Are You a Trusted Brand?
When you’re diagnosed with an illness and the doctor recommends a surgical procedure, your first question is whom would the doctor recommend? On getting the recommendation, you ask about their credentials, check the institution where they practice, sometimes ask the staff about the doctor and you even ask around in your acquaintances if they’ve heard about the doctor.
After having made your queries, you finalize the doctor based on their reputation, the trust level on the hospital where they practice, the opinions of people who know the doctor and the opinions of people who have heard about the doctor or who may have been treated by the doctor.
The doctor’s brand value is based on:
Recommendation from your trusted Physician
Qualifications
Skills
Institution’s Repute
Opinion of Team Members
Opinions of people who may have been treated by the Doctor
The doctor has made a mark based on all of these qualities.
Can a sales person also be gauged on these? Of course, they can.
If a customer requires a particular product about which you have expertise, other sales persons will refer the customer to you knowing you have a better chance of closing the sale and getting business for the company (considering that you have maintained good professional relationships with your colleagues and are not regarded as a you know what.)
The customer can evaluate you based on your qualifications and gauge you based on your skills through some preliminary questions. They can also evaluate the company you work for, with the aim to evaluate if they trust the company as well as the sales person.
They can ask other people within your company if they are talking to the right person. If you have developed a reputation within the company, chances are your team members will not only recommend you, they will offer the customer to transfer the call to you.
Prospective customers may also obtain a list of your current customers and ask them for an evaluation of the company and an evaluation of you. If you have offered great service and delivered value, there is a fair chance the customer will recommend you for the job.
Just like you build trust with customers and ask them for referrals, you should be worthy of getting referred as well. To be referred for a job you need to build trust, deliver value and be a pleasure to do business with. You could be very good at your job but if you are not approachable, people will shy away from referring you to their friends for business.
Therefore, you need to build on the ability to sell yourself and become a trustworthy person whom people can recommend to their professional colleagues and friends.