Different Types of Buyers for Service Companies

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As a business, you want to be able to serve a broad range of customers. But regardless of what brand you sell, there are only so many different systems you can offer. So how do you guide your customers to the option that will work best for their situation every single time?

In this week’s episode of Cracking the Code, Contractor University faculty member Drew Cameron explains how to structure your price guide and market yourself to be able to cater towards the needs of every customer!

Audio Transcription (in Beta)

On today’s show, you can learn all about the different types of buyers on cracking the code.

Okay, let’s get started with this week’s content. Today we have Mr. Drew Cameron, the one and only is going to talk about buyer types, money and payment conditioning. Take it away, Drew. Welcome to another edition of cracking the code. I am Drew Cameron with Flow Odyssey here for Contractor University powered by EGIA.

And today we are going to talk about buyer types and money and payment conditioning. These are some techniques that you have to basically be prepared to do and address as a comfort advisor when you’re in the home. And we get into the detail of this in the Elevated Consumer Buying Experience training as part of teaching you the entire sales process and sales skills.

Again, but this is a subset of that training and I wanted to kind of go ahead and share that with you here today. So let’s dive into the content. All right, Buyer Types. And so when we talk about Buyer Types, there are typically three types of buyers for any product and service out there. In any industry for that matter, right?

And again, people may look at them and call them different things but again, you’ll get the idea and the concept. You have basically three types of buyers and they’re those who basically want the premium overall best total experience. That’s their focus, right? And then you have, and that’s at the upper end of the range, right?

And then you have, at the other end of the range, those who are looking for an economic experience. They’re focused mostly on the initial investment, uh, they, it’s not that they’re cheap, but they’re basically more economical, for whatever their reasons are. Maybe they, they think that they’re moving. Maybe they don’t value comfort as much as somebody else does.

Um, maybe this is an investment property or a rental property for them. Alright. It doesn’t matter what the reasons, it’s their, you know, people buy for their reasons. It doesn’t matter what they are. It’s our job to understand what their reasons are and then embrace them. And then you have those that are looking for the, what we call the best total overall value experience.

And tho they basically are looking at that overall value, focus and value for their dollar. It’s like they want something really good, but they don’t want to break the bank to get it. But they also don’t want the cheapest thing out there. They want something kind of more middle of the road. All right, and so what’s available today from manufacturers is about seven levels from most manufacturers, about seven levels of experiences that are available to those buyers.

Okay, because what we have found is that, again, you may find different things in your company, but on average, what my business partner Russ and I have found across the broad scope of the people that we’ve worked with since we’ve been doing training, coaching, and consulting since 1999, Is that about 21 percent of the people, uh, are looking for the premium experience.

About, uh, 7 percent of the people are looking for the economic experience. And 72 percent of the people, the lion’s share of them, are looking for something right there in the middle. And that’s not surprising. You’ve heard about the bell curve, right? It’s the 80 20 rule, right? It’s 80 percent at the top, 10 percent on either side.

Well, this kind of reflects that. Now, again, our ultimate goal is to shift the mix of product and drive people towards premium experiences, right? Because they get a better life experience, and obviously as an organization, we can provide more value, more service to people, and of course, we make more money as an organization, as well as individuals.

And so that’s ultimately what we would like to see happen, but it doesn’t matter what the customer does, right? Because anything that we do for them is going to be better than anything that they have, And in my mind will be better than anything anybody else in the marketplace would do for them. I always believe that my people that have called me out to see them not necessarily my customer But the people who called me out to see them Are always going to be best served by me and my people and my company and my processes Than any other company in town that doesn’t mean that, you know, we’re right for everybody We may not be because we’re not right for everybody.

Okay, and that’s okay. You have to be okay with that. We’re gonna do things the way we do things, and we’re not gonna apologize for what it is that we charge. There is nobody that does what we do to the level of what we do, as good as we do, For as little as we charge. Again, that doesn’t make us the most expensive.

