving and receiving a person’s undivided attention.
- Physical touch: nothing speaks more deeply than giving or receiving appropriate touch.
- Acts of service: doing something that is unsolicited for someone out of love, not out of obligation.
Go to www.5lovelanguages.com for a free assessment to determine your and your significant other’s love languages
People give love and expect to receive love in one or two of these ways. The challenge is when people’s love languages do not align. For instance, if a husband’s love language is acts of service and gift giving, the way he loves his wife is caring for her car and doing things around the house, such as laundry and dishes. He frequently buys her gifts running the gamut from little things to expensive items. There will be problems if his wife’s love languages are quality time and words of affirmation. What she wants from her husband is his undivided attention and to hear him speak words that affirm her and their relationship. She would like to be recognized verbally and have him leave her love notes. No matter how much effort the husband puts into serving his wife and buying her gifts, she is not going to feel the love. No matter how much she affirms her husband and gives him undivided attention, he is not going to feel loved until she does things for him and buys him gifts. Unless love is expressed toward a person in one of the love languages they speak, they will not perceive it as love.
The Platinum Rule is a combination of the Golden Rules and love languages. The Platinum rule in sales is, “Sell to me the way I want to buy. Engage with me on my terms, seeking to understand my situation, preferences and criteria. Don’t present the way you want to sell. Deliver services the way I want to experience them, not how you want to deliver them.”
Most sales reps were taught to sell the features and benefits of a product or service and to tell the prospect how it will benefit them. In that manner of selling, the sales rep typically presents the product from his or her perspective and tells the client how it will benefit them instead of engaging in a discussion to identify the prospect’s buying criteria and their desired outcomes. A sales process that focuses more on telling than asking in-depth, open-ended discovery questions is not adapting to the buyer’s buying processes. It is very seller centric. Many sales reps wonder why they don’t get a second chance to meet with the buyer. The reason is that the seller was not applying the Platinum Rule. The rep should have been learning about the customer, their goals, problems, or needs, how they want to engage, and their desired outcomes before a presentation or proposal is ever made.
Here is an example of the Platinum Rule not being implemented in operations. When working with a local utility, the operations division, which installed the utilities connecting into new buildings and homes, had the same phone number residential and commercial customer support. That meant that contractors, homeowners, and large manufacturers all had to call the same number and talk with someone in the call center. Contractors and large manufacturers wanted a separate line so they could talk with the right people quickly. The way the call center was operating, there was no way to treat commercial customers any different than residential customers. This system was designed from an internal perspective without ever asking their commercial customers how they could be better served by the call center. If the utility had approached their customers from the Platinum perspective and listened, they would have developed a different way to run the call center, creating separate lines and support staff to serve residential and commercial customers more efficiently.
Another example is a regional accounting firm that was working on how they tracked billing. Customers were complaining about being billed for time spent on things they did not see as adding value. The partner explained it as “gray time” when the accountant may be working on something related to the client, but not adding tangible value to the client. One example he gave was charging the client for a courier service when the client was less than a mile from their office. The internal billing process required accounting for all the billable time throughout the day, but the customer saw that being charged for delivery was frivolous. The Platinum Rule was not applied.
When business leaders understand the Platinum Rule and apply it in the sales process, customers buy, and they buy often. As you read this book, I encourage you to further apply this concept internally with operations and externally with customers. Do to your customers as they would have you do to them. Understand their business from their perspective. Help the prospect buy, don’t sell to them!
The true spirit of the Platinum Rule is just that: think of others first. In the book fo Mark, Jesus said the second greatest commandment was, “…to love your neighbor as yourself.”[1] With that truth, your challenge or obligation as a sales leader or rep is to apply the Platinum Rule and treat your customers the way they want to be treated, according to their criteria of excellence.
The positive news on the story related to the local utility is that one-third of the operations staff were put under the control of the Business Development department, and a high-level operations executive was transferred to that department to help coordinate operations, support sales efforts, and be focused on what the customer truly wants. I worked with the sales reps teaching and coaching on Customer Aligned Selling™. The result was that sales went up and customer satisfaction improved.
Assessment
- What are the core purposes of your sales call: to help yourself or to help the customer?
- How much time do you spend preparing to understand a customer’s issues from their perspective before and during the sales call?
Ask your customers if they feel your product and service delivery aligns with their goals and needs.
[1] Mark 12:31
