Creating Rainmakers

Every manager of a professional firm realizes that generating leads and landing new clients are critical components of any successful business venture. But transforming accountants, architects, attorneys, consultants, engineers, and other professionals into client-generators is not always easy to do. Divided into two comprehensive parts-The Rainmaker Model and The Elements of Rainmaking-Creating Rainmakers outlines all the steps you should take to turn your professional staff into a powerful team of sales winners. Filled with in-depth insight and practical advice, this book will show you how to: * Generate leads * Build a strong network of contacts * Master a variety of sales techniques * Develop capable successors to current rainmakers * And much more Based on more than 100 interviews with the principals of professional firms, including many of today's preeminent rainmakers, this valuable guide has the information you need to help your company succeed.

Acknowledgments. Introduction. Part I: The Rainmaker Model. 1. What Is a Rainmaker? 2. What Rainmakers Know or the Mathematics of Selling. 3. How Rainmakers Think or the Skill of Optimism. 4. What Rainmakers Do or the Power of Systems. 5. Limits to the Rainmaker Model. Part II: The Elements of Rainmaking. 6. Targeting and Positioning. 7. Creating Value with Ideas. 8. Finding a Lead Generation Approach That Works. 9. Building Relationships That Produce Business. 10. Questioning and Synthesizing Methods. 11. Anecdotal Selling. 12. Finessing a Sale. 13. After You Are Hired. 14. Creating Rainmakers. Conclusion. Introduction to Appendices. Appendix A: Recruiting Rainmakers by Terence Gallagher. Appendix B: Compensating Professionals for Making Rain: A Tale of Two Law Firms  by J. Mark Santiago. Appendix C: Three Legs of a Stool: The Decisions That Shape the Marketing Function by Abigail J. Gouverneur and John Bliss. Appendix D: Creating Presenters by Sims Wyeth. Endnotes. Index.