It makes us the most economical, the most value oriented, the, you know, the best value for your dollar, if you will. Again, doesn’t mean that we’re right for everybody and that’s okay. So that being said, you have premium experience, value experience, economic experience. Underneath that, you’re going to have risk free solutions.

Meaning that once I quote a job, and we’re not going to get into the details of that today, but I’m going to set the table for you. Once I quote the job. Okay. You can’t lose as a customer, right? No surprises, no compromises, no excuses guaranteed. We’re going to do what we said we’re going to do to achieve the result that we said we would provide even if I missed something or forgot something or didn’t see something.

And so it’s a risk free solution in that capacity. In addition to the fact that everything that we do comes with a 100 percent unconditional money back guarantee. Okay. The four upper end solutions of the, of what you’re looking at on this page are going to be guaranteed for two years. Money back guarantee and the three entry level solutions or the bottom solutions there are going to be guaranteed money back for one year, meaning you’re going to get four seasons to kick the tires at the entry level stuff.

You’ll get eight seasons to kick the tires, um, you know, at the top, uh, at the top four levels. If you think about it from a car perspective, you get 24, 000 miles at the top four levels, you get 12, 000 miles at the bottom four levels. Here’s the interesting thing about cars. If you were to go and put 000 miles on any of those vehicles, and then take them back to the dealer and say, you know what, I’m just not happy with the vehicle.

I’m not happy with the way that it performed. Here are the keys I’d like to get all my money back. Okay, they, every car company is in the fortune 500 and not one of them would give you your money back. They don’t stand behind their products to the level that we, to which we do. Quite frankly, we feel that our customers deserve it and you should demand that as a homeowner.

Whenever you invite anybody into your house, they need to make you whole, make you, make things right by you. Now, that’s all I’m asking as part of my money back guarantees. And again, we teach that in the sales train. But for purposes of covering what we call buyer types here, What are we talking about? Now, we don’t use brand names, models, efficiencies, and capacities in our price guide.

Our investment guide basically comes up with names of the solutions that are consistent with what you get, right? The experience that you’re going to have. So Comfort Royale, Prestige, Collection, Signature Series, Select Air, Premier Performance, Prime Value, and Base Value. And then below that there might be a small statement about how that product is positioned.

So the one at the far left in the royal blue, hence comfort royal, is the most efficient. It’s the highest efficient system. The next step down in the platinum color, and again we don’t use gold, silver, platinum, bronze, or diamonds and pearls and rubies and things like that, because that puts value a value statement on that, on the solutions.

We don’t want to do that either, because that’s jading or biasing the information, if you will. But it’s the highest rated, meaning it gets the best reviews. Um, and again, that happened to be true in this particular client, uh, client’s business. The next level is the most popular. Why do you think that’s the most popular?

And it’s because it’s in the middle chunk of solutions that’s available to you and it’s not the upper end where you’re paying a premium Okay, it’s where you’re getting the best bang for your buck. Okay, and so that’s what that all says That’s first two lines below that. You’ll see a small paragraph a small statement about the types of people Okay within the category of the of the types of value up top the buyer types, excuse me You’ll see a small statement about The, the investment and who is the type of person that buys this.

That’s the persona of the person. And again, based on what I see when I go out to the house and what I hear them talking about, they’re going to basically be pigeonholed into one of these. The cool thing is, is when you see the price book, they can explore all of these. But as you can see, you have to have multiple buyer types.

And if you look at this, the blue, the silver or the platinum, excuse me, and the bra, uh, the blue, the platinum and the gold. All basically are under the premium experience. The gold happens to also be under the value experience, because there’s three at each level. And so when you basically chunk them together as three, you can see there’s some overlap.

And so the, uh, the gold, the silver, and the bronze are under the value experience, and then the bronze, the mud, and the light green are under the economic experience, right? The prime value and that signature series overlap. Uh, there, there’s usually a stepping in warranties and guarantees. There’s a stepping in maintenance.

