Attention Sales World... Are You Building Relational Depth And Meaning With Your Clients

Mar 20, 2023
Attention Sales World... Are You Building Relational Depth And Meaning With Your Clients
"Business is all about relationships... How well you build them determines how well they build your business."
Brad Sugars

The depth and richness of your conversations will determine the relational strength you have with your clients.

Conversely, these types of conversations will determine your long-term sales success.

Is there depth to your client relationships? Would you even know?

Relational Depth is a term created by Dave Mearns, the co-author of the book, Working at Relational Depth in Counselling and Psychotherapy,

“A state of profound contact and engagement between two people in which each person is fully real with the other, and able to understand and value the others experiences at a high level.”

Whether you are in sales, sales management or sales leadership, ask yourself the following two questions...

Are the connections between me and my clients REALLY real?

Are my clients able to fully understand the values and experiences between us to create relational betterment?

Gotcha thinking a bit, haven't I?

Can shallow and lack of enriching client relationships have a long-term impact on sales prosperity? Without a doubt, 100% unequivocally, YES!

Deep conversations require intent and meaning. They are not superficial and shallow.

To get you thinking, Oxford Dictionary defines superficial as, “existing or occurring at or on the surface; not thorough, deep, or complete; lacking depth of character or understanding.”

As you're reading this, start thinking about your client relationships and the interactions you're having...

Do you have a complete understanding of their business goals, desires, aspirations and what needs to be done to create business betterment?

Do you understand one thing they are working on right now within their business?

If you're struggling to honestly answer these, then what do all of you speak about when engaging with your clients?

Though small "chit-chatty" conversations are necessary, this is where many in sales lull themselves into a false sense of a meaningful relationship.

You see, salespeople who engage in these types of conversations only talk about the present day or in other words, transactional laced conversations.

Forward thinking and future proofing conversations require a deeper investment of time, energy and commitment to relational betterment.

I believe a relationship is shallow when it only exists on the surface and absent of any meaningful emotional connection.

A Selling from the Heart professional aligns the head and the heart inside their client relationships.

I believe when you are not aligned by any shared values with your clients, you find yourself treading in relationally shallow waters. You will find levels of success there, but let's refer to this as "transactional swimming". I fully believe this becomes 100% replaceable.

We all can mutually agree on the significance and long-term benefits of healthy, meaningful client relationships... My question to all of you... Why do so many struggle to form rich, meaningful and deep client relationships?

For some, they can’t be bothered to learn how, but for a vast majority, they have never been coached in how to build real client relationships.

“The quality of your life is the quality of your relationships.”
Tony Robbins

WHAT ARE YOU BUILDING WITH YOUR CLIENTS?

Your clients are much savvier then in years past. They're interconnected like never before. Their expectations are much higher. They notice if you're paying attention to them or not. They have instantaneous and much louder methods of voicing their displeasure as well as the support they're getting from you.

Greatness is a conscious choice and a discipline when it comes to building client relationships.

One of the most effective sales growth strategies is building real intentional and deep client relationships.

These types of relationships significantly enhance revenue. These types of relationships are built on trust. These types of relationships drive referrals and these types of relationships form connection.

Building genuine client relationships takes time, mutual care, and interest.

You must shift your mindset as engaged relationships translate into increased sales opportunities.

Build true, deep and meaningful relationships, not just one-sided affairs and watch your sales skyrocket and your leaky sales pipeline become ever flowing.

If you aspire to have an ever flowing sales funnel, then hold yourself accountable to build an ever flowing client relationship funnel.

If you want amazing client relationships, then do something about it!

 
 
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Here are three things you can do right now to build, strengthen and bring depth to your relationships.

AUTHENTICALLY ENGAGE

"Details matter. They create depth, and depth creates authenticity."
Neil Blumenthal

Your client relationships must be built upon trust and trust is based upon authenticity. Without these, there is no relational depth.

Your clients B.S. meters are finely tuned in and extremely sensitive. They can spot insincerity a mile away.

The authentic YOU must be a genuine reflection of who you REALLY are. You must believe it. You must own it. You must know what it stands for. You must know your strengths and your weaknesses. You must bring congruency to the forefront.

Selling from the Heart professionals proudly wear their emotions on their business sleeve as they connect to the relational hearts of their clients.

When it comes to authenticity in a relationship, I love what Newport Institute has to say,

"Authentic relationships begin when we reveal our true self to another person. That means being genuine and vulnerable in our communication and interactions. Moreover, we are congruent—in other words, what we feel inside is consistent with how we act and what we say to others."

Take that quote in for a moment and deeply reflect upon it. What words stand out to you?

It is all about the personal, meaningful, and transparent connection you make. If you are 'blowing so-called smoke' up your client's backsides what's the likelihood, they will trust you or even help you to grow your business?

Authenticity is a relational magnet.

STOP BEGGING

Amplifying your relationships is about establishing trust and creating meaningful value.

Engage with your clients, communicate with them, add value to their business, solve their problems, create opportunity for them, educate them and inform them, but why do so many insist and dropping the sales hammer on them all the time?

There is a healthy, natural and more fluid way to grow your business as opposed to dropping lopsided sales bombs on your clients all the time.

Mundane sales experiences and relationships die a slow and very painful death.

What concerns me about salespeople today, whether you believe me or not, is their lack of people and relational building skills.

Stop begging, bugging and badgering your clients to buy from you at month end, quarter end or year end, when you've done very little to enhance the relational experience.

Why would your clients help you to grow your business when you haven't helped to grow theirs?

INTENTIONALLY LISTEN

Successful sales professionals simply listen.

There is so much you can learn when you just listen.

Monumental listening is the key to becoming a powerful sales professional inside the relationship economy.

Developing excellent listening skills separates the good from the great.

When you intentionally listen to your clients you soon uncover their challenges, their vision, their business goals, even personally related things; all this to do one thing - strengthen the relationship and grow your business.

When you struggle to listen, you miss all the critical components to build a meaningful relationship.

The simple act of listening might be the key to growing your business, strengthening your sales pipeline and enhancing the relational growth with your clients.

Listening is the new prospecting inside the relationship economy.

DO SOMETHING ABOUT YOUR RELATIONSHIPS

Building client relationships requires discipline.

Are you up for the challenge?

Are you up for doing the work?

Are you committed?

Long-term client relationships must be deep and they must be built to weather the storms along the way. We all know there will be bumps along the way, however; the more you invest in these relationships the more you collect on these relationships.

Carl Rogers is noted as one of the founders of humanistic psychology.

This quote absolutely reinforces our time together,

"Relational depth cannot be ‘planned out’ and is not a ‘strategy’, rather, something that occurs between individuals as an organic experience. It occurs moment to moment, within the here and now."

Become present with your clients. Be in the moment with your clients. Set aside your agenda and focus in on their agenda.

I will leave all of you with this...

  • Genuinely care about your clients
  • Remember your clients
  • Connect with your clients
  • Celebrate with your clients
  • Really listen to your clients
  • Learn from your clients

And most of all... Love your clients

Originally published on Larry Levine's LinkedIn

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