Do you know the difference between a business Facebook friend or a business LinkedIn friend and a real friend? A real friend will drive you to the airport, lend you money and help you move.
Time to shatter the marketing myth that by just helping enough business friends we will sooner or later receive our rewards.
The late Zig Ziglar is often quoted as saying, “You can have everything in life you want in life, if you will just help enough other people get what they want.”
I love that motto. But another author I greatly respect is making me rethink my position on business friends.
“That’s somewhat true, but the rewards may be only intangible ones: such as satisfaction and warm feelings,” says author Jim Cathcart. “The more intelligently you choose, create and grow the right relationships the greater your success will be.”
A legend in selling, Cathcart is the author of Relationship Selling. He was inducted into the Sales & Marketing Hall of Fame in London, England and the Professional Speakers Hall of Fame in the USA. His TEDx video, “How to Believe in Yourself” has received over 1.4 million views.
Cathcart is as upbeat today as when I first met him 30 years ago. I recently interviewed him by phone as he was preparing for an international speaking assignment. Here are six tips from Cathcart for relationship selling:
- “The purpose of selling is to build profitable relationships. Without relationships there are only transactions and every day is just as hard as the one before it. With stronger sales relationships every day will be easier, more profitable and more fun!”
- “Your entire life is a series of relationships. When you change who, why or how you connect with people you simultaneously change your life. Therefore, you should be as intentional as possible in the formation and cultivation of your relationships. Choose well who you will spend time with and who you will avoid.”
- “Nature never stands still, neither can a business. A business is a living system. We must continually grow as people, as an organization and in our capacity to serve our constituents. When we stop growing we start to rot.”
- “Customer loyalty is something you should give rather than merely seek to receive. It is best earned by staying loyal to your customers over time, even when they don’t seem loyal to you. Then they always feel connected with you.”
- “Making a sale without establishing a trusting relationship is what vending machines do. No humans required. Building a relationship without making a sale is what we call a social friendship. No profit created.”
- “Relationship selling is a form of selling, not merely a type of relationship. The purpose of it is to help other people at a profit to you. When you are truly helping, you deserve to be well compensated for your product or service.”
A final thought from Cathcart: “Relationship selling calls for the formation of business friendships. That is a friendship in which the underlying assumption is that value is being delivered in both directions: services and payments. Without the transactions, the nature of the relationship changes from business to social.”