There’s a stepping in price. There’s a stepping in technology that drives this conversation. When you get into the details of this, and this varies by every contractor across the United States that we’ve ever worked with, uh, and their market as to what they put in there. But those are the types of buyers that exist in the market, premium value based.

And economic your results may vary as far as the percentages and that’s based on your skill set of your people And what it is that you’re doing out there. All right, so that’s buyer types And then what let’s talk about money and payment conditioning because uh, that’s the other thing once we understand what our who is our buyer And we’re going to eventually get into our price book.

I want to make sure that we’ve acknowledged in a previous cracking the code episode, we talked about price conditioning. That’s another video I’d invite you to go out and look at. We talk about price conditioning and how you’re framing what it could be, what the range could be based on the industry early in your call with a customer.

This conversation though, about money and payment options is after you’ve Talk to the customer, you’ve seen the entire house, you’ve seen the existing system, you’ve seen the ductwork, you’ve taken into consideration all the information, and you’re ready to share findings, options, pricing, and payment plans with customers, as well as warranties and guarantees and peace of mind protections.

But before you do that, you might want to have a conversation about the money. I’m not saying that you have to, but the, those that achieve the highest level of results, realize that they want to make sure for time purposes are making the most effective use of their time. And they’re only having a conversation relevant to what the customer says that they’re interested in considering.

Okay. That doesn’t mean we don’t show them everything. The problem is, is most contractors only allow customers to see the one, two, three, possibly four choices that they think are See, I show customers everything that’s available to them. Top of the line, down to entry level, and everything in between. Even if I think they’re probably going to be skewed towards the entry level.

Because it gives them things to say no to. It gives them perspective when they see everything. And they’re in complete control. They’re empowered. And they have the God given right to them to make a buying decision. It wasn’t up to me to eliminate choices. And when you eliminate choices and you don’t show everything that’s available, You violate the position of trust, in my opinion, and you don’t have the right to do that.

So, this is again, just a brief script. Let’s talk about money because that’s an important consideration. We’re making an investment of this magnitude, especially when spending several thousands of dollars. In round numbers without commitment, what would you feel comfortable investing to address your concerns?

And again, you can basically say, You know, total investment or monthly investment? In round numbers, what would you feel comfortable investing on a monthly basis to take care of and address the concerns that you have? Okay, you can might say, in round numbers without, you know, without any commitment, what would you feel comfortable investing, uh, you know, to do address your concerns?

That’s probably going to give them, you know, uh, Get them, you know, giving you a total investment number, right? And what I’m looking for is them to give me a total and or monthly or weekly. Now that’s up to you as to how you play, want to play the game. I like to ask in terms of a monthly number. Why?

Because you don’t earn all your money in once, you know how you earn your money. You know how you spend your money. You know what your monthly bills are. You probably don’t know what you spend or earn on a, you know, what you earn on a weekly basis, but you probably don’t know what you spend on a weekly basis, okay?

Even though you’re consuming utilities throughout the month, you get the bill at the end of the month. Same with the cable and the internet, the cell phone, the car, the, the, the mortgage. So I like to term, talk in terms of monthly, but again, you can play the game. with total monthly or weekly. I wouldn’t get down into the daily.

That’s a conversation with another day. We’ll break that down to a daily number. And then I’m going to provide several, if they can’t give me a number, they say, well, I have no idea. I’ve never bought a heating and cooling system before. I have no idea what these costs. And I say, I understand you don’t know, have any idea what they cost, but it’s more, it’s most, much like a car.

If you went car shopping, You probably have an idea as to what you feel comfortable spending on a monthly basis to get the car that you want. And that’s all I’m asking for. I’m going to share with you an investment guide. It’s a menu. It’s like going to a restaurant. And ultimately, you’re going to determine what you spend.

