Do you feel like you’re doing well with establishing trust with potential clients, but aren’t seeing this trust translating to more closed deals?
While getting the prospect to know, like and trust you is key to developing a business relationship and closing deals, it’s actually only half of the equation. The truth is, trust alone is not good enough if you want to close the sale.
So, what’s the missing link?
Clients are looking for experts in the industry to buy from, they want these experts to be able to provide value to their purchase and to be able to guide them to success. The obvious question is, how do you establish yourself and your team as a marketplace experts?
Here are a few steps you can take to establish industry expertise.
1) Present At Seminars
Do more than just attend them, you and/or your sales team should consider presenting at seminars. You automatically gain access to dozens, if not hundreds of new potential clients and establish yourself as an expert in your given industry.
2) Provide Knowledge Based Webinars
You can either host webinars or you can re-send previous editions to current prospects. Focus on providing as much value as you can during these webinars, as the information you provide and clarity of your message will dictate whether attendees will become potential clients.
3) Provide Access To Marketing/Research Materials
By having your sales team send these materials to clients, you are able to further provide resources that can prove to be invaluable to your clients. Remember, providing access to experts can often equate to being an expert yourself.
4) Collect and Distribute Sales Testimonials
What better proof of your marketplace expertise than other clients’ success stories? By sharing testimonials, you demonstrate to your new prospects that you have had previous success and possess the knowledge needed to produce results.
For salespeople who are used to cold-calling and prospecting, a conscious shift may be required in order to get into the proper mindset of focusing on becoming an industry expert. However, this shift is well worth it. By becoming experts, sales teams are viewed not only as successful business people, but also as important resources for prospective clients. ← Click to Tweet
Those salespeople who focus on providing value in their industries, not only assist buyers in their own businesses, but they also increase their chances of closing more sales in their markets and generating more leads. Want your sales team to be seen as experts? Invest in them! Send your team to seminars or conferences, and provide them with writers and webinar tools. Give them the resources they need in order to gain the knowledge required to become the experts that they are capable of becoming!
The payoff of this type of investment is huge! The more you leverage your team to become industry experts, the more you’re able to take an interaction beyond the realms of just trust, and into the realms of demonstrating real value and more consistent sales!
How are you demonstrating your expertise in your industry?
Spot on, it is about positioning yourself as an industry expert. I think through presentation in seminars, you will be branded as someone who has many years of experience. Taking sales and marketing towards another level. This would be looking at different seminars, forums for year 2014 and look at which area i can help add value in. Woody Allen’s old adage: “80 percent of success is showing up.”