I attended an SMM webinar recently, “The Secrets of Sales Credibility: The Trust Accelerator” by C. Lee Smith. He is the CEO of Sales Fuel and author of SalesCred: How Buyers Qualify Sellers ©. (If you’ve never attended, SMM is an excellent leading practices resource.)
Much is said in sales circles these days about “qualifying the buyer”. I liked Lee’s perspective on how buyers qualify the seller with an emphasis on credibility. The first part of C. Lee Smith’s webinar title addressed this:
In sales, credibility is being thought of as someone who knows what they’re talking about and knows how to help.
Only 1 in 4 Americans views salespeople as credible in what they say and do [American State of Credibility]
44% of millennials prefer no sales rep interaction at all in a B2B setting [Gartner]
Those darn millennials; always looking for a mobile, on-demand, self-service solution, HaHa! I describe this B2B buying phenomenon as, “Isn’t there an App for that?” It’s not just the millennials, though. Today’s Modern Buyer wants a salesperson who is easy to deal with; “knows how to help”. That’s where credibility comes in:
Sales
Credibility:
It’s what gets you through to high-level decision-makers that can transform your business. Credible people want to do business with credible people.
I love that phrase; “Credible people want to do business with credible people”. The “you” in the “transform your business” part is referring to the salesperson’s business. Credibility increases sales performance – I’m in total alignment with that perspective.
OK then, so why did I include the “but” in the title of my post? Because it was the second half of Lee’s webinar title that I’m not in alignment with; “The Trust Accelerator”. In my opinion, that’s an overreach. He suggests:
The goal of most professional salespeople is to become a ‘trusted advisor’ to their customer.
Ah yes, the old “Trusted Advisor” status. Spoken of often – by salespeople! I can’t remember a single time in my entire selling career when a prospect said to me, “Gary, what I’m looking for is a trusted advisor”. Not once.
I’ve researched, written about, and continue to coach salespeople on “Credibility” vs. “Trusted Advisor”. In The Speed of Trust © written by Stephen M.R. Covey he offers research and coaching on how to attain a trust status. I particularly enjoyed this research example:
I don’t think you have a full
trusting relationship until you are actually at the point that you deliver
success repeatedly. When one of my major
suppliers says we want to have a trusting relationship, I think, “What a lot of
rubbish that is!” I turn around and say,
“I don’t trust you. I am not going to
trust you until you repeatedly deliver success to me.”
Peter Lowe
I love this anecdote. The reality is prospective customers don’t trust us – yet. For me; I’m satisfied with being perceived by the Modern Buyer as credible; knowing what I’m talking about; knowing how to get things done for them.
However, if we insist on earning a position of “Trusted Advisor” then we must produce “…until you repeatedly deliver success to me”. Trust doesn’t beget results for us or our customers – it’s just the opposite.
When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or…
we
could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.