Editor’s Note: This is the third piece in a four-part series called “How to Be Your Customer’s Superhero.” With the help of Every Day Heroes from some of the nation’s leading energy solution providers, we’ll share tips for identifying and overcoming objections when it comes to presenting energy efficiency solutions.
Whether you’re driving the family cross-country in a rented camper-van, building a brand-new deck or simply fending off bloodthirsty mosquitoes at your neighborhood cookout, chances are you’ll do something heroic this summer.
But if you really want to step things up, you need super powers that can help you every day of the week. Harness the power of utility data analytics.
In our last episode of “How to Be Your Customer’s Superhero” we discussed how to strategically help clients improve building performance with energy insight. This time around, we’ll show you how to overcome a common villain known as Inertia, an evil force plotting to convince clients there’s nothing they can do to reduce high utility costs.
It’s easier to just pay the bill
Unlike your customers who suffer from a lack of knowledge and insight, some clients are fully aware they’re wasting valuable dollars patching together old, inefficient systems. Their biggest obstacle isn’t lack of awareness, it’s a lack of access to funds. They simply don’t have the cash flow to launch a big efficiency project. For them, it’s easier to just keep paying the bills – even when they know they’re paying more than they should.
As everyday hero Jack Lann, Business Development Manager at Building Technology Systems recently told us: “Every single building has operating issues and inefficiencies. So even when the client thinks they don’t have the budget to make improvements, we help them understand that they actually do—they’re just giving that money to their utility company every month instead.”
Time to put on your cape and go to work!
You can help this customer by leveraging the difference between data and rich data insight. Objectively, this customer knows that they’re wasting money. Without rich data insights, however, diagnosing the exact problem—or even fully understanding how much it impacts their bottom line—is just an educated guess.
Turn data into actionable insight
Start by asking a slightly deeper level of questions in this case and see where the answers lead you with your client.
- What if you could save 10% or 20% in energy costs?
- What would that mean to your business and your bottom line?
- What are your biggest pain points in managing your building?
- What would it mean if I could solve those problems for you?
Next, introduce and explain the value of energy benchmarking and data visualization.
EnergyPrint’s utility dashboard, for example, can provide building trend analysis, ENERGY STAR® performance, weather normalization and cost avoidance reporting based on current, accurate and validated data.
Whether you use EnergyPrint’s Utility Dashboard or build your own charts and graphs, use easy-to-understand visuals to help paint a clear picture of their total energy use and identify cost savings opportunities.
Everyday hero Tommy Mayhew, Business Development Manager at Daikin Applied, puts it this way: “No one wants to come in last. If you know a client’s building is performing 30-50% worse than its peers, than that’s what you lead with in the discussion and leverage utility data with comparison visuals to start building the case for improvements.”
With a concrete time horizon that objectively demonstrates exactly when a capital improvement project pays off, energy efficiency plans that previously felt out of reach suddenly make a whole lot of sense. Bottom-line savings will speak for themselves. And with accurate utility data and expert energy analysis, your client will see it for themselves.
In our next and final installment, we’ll show you how to use verified, objective data to make your client (and your business) look good.
Want to learn more sales best practices from industry leaders? Download the full whitepaper— Tips from Industry Experts: Leveraging Utility Data to Drive Client Engagement