It’s like going to a restaurant. How hungry are you and what do you feel like eating? That’s ultimately what determines the check upon completion of your meal, right? You’re, yeah, that didn’t show up and surprise you. It was a function of everything that you picked. Well, I’m going to share with you the exact menu that we have, but for purpose of making the most effective use of our time, I want to know where to begin the exploration process.

I’m going to share everything that’s available to you, but I’ll start with where you feel most comfortable. And again, if they start with, if they say, hey, they want to skew towards the entry level of the book, and again, an entry smaller level range or something like that, that’s fine. And so these are the ranges that I would provide probably for a monthly number, Again, based on what I’ve seen, that number could be higher or could be lower based on the scope of work that I’ve identified by this point in time during my time with the customer on one or two visit process, right?

You know, you could invest as much as 200 a month, but you don’t have to. You could spend as little as 60 a month and anywhere in between. Um, again, for the most premium solution, it’s probably going to be 200 plus a month. Um, you know, for an upper level solution, it’s going to be a 200 down to about 120 a month.

For a mid range solution, you’re looking at probably about 120 to 60 a month. And for an entry level solution, you’re probably talking less than 60 a month. And that’s before energy and repair cost savings, Bill and Susan, and any other incentives that might be out there. Okay? That being said, uh, for purposes of, you know, beginning the conversation and exploration, where, where would you like to begin?

And that way, when you get to the price page and the money page, uh, or however you’re showing options to a customer, you know where to begin, you’re relevant to them in their process and you let them see everything, even the stuff that’s way more expensive, because again, that gives them perspective, context, and it gives them things that they’re saying no to.

And by saying no, they’re saying yes, that, not that. Okay. And it’s making it an affirmative choice. I’m advocating for myself that yes, I don’t want that. I know I don’t want to spend that kind of money. And that’s cool. Right? And you can play the total investment as well. Right? The things not to do though, oh, excuse me, the one other thing I wanted to say, uh, talk about was talk about payment conditioning.

And once they give me that number, I’ll say, well, thank you for that. And how are you planning on paying for whatever you decide to do? And before you answer, let me explain all the ways that you can pay and basically, and state that most people take advantage of your convenient and flexible investment plans.

It makes doing what you’re going to do easy and affordable. And so that’s where I teach the skill called leverage. If you ever heard me talk about financing, I actually call it leverage. And so I asked the customer, how are you planning on paying for doing whatever you decide? And before you, uh, you say, so, uh, before you, um, answer, let me tell you all the ways that you can pay.

And so obviously upon completion, we accept cash or check. You don’t need any money out front. Uh, we don’t take a deposit. We’re solvent as a company. We don’t need your money to finance the job and see, I’ve just given a shot at somebody’s credibility who takes a deposit. We also accept all major credit cards.

Some people like that, Bill and Susan, because you get your points, your miles, your cash back. It’s got a little bit more flexibility than the cash option, um, but it may tie up your credit. And you’ll have, obviously, a larger payment, and depending on the fee to borrow that money on your credit card, you’re going to carry that rate with you.

As we know, credit card rates can go up to 28 percent, right? And that’s going to get you a, a, a monthly payment. And then that gives you some flexibility because you can pay that off over time if, as you see fit. But people like that because they get that points and miles of cash back. And then we have some people who take advantage of one of our payment options that we bring to the table.

That way you don’t have to go ahead and, you know, tie up things with your bank account. Um, we have some people who like zero percent. Again, I can basically do this free for one year. You put no money down and you can pay it off if you want over the course of that year, but take your time, but it’s free for a year.

All you have to do is pay it off by the end of the year. And there’s no prepayment penalty if you pay it off anywhere along the way. In addition to that, and that’s 0 percent interest during that timeframe. You just got to pay it off by the end of the year, but it’s free for a year. Just make sure you make that full payment by the end of 360.

I also have 0 percent interest for 12 up to 36 months, depending on the solution that you go with. Um, again, some people like that because again, it gives you limited flexibility. You do have to pay it off within that window. The nice thing about it is it’s just make those small equal payments over time.

