Trust and Respect

I would hope young and old readership would follow each thread and read fully in context what each poster posts, considers what they say, examine their own biases, and come to their own conclusions. I've yet to find one person here absolute or even relatively definitive TRUTH on these matters, BUT I have come to a few conclusions and recognize those whose ideas match my own more closely than those that don't.

1. Engage passionately with what you do - what and how you sell - to begin with. How that appears from the outside will vary.

2.Prospect with the intent of getting someone something he or she needs, wants, and is willing to buy. Do that with engagement. BUT disengage from the out come - from the prospect's decision. That is, engage yourself with respecting either a YES or NO equally with no intervention if the reply is NO.

3. When the prospect says NO reply with: Okay, bye! and move on to the next prospect. Stay fully engaged in your prospecting without the burden of trying to change minds, help people identify things they have yet to identify, or meet objections or the word NO with further probing or questions in any attempt to sway or uncover something.

4. Moving on repeat the above fully engaged in the process of prospecting with the goal of identifying one prospect who says: I need that, I want that, I will buy that IF if meets my conditions of satisfaction.

5. Finding that prospect, begin an inquiry to establish trust, further the relationship, see if there is a mutually benificial and agreed upon reason to do business, and come to terms with both sides conditions of satisfaction. Be sure commitments are made every step of the way in this engaging conversation, negotiation, or mutual close.

6. If at any time the prospect breaks the commitment, indicates lack of honesty or trust, demands what you aren't willing to produce, or disrespects your position and what can be delivered - end the meeting and forget the sale. You get to the heart of these things by being attentive and asking specific questions - in other words, fully engaged in the conversation.

7. Engagement and disengagement mirror one another and have to be balanced, are not the same thing, kept in a state of readiness, and utilized effectively for significant success, progress, and respectfully mutual decisions to be made properly.

MitchM

There are many definitions of the word “respect.” Two that are important in sales are:
1. to regard another person as having value equal to other human beings.
2. to treat another person with the same consideration and high regard as other people that you esteem.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MitchM

An old salty dog worth his salt would trust and respect anyone regardless of age who came with honesty and respect, knew his or her material, and didn't try to be slick or clever - just straight talk about something that could be of benefit in a confident way.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bald Dog

Self-respecting people will trust and respect you by default regardless of your age.

And the opposite of self-respecting people, the obnoxious *******s can just take a running jump at the nearest freight train and by killing themselves, they're cleansing the world of commercial scum.

If you don't get it, just walk out. If they don't respect now, they won't respect you later either. Now some people may say that you didn't earn trust and respect. I think it's bull****. What you didn't earn is mistrust and disrespect. but if this is what you get from the getgo, you may be dealing with a slimeball.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bald Dog

In the mid-90s, researchers asked almost 3,000 decision makers “What is the highest degree to which you trust any of the salespeople you bought from in the previous 24 months?” Only 4% “completely” trusted the salespeople. 9% “substantially or generally” trusted the salesperson. Another 26% “somewhat or slightly” trusted the salesperson. 61% said they trusted the salesperson “rarely or not at all.” And these are people who actually did business with those salespeople. What did the respondents think of the salespeople from whom they decided not to buy?

MitchM, Bald Dog and anyone else who believes that prospective customers will trust and respect salespeople by default how do you maintain your belief in the light of this empirical data?

Quote:

Originally Posted by JacquesWerth

There are many definitions of the word “respect.” Two that are important in sales are:
1. to regard another person as having value equal to other human beings.
2. to treat another person with the same consideration and high regard as other people that you esteem.

When you refer to "Trust and Respect" in your HPS training Jacques what are you referring to specifically? Do you have assigned meanings to those terms and if you do what are they?

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpeedRacer

When you refer to "Trust and Respect" in your HPS training Jacques what are you referring to specifically? Do you have assigned meanings to those terms and if you do what are they?

The definitions that I posted above are the meanings that we assign to "Respect." I think meaning of "Trust" is evident.

The hardest thing for most salespeople to get their minds around semis to be:
The most effective relationship that you can have, whether in sales or otherwise, is one of Mutual Trust and Respect.

That is why we have been working for over fifteen years to perfect the Trust and Respect Inquiry (TRI) process. The TRI is now better than ninety percent effective. It can be completed in less than twenty minutes.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JacquesWerth

The definitions that I posted above are the meanings that we assign to "Respect." I think meaning of "Trust" is evident.

The hardest thing for most salespeople to get their minds around semis to be:
The most effective relationship that you can have, whether in sales or otherwise, is one of Mutual Trust and Respect.

I wonder if the challenge you describe Jacques doesn't stem from miscommunication.

