Residential Metal Roofing Executive Report

System for Selling – Part 5: Exclusivity

Issue #57 | August 4, 2016 | Todd Miller

Recent issues of the Residential Metal Roofing Executive Report have found us reviewing our System for Selling:

Isaiah Industries’ selling system is a fully scripted process and presentation to properly evaluate homeowners’ needs and wants, educate them on available product and companies, while leveraging psychology and exclusivity to build maximum value in your unique solution, and culminating in an exact price and proposal.

In our last issue, we looked at the Psychology of how you present yourself and your product to homeowners. This issue, we want to discuss the idea of “Exclusivity” and how you can use that to your benefit.

Homeowners are prompted make decisions when they discover what they want and who can provide it to them. Unfortunately, getting a homeowner excited about something offered by your company without the affirmation that they can’t receive what they want from anyone else will just send them to your competitors – and this time they will be armed with your bid proposal and other information!

So, when thinking about how to promote the “Exclusivity” offered by your company, you have to ask yourself this question:

What can customers get from me and my company that they absolutely cannot get from anyone else?

In answering this question, do not sell yourself short! Think about things like:

The products you offer
The experience you have
The experience your installers have
The underlayments you use
The coatings on the products you sell
The warranties on the products you sell
The history of the products you sell and their manufacturers
The flashings methods you have perfected and use
Your company’s published customer service program
Your attention to ventilation and ensuring a “healthy home”
The projects you have done that are similar to theirs
Your company’s quality assurance program
Your safety program
Trade associations you belong to
Special training you and others in your company have had
Ongoing training you subscribe to
Your company’s licenses and insurances
Your workmanship warranty

The things that you determine through this self-evaluation help to make up your company’s Unique Selling Proposition. Again, these are features, benefits, and value which your customers can only receive from you and your company! They are the things that you offer “Exclusivity” on!

So, how do you use these things?

First of all, you will choose a couple of these things and promote them on your website and through your advertising campaigns. These exclusives can be great “calling cards” for you to attract prospective customers.

Next, when you do Needs Analysis with your prospective customers, you will make note of their needs which only your company can meet. These then become part of your sales presentation. In talking about the “Exclusives” you offer, you have to draw comparisons to the competition. You want to show how what you offer will end their pain in ways that your competitors can’t.

If you have been in business 25 years and have a solid balance sheet and you know that your competitors are boot-strapping start-ups, you need to talk to your prospects about this. If you have concealed fastened products and your competitors all sell exposed fasteners, you need to discuss this, and bring photos if possible. If you have flashing methods that involve flashing into masonry and behind siding and your competitors just use sealant, that can be a great thing to show.

The list of how to promote your “Exclusives” goes on and on. Let me know if you’d like to brainstorm on ways to do it. The point is, though, that you need to use your “Exclusives” to your benefit and “close the door” on the possibility that the customer may receive the same things elsewhere.

Finally, when you’re making your proposal to the customer, you want to reiterate the “Exclusive” things offered by your company. In essence, you use these things to build the value of what you’re offering and to justify your proposal. If the customer wants these things that only your company offers, then they will need to do business with you.

Good luck with making “Exclusivity” a part of your sales process. It is something that many companies forget to do but yet it is what makes you and your company the unique entities that customers want to do business with.

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