Beliefs that Hinder Salespeople – I Have Great Relationships with My Customers

by Dave Kahle

“I have great relationships with my customers.”  That is one of the most debilitating myths around – one that cripples the performance of the average corporate salesperson.  Yet, it is endemic within the population of salespeople.  I am not sure that there is a salesperson anywhere who doesn’t, to some extent, believe it.

       For example, I have never yet had a salesperson come to me at the break of one of my seminars, and sheepishly confess that his customers really don’t like him.  It’s never happened and probably never will.

       I have, on the other hand, heard senior sales executives, when discussing their sales force with me, allude to someone whom they hired from a competitor because “they had such great relationships with their customers that they were going to bring their business with them.”  And, almost universally, it didn’t quite happen that way.  The salespeople, and their prospective employers, thought, erroneously, that the salesperson had great relationships with their customers.  They subscribed to the myth.

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          Great Relationships = Smoke-Screens

In recent years, I have come to see the belief that a salesperson has “great relationships” as something of a smoke-screen.  It’s used by the salesperson to obscure a deeper issue – their lack of sales expertise.  As long as they believe that they have great relationships, then they don’t need to be competent salespeople, because after all, their customers like them and will buy from them no matter how poorly executed are their sales competencies.

Strategic Decisions Based Upon Great Relationships

Here’s another problem.  Salespeople who profess to have great relationships with their customers all too often limit the preponderance of their sales calls to those with whom they have these relationships.  In other words, the existence of the perceived relationship dictates their strategic decisions – they go where it is easiest, and spend time with those whom they perceive...CLICK HERE TO READ FULL ARTICLE.