Fast Focus
	Rainmakers work harder and smarter than average producers.
	You can learn the skills of a rainmaker, but practicing them isn’t easy.
	Rainmakers don’t leave without asking for the sale.

Who’ll Start The Rain?

Rainmakers outperform everyone else in the sales jungle. Here’s how to grow your own superstars.

By  Rob Lieblein

Riddle: How does the biggest fish in the pond make the water level rise?

No, the answer is not that old scientific fact of displacement. That would be too easy.

He does it by making it rain.

Rainmakers—those big fish who also reel in the whopper customers as though they were on the other end of the fishing line—will understand the analogy. We’re swimming through this pond we call a marketplace, and only the biggest of us ever makes a splash. The rest are simply battling the current and trying to get enough food.

Before this analogy grows algae on its gills, let me get to the point: If you want to prosper in this tough market (or any market), you have to be one of the people out there making a splash.

I don’t really care whether it’s a soft or hard market. It doesn’t matter to the best people in our industry, and that’s whom I want to learn from because the most successful people have strategies to prosper in any market. In short, they know how to make it rain.

In this article, I want to talk about the traits and attitudes of our industry’s rainmakers, and I have a long list of tips from a very good book.

What’s a Rainmaker?

My definition of a rainmaker is someone who is beyond the successful producer level. The rainmaker is at the pinnacle of a successful sales culture. Although I keep studying sales culture strategies and instilling them in my clients, I am constantly amazed at how many firms are still not focused on this important approach. A strong sales culture will enable successful producers, but what does it take to be more than just an above-average producer or a top-quartile performer? What is the DNA of a rainmaker?

A rainmaker is the best of the best, like the “Top Gun” pilots in the U.S. Navy. By virtue of the title, only a few of the very best can ever earn the name and get to soar through the sky like gods.

Rainmakers outsmart all competitors, succeed in both hard and soft markets and, in the end, make more money than anyone else. In my life I have met several rainmakers and have learned what they do differently from everyone else.

What Does It Take?

It’s easy to be a good producer. By “good” I mean hitting your quotas, making decent money and making your boss proud of you. With a level of dedication and hard work, it is not hard to achieve these things. But becoming a rainmaker? That is hard.

I often hear a salesperson make some derogatory remark to play down the rainmaker’s ability, like saying the rainmaker doesn’t have great technical skills. I laugh when I hear these things. Rainmaking is a skill. Just like the skill of making a good presentation, the skill of being a rainmaker is gained through study, training and practice. The rainmaker is the ultimate professional—and someone who outworks his or her peers on all of those skills.