Relationships versus Trust, which puts more money in the bank?

A recent breakthrough I had:

I was out in the mountains cross country skiing the other day and I had a thought pop into my mind about a conversation I had with a client. It was more so of a disagreement/learning moment between the two of us but the idea behind it was so powerful I figured I had to share the highlights in today’s article.

Relationships versus Trust, which puts more money in the bank?

Now this isn’t a common perspective but I’ve found from my experience in the sales industry that…

Trust always trumps relationships.

In a world where sales are often equated with networking and relationship-building, consider the  age-old debate that sales isn't about the product or price, nor is it about the significance or the number of your connections, but in the trust people place in your capabilities to help them.

We've all heard sales statements like:

“Good friends make great salespeople”

or…

“The longer the relationship, the easier the sale.”

But while these sayings aren't entirely without merit, they only scratch the surface of what drives true sales success because rapport beats relationships every single time.

The root of the word rapport is trust, and relationships can take a really long time to build.

“But Hamish, trust comes from building long relationships, right?”

You wouldn’t be wrong if you were thinking this also, but the real depth behind this concept is that people buy from you based on your ability to understand and solve their problem, not just how well you get along.

Even if you are in long form enterprise sales, your buyer is going to buy from you because they trust you to solve their problem whether it's the 1st or the 50th time you’re doing work together.

But where I encourage you to think on this topic lies within the idea that selling purely on relationships is a great way to have a lot of friends and not a lot of sales.

I want to leave this article on more of an open end for thinking and reflecting because of how heavy this concept really is because…

It's not the number of contacts in your phone that counts, but the number of people who believe in your capacity to solve their problems.

Next time you're gearing up for a sale, ask yourself: ”Am I just adding another friend, or am I building a foundation of trust?”