Monday, August 16, 2010

Building Real Trust With Your Prospects and Clients

We're in a crisis that is MORE than just about the numbers. "Lazy" businesses, who neglect building trust and *real* relationships with their clients are gonna get smoked by this current environment.

As a business owner and entrepreneur myself, I pay attention to politics and to the drift of the nation with a great deal of interest--and to understand what your clients are thinking about. And there is a lot of talk these days about this recession, of course.

One of the political commentators I have read (though I do not always agree with her analysis) is Peggy Noonan--a former Reagan speechwriter, she is now a commentator on MSNBC and writes a weekly column in the Wall Street Journal. She is a great writer--elegaic, and she isnot afraid to let her personality shine through.

(Incidentally--isn't that the mark of great writing, especially sales writing? We tend to gravitate and read people who stand for something, and do it with their own unique style...not the bland junk which puts us all to sleep. There is a lesson there for you and your business...if you see it.)

But my point is not just about her style--it is about what she said in her column from some time ago. Noonan describes the deep uncertainty which many of your clients (and, perhaps, you) were and ARE STILL feeling about the economy and our country. The Dow is sinking, nobody is sure about the "stimulus" yet...but it seems to be more than that.

[Her column is here: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123508142847026881.html]

However, at the end of the piece, she says something which I believe is deeply true--and strikes a note of hope for you, Paula, if you are willing to see it.

Noonan writes:

"Dynamism has been leached from our system for now, but not from the human brain or heart. Just as our political regeneration will happen locally, in counties and states that learn how to control themselves and demonstrate how to govern effectively in a time of limits, so will our economic regeneration. That will begin in someone's garage, somebody's kitchen, as it did in the case of Messrs. Jobs and Wozniak.

"The comeback will be from the ground up and will start with innovation. No one trusts big anymore. In the future everything will be local. That's where the magic will be. And no amount of pessimism will stop it once it starts."

Did you catch that? "No one trusts big anymore."

There is a lot to consider there, but here is my primary point:

Are you "big" to your clients? Or, does your business have a "face"...a personality and a relationship with your customers and prospects?

Obviously, I take my own advice to heart here--it is one big reason I take time each week to write you these notes. But businesses that neglect their relationships with their clients...hoping that clients will remain loyal to a business which presents itself as a *big* "company" (instead of a place with real people and personality) won't survive this recession.

It us a by-product of the Internet age...and you have gotta pay mind to it. Do not get seduced by the siren-call of "professionalism" in communication. That is another word for "boring" and will put your customers to sleep.

Give your clients a "face"...and you will be left standing--and thriving--when the dust of this economy settles, while your bland, "professional" competitors will never know what hit them.

You will have a relationship built on trust...not just a transaction.