In the restoration industry, success in sales is based on building trust and establishing credibility. When selling any service, the prospective customer has only your relationship, the information you provide, and the inputs and evaluations from others on which to base their choice of vendor. Effectively building trust is the most critical skill your business development people must master.
The selling strategy I have found most successful is to build that trust and credibility on the platform of positioning your company, and yourself as the sales or business development professional, as a partner; a resource that can help the customer achieve their goals. This is a partnership that goes well beyond simply providing your services when they are needed. When fully embraced, you’ll find this method is significantly more successful and built on a deeper relationship with the customer than the “find their pain” approach popularized in the 1990s.