How to build rapport with your customers
Building rapport has a huge impact on how likely you are to secure a sale or ongoing custom from a potential client or customer over the phone. A key element in sales is to gain the trust of your customer, which without face to face interaction can prove more difficult than it sounds. This post is all about how to build rapport with your customers and we’re sharing our secrets to getting it right to secure your deal.
FIND COMMON GROUND
This is a really easy way to build a relationship with your client. Finding common ground such as interests, lifestyle similarities like children or even hobbies is a great way to begin planting the foundations to an ongoing working relationship with your customer.
BE TRUSTWORTHY
If you say you’re going to do something, do it and don’t make empty promises that you can’t deliver with. Being trustworthy is hugely overlooked in cold sales, but if you want to grow long-term relationships with your customers and earn a great reputation, stick to your word.
MIRROR THEIR RESPONSES
When we say mirror their responses we don’t mean match their possible negative reactions, instead we mean to match their tone to the dependency of their formalities. NEVER address somebody by their first name without asking if you can first, this is usually a good indicator of whether this potential customer is going to take a more casual approach or not. Another way of mirroring is quickly picking up on whether this customer wants to get straight down to business or is open to some small talk to start. A great salesperson will be able to establish the pace and formalities each call requires for optimum results.
PUT YOURSELF IN THE CUSTOMERS SHOES
Seeing your customers perspective and overcoming their objections by putting yourself in those shoes is an excellent way to build rapport and secure the best outcome possible. This method creates a mutual understanding and shows the customer that their individual circumstances or concerns are valued and taken into consideration. 
TAKE AN INTEREST IN YOUR CUSTOMERS
A great salesperson will pick up on small information points that your customer may divulge during small talk. A great way to show your potential customer that you are interested in them personally is to ask how their week or day is going. This will usually open up the customer to giving you information that you can use to either continue to open the conversation further, giving you the ability to further build rapport and gain trust, or use in developing a reason for them to buy your product or services.
BE CLEAR, CONCISE AND DON’T LEAVE CUSTOMERS WAITING
Being clear and concise is important to ensuring you gain your customers trust. Fluffing something up by trying to sweet talk the sale is going to make your customer suspicious of your intentions. Make sure you are clear on exactly what you can offer your customer and concise about why this product or service is for them. Do not leave your customer on hold or keep them waiting, this is a sure fire way to destroy your entire rapport built during the call, leaving the customer feeling like they are not a priority after all.
A lot of the methods of building rapport that work well are just by treating the customer as an equal and being respectful. There will always be barriers to overcome with some customers, however, with the right training and experience the barriers are quite easily broken down and rapport is able to be built from there. At the end of the day, you are trying to gain or retain somebodies custom for your business, investing time and effort into the potential customer can pay off.
