At school, Sammy kept telling his friends about the magic at his house. They were, of course, very curious and wanted to see the magic.

So one day they were invited over and Sammy took them up to his room, opened one of his dresser drawers, and then told them that two days ago he threw all these shirts and pants down a chute and a day or two later they were in this drawer clean and folded.

"Pure magic!" he exclaimed.

In this story, Sammy had no concept of the work, machines or cleaners that were used to provide for his magic. This month's article will focus on selling commercial magic.

Working wonders

Just like a magician, we tell people to watch as we make spots and dirty traffic patterns disappear right in front of their eyes. It takes technical competence to perform these disappearing acts and we can always count on our audience to ask "How did you do that?"

Just like other great magicians, if we tell them how we did it, it ruins the fun and mystery. People love mystery and will pay to see it.

Certainly, this idea is in a direct parallel to what we market and sell in the commercial market. Debate has taken place for years over what should be included in marketing materials for the commercial market.

Should the materials contain pictures of trucks and people cleaning carpet, or do we present examples of clean carpet, void of any mention of products or equipment? When showing pictures or mentioning cleaning methods along with the products and equipment, aren't we really taking the fun and mystery out of what we do?

Soon we wind up boring the customer by telling them "how we do it" instead of "what you get with our company."

Selling ideas

One commercial carpet cleaning company explains how they won the contract to clean 18 floors of a "Class A" building, and never once mentioned how they cleaned, nor were they asked by the customer how they cleaned.

They kept the account for more than eight years until the company was sold. This is a great example of what this article is about, which is the selling of ideas — not chemicals and equipment.

An often-used sales commentary goes like this: The salesman was getting into his car after lunch when another person noticed several drills in the salesman's back seat and preceded to ask him about the drills.

The questions were "What is the RPM?" and "How changeable are the bits?" and "How much power do they have?"

The salesman thought for a minute and answered, saying, "I know I can find all those answers for you but I really don't sell drills as much as I sell holes."

In commercial carpet cleaning, our holes are "clean carpet." Our customers are interested in clean carpet, clean upholstery and clean fabric panels. Customers want to talk about outcomes and value for their company.

When walking with a customer in their office looking at their carpet, your comments and questions to the customer can reflect the outcome by saying things like, "Those spots should come out," and "That area is going to look 100 percent better," and "We will maintain your warranty."

You might also say, "If you start cleaning this carpets now, we might be able to keep it looking great for 10 years or longer, and matching the money that your company would save by not having to purchase new carpet."

Create confidence

Creating confidence with a customer during a walkthrough is the best thing you can do. Answering questions positively and to the point help creates that confidence.

When creating confidence, you can include comments about:

• How you will get the job done without interrupting their schedule
• How your employees are trained, certified and have had background checks
• How you guarantee your work and have a great track record
• How you will ensure carpet performance is maximized due to skilled maintenance procedures and programs.

Keeping carpet and other textiles looking great is truly magic that customers are willing to spend money for and tell others about.

They may not know exactly how it happens, but they do appreciate the outcome.

Fred Geyen is president of the Geyen Group (www.geyengroup.com). His background includes commercial product sales and program development for residential, commercial and disaster restoration with ServiceMaster. He has a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Accredited Professional (LEED-AP) designation and is on the board of directors with the LMCCA. Geyen can be contacted at (612) 799-5111.