Build Relationships
and the Sales Will Come

Search the Web and you will find thousands of articles on selling skills. Practical techniques in areas such as prospecting, handling objections and closing are valuable, but one of the most useful sales skills you can acquire is the ability to develop strong and lasting relationships. If you can achieve a level of balance where cultivating relationships is truly your goal, and not simply a technique for closing more sales, you'll find yourself on the road to success in sales and in all aspects of your life.

Life is about relationships

The happiest, most fulfilled and truly successful people are those who have invested their lives in meaningful relationships. In today's busy world it's often easy to get so caught up in things, and in the fast-paced activities of life… that our relationships can become neglected, strained or broken. In reality, people are far more important than things, and if we live our lives with this understanding, everything we do will take on a greater meaning.
As human beings we are not isolated, independent organisms. We are part of a greater whole. It's through our relationships that we function as part of that whole. When our relationships are strong, clear and mutually fulfilling, we feel productive and our lives produce measurable results.

Business is also about relationships

Relationships are also the key to business success. Employees feel fulfilled in their jobs when their relationships with managers, co-workers and customers are good and they feel good about the company they work for. Customers keep coming back when they are treated well and feel like you really care about them.

Does all this mean that management and sales skills are not important? Absolutely not. In fact, a focus on relationship demands that we become competent in our roles in business. But too often, sales people lose to competitors because of a failure to establish a solid, open relationship with the prospect. They had the right product, the right opportunity, the right price, and strong selling skills, but the competitor had the right relationship.

The Competent Sales Consultant

Whether you are a sales person, general manager or the CEO of your company you are involved in the sales process in some form every day. By increasing your selling skills, you enhance your ability to function competently in your business relationships.

The truly competent sales person is a consultant who is able to establish relationships in which he or she provides much needed and appreciated services to clients. Sales are certainly a goal, but they are not the primary goal. A good consultant is a trusted professional who provides guidance in solving business problems. When you effectively fulfill this role in your business relationships, trust grows and sales are one of the outcomes. Conversely, when your primary goal is to make a sale at any cost, your prospect's natural tendency is to resist.

If You Build It They Will Come

What is the most effective way of getting the sales to come? Build a solid business relationship based on trust and mutual benefit. If you build the kind of relationships in which your clients view you as a highly competent consultant in areas where they are experiencing problems, you will get sales.

More importantly the relationships you build will serve as conduits between your company and your clients' companies. These conduits form a network of partnerships that allow the connected companies to grow and benefit in ways that would otherwise be impossible. Fresh ideas, new insights and sales will flow through these relationship conduits. Over time, as the relationships increase in quality and quantity, the network will expand, and sales will increase as a result.

- Roger Reece

Check out our sales seminar, "Build Relationships and the Sales Will Come"

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