As a salesperson and a business, your reputation has a huge impact on how people view you and how the business grows. You can have the best product in the world, but if people do not think highly of the salesperson or the company, it will not sell. It takes time to build trust with customers and develop a reputation, but if you take time to work at it, you should be rewarded.
There are a few aspects to building trust. In a sales conversation, this starts with the bonding and rapport. It is where you learn about the other person and start developing a relationship. This can be learning about their business, position, family, or anything else. The salesperson needs to know the prospect, but the prospect also needs to get to know you.
Later in the sales process, there may be a point where it makes sense to be more of a consultant. If this happens, give the client useful information. It shows that you know about their problem and are really wanting to help, not just focus on the sale. You have to be careful with this, though, because if you do too much of this, they may get all of the information they need and not need to move forward with the purchase, or you also might stray from answering their questions and move their focus away from the real problem. Both of these are not ideal for the salesperson. Being knowledgeable and answering their questions knowledgeably is important.
If the prospect has a good experience with the salesperson or the company, word will spread around that people should look in to working with that company. The opposite will happen as well. If there is a bad experience, people will learn to stay away from you.
In the end, building a reputation and trust with prospects and clients is very important, and is something that needs to be focused heavily on in all aspects of the business.
BoweryJE22