Ben Wright explains why sales teams chase customers instead of attracting them: weak Know-Like-Trust connections. The fix is letting prospects co-create solutions, like using an online tool to design their own solar roof. This deepens familiarity and trust, so customers come to you.
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In this episode, you will learn the real reason why you're always chasing customers for sales that you never considered before and how to fix it. Welcome to Sales Growth Made Simple, the show helping 7 to 8 figure trade, construction and industry sales and business leaders finally end the stress of inconsistent sales by simplifying your sales systems so your team can close more deals and grow faster. I'm your host, Ben Wright, a leader who has been building businesses and sales teams just like you for the last 20 years. Before we get into today's episode, I just wanna ring the bell. This is episode 200 for Sales Growth Made Simple. Episode 200, I cannot believe we have made that, right? 4 years ago or 3.5 years ago when we started this project, you never could have said to me we're gonna get to 200, that we're gonna be a top 2.5% global podcast and growing and growing rapidly at this point in its evolution. I am very, very grateful to be getting here. And for those listening, you know, I hope that you're listening because we have generated you lots of value along the journey. And please be rest assured, we have so many great topics ahead that we're going to keep talking about. But for the moment, for now, just a very quick, you know, point in time where we can acknowledge 200 episodes for our podcast and for everyone involved, you know, particularly for those editing Yahweh, a shout out to you. Shout out to my wife and my family and all of my customers that have got involved in this. Thank you. You know, great moment and I can't wait for the next 200. But to get to the next 200, we need to make sure we continue to create value. So today we're going to be focusing on the real reason why you're always chasing customers for sales. And we're going to focus on 3 things that you're generally not generating enough of if you're chasing customers for sales. That's making sure they know you, they like you, and they trust you. So they are without doubt the 3 levers that lead to customers making purchasing decisions. So let's slow down and unpack those for a minute. We speak about customers or people making decisions to buy from someone because they know, like, or trust them. So knowing them, knowing them all comes down to that they feel like you are an entity that they have a relationship with, that you're a person who they don't just see as part of a business, Ben from the business. But you are a person that they have a little bit of depth with. You've had conversations with them, you've had emails, you've had phone calls, you've discovered problems and you've unpacked them. You've gone through a process whereby you've understood what they need. You know one of their friends or one of their colleagues. You've worked with them before. But knowing somebody is more than just having seen their social media account, but it's a number of layers that you've been able to develop with your customer or the customer's been able to develop with you to make that decision. Now often the no part can come very, very quickly, but I'm going to give you a lever at the end of this as to how you can build the no, like, or trust really effectively. And the second one is like. So like can come in a couple of ways. The first one is that instant attraction, if you like, that when someone comes to your front door, to the front of your business, and you sit down, in that first 30 seconds you make a judgment call that says, yeah, I could work with this person. Yeah, I like that person, right? The early indicators that says, yeah, you're my type of person. Now that can obviously be influenced in a lot of ways, but it's very much so by being punctual, by being well presented, by smiling, by some of your basic body language. I'm here, I'm engaged, I'm ready to talk to you. By how you smile, by the questions you ask, and by simply how you can make that person feel. So knowing someone, liking someone, and the third one being trusting someone. Trust is the hardest of the three in my experience to build, and that's because normally to trust someone, you need to have a moment in time when you can build that trust. Something's gone wrong, they've sent a quote through at their agreed time, they've answered your questions, they've met any of your needs that you have. But building trust is very much about having a relationship with someone where they don't necessarily feel like they know you or like you, but they can trust you that when you say you're going to do something, you do it. And trust for me in my experience is most effectively built in things like getting quotes out promptly, getting that on time, being accurate, being attentive, listening to customers and answering their questions. Now for each of these three, there's so many different things we can be doing to be building our examples of being known, liked, or trusted. However, one thing for me that universally works really effectively to build that know, like, or trust levers, and in essence, stopping you needing to be always chasing customers for sales. Is getting them involved in projects. And what I mean by that is not just meeting them on site, meeting them out at their business, meeting them out at their homes and saying, hey, let's get going on this, let's talk through your project, what do you need, what do you like, what don't you like? It's more than that. It's about getting them actively involved in the project, getting them involved in designing the project, getting them involved in choosing where things go, choosing colors, giving them options around quality levels, giving them options around prices, around speed to install, around type of fixtures and fittings. Actively talking to them about what they do and don't want within that project. And the best example I have of this from my time in any industries is in the renewables industry when we had our solar business. And we used to give customers an online rooftop design version of their house. So they'd log into a system that we had, they'd go and type in their address, whatever it may be, right? They'd type in their house and bang, up would come a satellite image of their roof. And on there, they could actually design their own solar system. They could lay out panels where they wanted them on the west, on the east, north, south, right, whatever it may be. Put them so you couldn't see them from the street, whatever took their fancy. And why this was really effective is that it got customers really engaged in seeing solar being brought to life. And with you there as the partner, with you there as the one that was going through that journey with them, you were someone that they could build some knowing, some liking, or some trusting around. Now, of course, in our industry in solar, it was a little bit difficult to always follow customers out designs, but what it did was it gave us somewhere to start from. It gave us a point at which we could start talking to our customers about their design. They were engaged, they were ready to go because they were putting things on their roof. It was like having solar panels in their hand, right? But by being actively involved in that process from start through to finish, we were able to very quickly enhance, you know, those capabilities around know, like, and trust. Around customers saying, hey, I know you, I've spent some time designing out this project with you, you've gone back and forth, you've given me some suggestions, love it. He's here, he's helping. She's been involved in this process and, you know, she's had a smile on her face when we're talking about doing the design. She sat next to me when I did it on my computer at home when she came around to visit my site. Or trust. I put some panels in a certain location of the roof, right? He said to me, actually, that's not a great spot because you're going to get shaded by the tree. It meant I didn't quite put as much on the roof, but I wasn't wasting money and putting solar panels on there that, that weren't going to generate any energy. So it gives us the chance as the supplier to be really working on those 3 levers, really increasing the opportunity that we can be someone that they know, like, or trust through one simple lever, and that's getting them involved. So as we roll out of today's episode, I'd really encourage you to think about what's something you can do with your customers to get them actively involved in the design of their project. I have never, ever met an industry where we couldn't do this. So if you think you're one of those people that can't, then get in touch with me and I'll give you some ideas. I promise you that there's a commitment there. All right. But have a think about how could you get customers involved in designing their own project to increase the chances of you being known, liked, or trusted? That's it for today. I'm very grateful that you not only listen, but I'm really grateful in this instance that you take a moment once this podcast is finished to think about how you could get customers more actively involved in their projects. It's very much a 1% better every day approach. It very much works. Small little changes that we can repeat again and again do make all the difference. But between now and Wednesday, thank you for listening in to today. Bye for now.