You provided two different meanings for the term "respect". The first was, "to regard another person as having value equal to other human beings." This makes sense to me in the context of Seller and Buyer interaction.

The second was, "to treat another person with the same consideration and high regard as other people that you esteem." This is not the same as the first definition and doesn't make sense in the context of Seller and Buyer interaction because it needs to be qualified. It's not probable that a Buyer will have the same high regard for salesman X, whom they know nothing about, as other people they might esteem such as an authority figure.

You also wrote that you thought the meaning of "Trust" was evident. Once again without qualification there is an enormous opportunity for miscommunication. Here are a few different definitions of "Trust" from different sources:

have confidence or faith in;
reliance: certainty based on past experience;
hope: expect and wish;

And to what degree of trust are we talking?

completely
substantially or generally
somewhat or slightly
rarely or not at all

What is evident to you may not be as evident to others. That is one of the challenges to clear communication.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpeedRacer

MitchM, Bald Dog and anyone else who believes that prospective customers will trust and respect salespeople by default how do you maintain your belief in the light of this empirical data?

By not exhibiting behaviours that are typical of salespeople.

No presentations, no brochures, no rapport-building, no "how are you today", no enthusiasm overdrive, no leaning forward, no objection handling, no asking for the sale, and no closing.

No one-way presentations but collaborative diagnosis and solution development

No brochures but paper and calculator to quantify problem

No rapport-building but cutting to the chase

No "how are you today" but cutting to the chase

No enthusiasm overdrive but a level-headed objective approach. Enthusiasm makes you emotion-driven.

No leaning forward but sitting naturally.

No objection-handling but accepting come what may. But I have a very strong qualification process for the meeting.

No asking for the sale but having the final word on whether or not I accept the prospect as a new client.

No closing but letting the prospect close herself and I decide whether or not to accept her as a new client.

This is an odd approach but it works for me rather nicely. I'm being treated as a peer not as a salesperson.

Thoughts?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bald Dog

By not exhibiting behaviours that are typical of salespeople.

In one post you assert that prospective customers will trust and respect salespeople by default. In another posts you provide empirical data that shows 26% “somewhat or slightly” trusted the salesperson and 61% said they trusted the salesperson “rarely or not at all". Do you suggest that 87% of the salespeople involved in those sales diminished the trust defaulted by the Buyer through their own behaviours?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bald Dog

By not exhibiting behaviours that are typical of salespeople.

"No presentations, no brochures, no rapport-building, no "how are you today", no enthusiasm overdrive, no leaning forward, no objection handling, no asking for the sale, and no closing." -- BD

Tried that - cost time & money & good sales. Today I use marketing tools very carefully w/mostly people already sold or looking seriously. ALSO, when I found the leaning-forward-mirroring-behavior-handling-objections-acting made me feel like a Saturday Night Live set or worse some daily SOAP replete with convoluted and manipulating-for-my-own-good-disguised-as-their good - I decided to quit all that! I changed the station - I deleted the station.

"No one-way presentations but collaborative diagnosis and solution development" - BD

That's it!

"No brochures but paper and calculator to quantify problem" -- BD

Essentially!

"No rapport-building but cutting to the chase" -- BD

Exactly!

"No "how are you today" but cutting to the chase" -- BD

Only quickly if at all but cutting to the chase quickly.

"No enthusiasm overdrive but a level-headed objective approach. Enthusiasm makes you emotion-driven." -- BD

I can be enthusiastic at times and overtly passionate BUT I mostly keep it in control - level headed is best.

"No leaning forward but sitting naturally." -- BD

Sometimes I slouch, when I lean forward it's not as a manipulation - it's a natural response to the situation, but usually I'm sitting naturally as I would anywhere. Nothing is more of joke than the salesman leaning forward, building rapport talking about family and hobbies, smiling at everything and using all the clever twists and turns memorized from sales trainings.

"No objection-handling but accepting come what may. But I have a very strong qualification process for the meeting." -- BD

Exactly! What is your qualification process for the meeting, BD?

"No asking for the sale but having the final word on whether or not I accept the prospect as a new client." -- BD

Agreed! Revelation came when we rejected both a sale and a sponsorship into business.

"No closing but letting the prospect close herself and I decide whether or not to accept her as a new client." -- BD

Same as above!

"This is an odd approach but it works for me rather nicely. I'm being treated as a peer not as a salesperson." -- BD

Equal footing equal respect and trust!

Thoughts?

- BD

You got them!

MitchM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpeedRacer

MitchM, Bald Dog and anyone else who believes that prospective customers will trust and respect salespeople by default how do you maintain your belief in the light of this empirical data?

Good Point!
If neither the prospect nor the salesperson has done anything to engender trust and respect, then it is not likely to occur for either.

Trust and Respect

Sales Forum