0 percent interest. Okay, same as cash. Or were you going to be like most of our customers and take advantage of one of our convenient, flexible investment plans? Get you the lowest payment possible. Most people like that because what you save in energy and repair costs is probably going to offset your investment.

And let them answer however they see fit. But I led in that order, um, because I, again, I ended up with what most people do, and that’s, again, you’ll see in another episode, uh, how we frame that when we, when we share the actual numbers. Uh, we don’t have time for that today, but I ended up with what most people do, and it is the most attractive, and it says what you save in energy or repair costs will offset that investment.

In essence, it becomes a free loan. So you don’t have to come up with all the money at once. In fact, most people finance their first system because they, they had it under the mortgage. They typically finance the second system. And allow what they save in energy to help pay for this, because you can, you’ve been overpaying the utility to be uncomfortable for this long, why don’t we put that money to work for you?

And so that’s kind of what we do. So, would you like my, like most of our customers, like to take advantage of one of our convenient, flexible investment plans that makes getting what you want easy and affordable while allowing the utility company to, and repair cost savings to help you pay for a portion of it.

If not all of the new system, again, depending on what you’re doing and what you’re upgrading, you actually might be able to make it a cash positive solution for the customer. But again, there’s some scripts to give you an idea around what I said there. And then lastly, what not to do. Don’t compare yourself to other companies.

This is about you and what it is that you’re doing within the scope of work that you’re doing. Somebody else may have quoted a different scope of work. And if the customer is thinking they’re buying heating and air conditioning versus the scope of work that you did, somebody else’s numbers could be way off.

And that’s, so I’m not comparing myself to other companies. I might compare myself to the industry, but not to other companies. Okay. I’m not only focusing on 0 percent payments, uh, here when I’m sharing the numbers, which I’ll talk about the numbers specifically in another segment that we’ll do, but I’m showing the lowest payment possible range is most important.

I’m not going to get into the various payment options that I might have. I might have 699. I might have 999. I might have 2. 99. You may have all kinds of different programs that you can do. I like to go in and focus in on the one that is going to be my bread and butter solution for the lowest payment possible.

That’s just how I approach it. Don’t fail to mention that you’re only providing that range based on the equipment and the scope of work that you’ve seen up to that point. Now, at this point, you should have seen everything. But if they pull crazy Ivan on you and pull something out at the last minute and say well, you know, I want to do a generator as well.

Well, okay, we hadn’t taken that into consideration as of yet. But if I’ve seen everything, then I don’t have to, you know, worry about this point right here, right? And it’s not budget. People don’t have a budget for this, so don’t get caught up on the budget. Uh, it’s basically the money that they’re spending and don’t omit this conversation.

You may have had the previous conversation about price conditioning. Uh, this is the conversation that comes right as you’re about to share findings and options. And so what I would say here is don’t omit the previous conversation about price conditioning, because if you get to this point and you haven’t had this conversation, then you may find that a customer is not really open and receptive to this conversation.

And don’t forget the, again, to mention the energy repair cost savings and any other promotions and incentives, rebates, tax credits, trade in allowances and things like that that will offset the payment there. So that is what we call buyer types. It is money and payment conditioning. And as a member, you are the mission.

There’s my contact information on the last slide there. If you have any questions about this, um, this commentary or anything else that we talk about, feel free to reach out. But make sure you get your people to the classes where we basically pull this all together and they can see how this is a subset of the larger sales process and the skills that they need to have to execute at the highest level until next time.

Well, thank you very much, Mr. Drew Cameron. We appreciate all that you do. And thanks for that amazing piece of content as you always provide. Now, listen, be sure and share this on Facebook. And if you’re not a member. I want you to click the link and sign up for a free trial. It’s a 30 day free trial. You get access to all of our content.

And I guarantee you, if you follow the advice, if you take the courses, you will take your company to new places, new amounts of success. Well, folks, that’s our show for this week. We’ll see you next week until then. Bye bye for now.