Trust is the dominant success factor in creating lasting customer relationships. Trust is the soil that grows customer lifetime value – the metric that means money. The more your customers trust you, the greater your profitability potential. Trust is required to create happier customers that stay longer and buy more.
The two levels of trust in B2B relationships
- The first is short-term. It is the trust, perhaps better defined as the confidence, that an episodical, predefined, and measurable task will be done reliably, and, in fact, optimized. This is fertile ground for martech and AI. The reward is revenue.
- The second is long-term. It’s about your client embracing you as an essential resource in achieving their future. It’s personal, and it’s beyond the language of any contract. The reward is profitability.
Rock-solid performance is what earns your customer’s short-term trust.
Greg Sieke of SieckGrowth puts this right on the table: (Greg is an independent marketing consultant whom I respect. I will be sharing the wisdom of others, as well.)
“Performance is the coin of the realm. Delivering on the task is all that matters. B2B buyers and sellers bet their careers on getting things done. You invest in the long-term by delivering 100%+ in the short term.”
In some cases, the business plan was only short-term. Flip the company in 3 – 5 years. Grab as much of the marketplace as you can, as fast as you can, and show as much revenue as you can. This worked then, though probably not as much as we have all dreamt about.
Now, the acquisitions market wants to see sustained profitability, which takes longer and requires both focus and will. And if a purchase never happens, well, you’re solidly profitable.
How do you earn a customer’s long-term trust?
Three key things are needed:
- Align your organization towards profitability.
- Understand and embrace your customer’s desired future state.
- Craft and commit to your long-term future state.
Align your organization towards profitability.
It may also be that the culture is resisting change by perpetuating the status quo. Paula Zirinsky, of Zirinsky Strategy LLC, illustrates the power of culture.
“Law firms talk about long-term relationships, but many still pursue business like a one-night stand. Staying engaged even after a matter concludes is what sustains trust and builds the relationship.
“Firms that shift from matter-based interactions to long-term advisory stewardship will earn the trust others leave behind.”
While cultural change is slow and difficult, you do have one tool that will work right now. Incentives drive behavior.
First, a word of caution:
Corporations get exactly the behaviors they measure and reward. Conversely, misaligned measurement and reward systems drive unintended corporate behavior, regardless of the stated goals. This is the upshot of organizational management scholar Steven Kerr’s, “On the Folly of Rewarding A, While Hoping for B.”
If your company is not measuring and rewarding long-term profitability, it ain’t gonna happen. For instance, take the department called Customer Success (CX). These team members are often rewarded on near-term sales and not on a customer’s success. If the customer succeeds by purchasing more of your products and services, that’s nice, but you’re backing into it. Perhaps your customer’s success would be more robust if both parties could agree on a set of shared metrics, and your team is also incented on reaching those targets.
Perhaps you put a percentage of profits aside that is distributed directly to your teams at the end of the year. Kinda like the season finale of Landman.
Your internal measurement and reward systems must be aligned with short-term and long-term goals. If each individual materially gains from increases in customer lifetime value, their performance will rise to the occasion.
Understand and embrace your customer’s desired future state
You’ve got to show up. It’s person-to-person. It’s about so much more than what’s written on their website. We are all people and an eye-to-eye handshake goes a long way. You have to earn the right to be part of this conversation.
“People trust people more than institutions.”
— Edelman Trust Barometer
It’s about stepping up to the plate, stepping out from behind the technology, being present before and after the meeting. It’s about being prepared and tapping all your resources, not just what you happen to be selling, to solve your customer’s issue. It’s about getting to know the people, and for them to get to know you. Go out and have a meal.
Jonathan Goodman, GTM and PMM strategist:
“In-person has been making a comeback. Lots more small, highly cultivated, IRL experiences. Executive dinners and roundtables. Our team makes a point of getting on a plane and getting in the room at every opportunity. It’s part of the brand experience.
“We’re in both worlds. Remote efficiency. And in-person trust-building.”
Craft and commit to your long-term future state
Let’s tell the story of your future state. This is the story that answers each customer’s basic question “what’s in it for me?” It’s most effectively a story, because that’s how people learn. Your team needs to learn it by heart. Your customer needs to learn to believe.
“Stories are the original human technology.”
- Seth Godin, Building blocks of marketing
The story is about a rambling stagecoach journey through the dusty West. The hero is your customer, and you are riding shotgun. Your job is to deliver the goods. You can’t do it remotely. Your job is to have your customer’s back.
At its heart, it’s a simple and very human story about how you are aligned with your customer’s goals. Here’s a quick for-instance of the kernel of the type of story I’m talking about:
Each team member has one focus and one goal, and that is your continuing success. There simply isn’t anything more important.
The trick is you can’t just write it or say it, you have to live it. Your customer isn’t going to bestow trust without the lived, demonstrable proof that the story is true. It’s absolutely person-to-person and manifests empathy, connection and commitment. Generosity, insight, anticipation and respect are throughout.
“The strongest client relationships are built on trust earned over time—not on price, contracts, or scope of services.”
— Bain & Company, Client Loyalty Insights
The story becomes like a mantra. It answers employees’ question of what’s the right thing to do? It is the road map for every message and every interaction. The story builds long-term trust, every day, with every message and every interaction.
“Trust between management and external advisors is critical for long-term value creation, particularly during periods of transformation or uncertainty.”
— PwC, “Building Trust in Business Relationships”
My recommendation is to have the story, the music, the lyrics, the orchestration in one place, that everyone can learn and reference, so we’re all singing from the same song sheet. It’s an urgent resource, and will be the topic of my next article.
Let’s get everything going in a straight line
This approach concentrates the effort of your corporation and of every employee on helping your customer reach their future state, and your continuing and accelerating profitability.
Let me conclude with a quote from George Roberts who is the VP of Innovation at Smart 1 Marketing. I asked George to undertake this because he and I have done business over many companies for 40 years. It kind of sums things up:
“In an era of automation and DIY tools, we sometimes forget that you cannot automate trust; it requires a genuine, long-term investment of human resources. Your tech stack might be efficient, but it cannot be empathetic – AI will never love you back. When you commit to serving the relationship with the right clients, the profits will inevitably follow.”
Everyone is looking at AI and AI is looking squarely at earning that short-term level of trust. But its benefits of faster cheaper are not as valuable as we look to earn the second, long-term level of trust. That level needs you.
The most powerful differentiator is your simple and very human story, in word and deed. Engage your best customers with empathy, connection, commitment, generosity, insight, anticipation and respect. That’s what will bring you up to and through the door of long-term profitability.
Sit ‘em down around the campfire. Tell ‘em a good story. Make it a singalong.
About the Author
International author, lecturer and consultant, Scott Hornstein has worked with clients in all phases of marketing strategy, research, and implementation. He has worked with companies large and small to build profitability, by improving marketing performance, and reengineering the customer experience to boost satisfaction, referrals, and customer lifetime value. Contact Scott.
More articles by Scott Hornstein:
- Make ‘Em Laugh: The Power of Humor in B2B Marketing
- How to increase your yield of qualified leads by 10-20%
- The whole world is changing. B2B marketing, not so much. Here’s a swift kick in the pants to get us going.
- Profitability Starts with Identifying Your Ideal Customer Profile – ICP
- This Would be a Great Business if it Weren’t for all Those Annoying Customers
- Customer Satisfaction is the Pulse of Your Profitability