Consumers must have faith in the companies they do business with, especially in the service industry. Clients are generally hesitant to collaborate with a company they are unfamiliar with or one that does not have a strong track record in their field. When this is the case, salespeople must win their prospects’ trust.
You should understand that selling has changed dramatically and that the pushy and dishonest sales approach no longer work. Using them is one of the worst sales blunders you can make. Even if you operate with complete honesty and integrity, people will be afraid to trust you. This can hurt your performance.
Close More Sales by Building Customer Credibility
To increase sales, you must increase your credibility in order to acquire the trust of your prospects and consumers.
One of your primary responsibilities as a sales representative is to establish credibility with your prospects so that they trust you.
Unfortunately, this is also one of the most difficult challenges that reps encounter. 82 per cent of B2B decision-makers believe sales representatives are unprepared. Knowing your business/industry inside and out is an essential aspect of prospect purchasing decisions.
Your sales rep can use the following tips to establish credibility.
1. Share success stories
Prospects must be able to see themselves succeeding with your product or service. Sharing success stories is one of the most effective strategies to help them picture achievement.
The majority of prospects you work with will have similar issues. By demonstrating how you assisted a peer in resolving a similar problem and using figures and KPIs, you give a great deal of credibility to the message you’re conveying to the prospect. The idea is to encourage them to consider what their problem would be if they were this customer who started working with you. To put it another way, their problem would be solved. Speak from experience and provide a good anecdote about a previous discussion or client with which the prospect can identify.
2. Provide value add metrics
It’s essential to focus on providing value to your customers, just as it is to share success stories. Top industry representatives provide far more value than simply forwarding the most recent headline. They carry out research. Is a new study on communication and job satisfaction published in Nature? Sending something like that to your HR prospect, when applicable, saves them time from having to research and can augment their action plan with their team. You can send prospects fascinating industry material to assist educate, informing, and starting a dialogue.
3. Create a LinkedIn profile with an aligned message
As a sales representative, you must aware that prospects may conduct research on you before or throughout the sales process. When they do, make sure your messaging is consistent. Take advantage of this by updating your LinkedIn profile with wording that corresponds to what you’re saying in your chats. It reinforces the essential points you want to communicate when people hear the same thing online and offline.
4. Engage with prospects on a human-to-human level
Being helpful and human is essential in inbound sales. As a sales representative, your primary goal should be to connect with your prospects. They will not buy from you unless they have that connection.
Trust is the foundation of credibility. And trust is founded on a human relationship. So, instead of treating your prospects as numbers, approach them as individuals. When you engage your prospects on a personal level to understand their wants and opportunities, they are more likely to listen to what you recommend. Essentially, this is about establishing rapport.
5. Personalize your outreach
Personalizing your outreach is a terrific approach to engaging with your prospects in the same way that creating rapport is. To elicit a reaction, you must be aware of the fact that individuals are overloaded with information and emails, acknowledge it, and then customise your appeal.
Find something in common with someone on LinkedIn, such as sharing a suggestion that may be useful to the firm or including an article that may be relevant to their industry. If you aren’t tailoring your approach, you will undoubtedly lose out on a lot of great-fit companies.
6. Focus on building rapport
While we briefly mentioned it, we haven’t focused on it. When it comes to closing a sale, rapport is everything. Once you have someone’s attention, the next step is to establish rapport and a relationship. Learn more about THEM as individuals, offer a story that you believe may relate to them, and show that you care about them.
When you combine this with offering value during the sales process, you will become a valued advisor. If you aren’t tailoring your approach, you will undoubtedly lose out on a lot of great fit companies.
7. Understand everyone involved in the sales process
When you make a deal, you know you’re not only talking to one decision-maker. Purchasing a product or service involves a number of people, particularly on the B2B side.
It’s important to understand everyone’s function and what they care about. This allows you to adapt your solution to each individual and establish credibility from there. The most successful sales reps have buy-in from numerous different persons within a firm, so make sure to care about everyone involved in the sales process, not just the decision-maker.
If you aren’t tailoring your approach, you will undoubtedly lose out on a lot of great fit companies.
8. Tell prospects who is and isn’t a fit for your services
Salespeople have a poor impression of being “untrustworthy” because there are hidden agendas in the interaction. That is why you must be candid about who is and isn’t a suitable fit for your services.
Prospects dislike working with salesmen who are eager to sell everything to everyone. They want salespeople who can get to the point quickly and explain why a prospect is a good fit for their service. And it should be bite-sized, which means a prospect should be able to say yeah, that doesn’t apply to everyone, but it does to me, or no, that doesn’t apply to me.
If you aren’t tailoring your approach, you will undoubtedly lose out on a lot of great fit companies.
9. Be willing to walk away from a deal
When you’re desperate for a deal, it’s natural to schmooze a little more than usual. However, it is critical to avoid this.
The worst thing you can do for your credibility is to need a deal and are unwilling to walk away from it, especially if the contract isn’t a good fit for you or the prospect. Prospects can tell when you aren’t looking out for their best interests, and they should since you aren’t. Keep your pipeline full as a corollary. It’s simple to state that you should be willing to walk away from a contract. It can be really difficult, especially if your pipeline is empty.”
You won’t have to worry about needing every deal if your pipeline is full.
10. Share control with your prospects
Your role as a salesperson is to work with your prospects to discover the best answer. It might help if you act as a consultant, so you can supply information while they contribute to the process.
Whoever advised you that the salesperson should be in charge of the sales process was incorrect. Salespeople should guide but not control the sales process. It’s also your prospect’s process.
In practice, when you give your agenda, ask your prospect what topics they want to discuss.
Then genuinely pay attention. You don’t want to go ahead if your prospect isn’t ready to do so.
11. Have a clear process in place
Finally, communicating the sales process is an excellent method to establish credibility with your prospect.
A clear agenda and concrete next steps make a prospect feel safe and as though you’ve done this before. Prospects who are learning about your product want to be directed, which fosters trust and credibility.
Then genuinely pay attention. You don’t want to go ahead if your prospect isn’t ready to do so.
Summing-up
It’s incredibly important to build credibility with your prospects. To do this, focus on building rapport and connection during every conversation. If you need help to train your sales rep on how to build credibility with customers and in the other aspects of running the sales process smoothly you can contact Shergroup. Shergroup offers an online sales coaching program, in affiliation with, the sales guru, Mr Bruce King. Our CEO, Claire Sandbrook recommends sales coaching and has implemented it in Shergroup’s training and support system. So, if you’re looking to get your team excited about the prospect of growing your business, now is the time to invest in Bruce’s world-class sales coaching programme!
To find out more about the sales training program check out the link below- https://shergroup.com/sales-bruce-king
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