5 proven ways to build customer trust for sales managers

Sales professionals are repeatedly reminded of the truism that, to win over customers, it is important to focus on earning their trust. While engaging with a customer, success proves elusive if the focus is on chasing revenue.

Customers engage with businesses how they engage with people and build relationships only with companies they can trust.

Customer trust increases customer retention. Studies show that an increase of just 5% in customer retention increases profits by 95%. It pays to gain customer trust. Another study shows that 83% of customers recommend a business to others only if they trust it. Winning customer trust helps retain not only customers but also win new customers.

The five approaches that salespeople can adopt to win customer trust include:

Provide the best customer service

Customer service is proof of the business’s commitment to its customers’ interests. Superior customer service shows that the company cares enough about its customers’ concerns. Superior customer service reveals that the business cares enough about its customers’ concerns.

The quality of customer service impacts customer retention. It is important to have a dedicated customer service team that reliably addresses all customer issues. The service team should have performance guidelines that ensure that customers receive efficient and consistent service. The service team should also be trained to provide the customers with all the information that they might need.

Businesses can avail themselves of corporate sales training programs for this purpose. The team should also have the autonomy to stretch the contracted customer service terms within reasonable limits. Going above and beyond is a sure way to win customer trust.

Share customer reviews and testimonials

Customers tend to trust reviews and testimonials of other customers over the business’s marketing messages. A study found that 72% of customers trust a business with positive reviews and testimonials. When customers recommend a brand, it builds trust in the brand. Customers trust what other customers say more than what the brands themselves say. Positioning a brand, as the one favored by other customers, on the strength of the reviews and testimonials, is a powerful tool for building customer trust and winning their business.

Be Honest and Transparent

Customer retention is difficult to achieve because customers have multiple options to choose from for their product or service needs. Building a pool of loyal customers is best done by being honest and transparent in dealings with customers. Set up the right customer expectations by letting the customers know exactly what they can expect at the stage of signing the contract itself. The sales team should be honest about the pricing offered and be sincere in its commitment to working in the best interests of the customer. The best corporate training and development programs always emphasise the importance of honest and transparent dealings with customers.

Request for, and act on, customer feedback

Customer feedback helps businesses improve their products and services. Feedback helps companies in assessing levels of customer satisfaction. In the absence of feedback, companies will have no means of judging what customers think of their products and will have no tool to estimate the business’s long-term success.

Seeking feedback serves to show customers that you value their opinion. Acting on feedback is an excellent way to show that the relationship is two-way and that you value customers more than their revenue.

Be Reachable

Prompt customer service is essential for delivering a great customer experience. The business’s service reps should be reachable either over the phone, e-mail, live chat, or social media. Being reliably reachable reinforces the recurring theme in this list of suggestions that the business is trustworthy. Being reachable and delivering superior customer service, as all corporate learning programs will tell you, shows customers that you value their custom-enhancing customer trust

Final Thoughts

Valuing your customers is the key to building trust. This is only possible by delighting them at every possible touchpoint. Suppose the sales team puts customers’ interests first before everything they do. In that case, the customers will know that they are the business’s top priority, and customer trust and loyalty will follow automatically.