Envisioning Success

Stop Selling and Start Relating

Posted by Chris Shockley under General, Marketing

I was raised in the old school way of selling. Not that I was good at it, I’ve never liked the things that are faked or manipulative. The idea of “working” a person over, intimidating them, scaring them, closing, etc, just never sat nor does it sit well with me.

I have no problem asking for someone’s business, mind you, but I’m not going to sit there and hit them with “This deal isn’t for everybody” or “My boss will be real mad that I’m giving this away” or something.

I guess I’ll never be a good sales person.

Really?

Well, Facebook and Twitter have brought to the forefront something very interesting in a way we knew fundamentally but maybe never defined:

Relationships matter!

They matter a lot. More than fancy business cards, embroidered shirts or slick haircuts.

We all know that it takes a number of meetings with someone before we are willing to trust them enough with our business. So we spend our time trying to tell them all the great features our products and services offer and maybe even the benefits to them. However, it will still take repeated interactions typically, to make the sale. All the while, they are getting information from our competition.

If we make it clear that our customer’s needs are important to us, you’ll stand out from the guy down the street.

But, if someone refers us, we are willing to skip right to talking about what color and how many, aren’t we?

So, what should we be focusing on? Building those relationships! Our time with customers and prospects needs to change from “selling” to learning about them; literally befriending them. Don’t fake it, really make an effort to change how you interact.

When you meet someone, don’t think of them as someone from whom you need to squeeze for every last dollar. You may get money out of people doing that, but you’ll be forced to put that much effort into everyone you meet again and again, and at the end of the day it’s just you with your money and lots of people who aren’t really sure what just happened.

If, instead, you focus on treating people as friends you’ll find that they are much more receptive. The walls drop and they interact more fully because they aren’t defending themselves from your sales pitch. Be honest with people especially if there is a shortcoming, a mistake or you honestly feel that they will get a better product (IE: something that better fits their need) from someone else.

This kind of forthrightness will not be forgotten and I promise it will pay dividends as people will refer their friends to you because they know you won’t attack them, but will treat them with respect, honesty and friendship.

I’ll leave you with this thought. Who would you rather be doing business with anyway, people that were cold and stern or warm, receptive and friendly? I don’t mean you as a customer, I mean YOUR customers. Yes, you can have customers that actually like hearing from and seeing you.

I may not have every customer over for dinner or ask them to watch my kids, but a wave and a “How are you doing” is very fulfilling and makes the entire process relaxing and enjoyable.

In the end it is those relationships that will create real success with less effort

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Chris Shockley is owner of Envision Design Solutions and has been building websites for over 12 years. He can be reached via the web: http://www.EnvisionDesignSolutions.com/