enduring relationships

Selling or Solving

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Rising inflation is driving a greater emphasis on price over value creation in negotiations. It’s not just the dramatic, unpredictable cost increases that are impacting your customers’ decisions, but also the sense of higher risk related to uncertainty, that cause the short-term, price-first perspective to prevail over the longer, strategic view in your customers’ buying process.  Focusing on price as the primary decision factor has the advantage of being clear, direct and easy to evaluate. Everything is …

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Customer Experience Value

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Relentless disruption during the past couple of years has elevated the value of excellent customer service. Those who thrive in delivering exceptional customer experiences have increased satisfaction by ensuring that the benefits of their offerings go beyond resolving the customer’s immediate need, to creating value that accelerates that customer’s progress.  Such experiences build enduring relationships which subsequently provide insights about trends, changing customer demands, feedback on strategy, and innovation opportunities – all valuable inputs for …

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Customers Value Options

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When your customer comes to believe that you understand their business, and care about its success, then you’re on your way to building an enduring relationship.  Their belief is grounded in your proven delivery of solutions that create value for them, solutions that resolve a short-term need while contributing to the achievement of their longer-term goals. Thisenables your solutions to become investments in their future rather than one-time transactions.  Ensuring that your solutions create value rests on your ability to …

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About Promises

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Organizational culture is a core element of sustainable competitive advantage. Talented people gravitate to companies who care about their employees and customers, companies whose leaders measure and strengthen their culture, recognizing its impact on their ability to create value.  One tactic that demonstrates this value proposition is making and keeping promises. In a world where customers have many options available to them, “promising” an outcome, and then delivering it, is a differentiator.   A promise is deeper than …

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The Thing About Promises

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Businesses sometimes refrain from using the word “promise.” It’s risky to promise an outcome that might fail to be delivered due to some unforeseen variable. So if no promise is explicitly made, then the risk of failure is reduced.  But in a world where customers have many options available to them, “promising” a result can be a differentiator. A promise is a commitment, that when fulfilled, creates value for the customer, reinforcing trust and building loyalty. Without risking …

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Pulling the Fire Alarm

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Bob Schultek Author of The Gauntlet As sales leader, you encourage your team to develop strong customer relationships. Because this takes time, you counsel them about perseverance, commitment and accountability, and enlighten them that they will know that preference has been earned when they are invited to participate in more strategic discussions like new product development meetings. Like most sales professionals, your team is highly self-motivated, with each member consistently demonstrating initiative. They understand that the …

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Why Customers Are Dissatisfied

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The most productive way to grow sales is to increase orders from current customers. Despite this proven fact, a Learning Dynamics study reports that more than 60% of companies do not consider customer satisfaction as a top priority. Reasons for customer dissatisfaction include: Few supplier personnel are aware of what customers actually do with their products or services; In about 20% of companies, sales people do not follow up with customers; senior managers do not …

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Is Trust The Most Vital Ingredient of Relationships?

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What’s the most vital ingredient of enduring relationships? Your first instinct might be to answer that trust is the most essential ingredient. But in today’s “connection” economy, there’s an even more primal element that enables trust and benefits everyone in the relationship. Before trust can grow, there must be generosity. Generosity creates trust. Generosity is more than offering discounts or giving products or services away for free. If we don’t know you, why would we invest valuable time …

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Active Listeners Get What They Deserve

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  Listening is not a passive act. In our world of perpetual urgency, being  an active listener makes you distinctive – it’s a competitive  advantage. In fact, prospects cite engaged listening as a key reason  they choose to work with one supplier versus another. Active listening communicates respect for the speaker, and his or her  time. It maximizes the productivity of your interaction with your  customers or your personnel.Learning to be an active listener starts …

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