Ever wonder how some thought leaders always seem to have great relationships with their clients?
Building good client relationships is crucial for the success of any business or professional practice. Strong client relationships can lead to increased repeat business, a positive reputation, improved communication, increased productivity, and personal satisfaction. By cultivating effective communication, trust, and a willingness to go above and beyond for your clients, you can create long-lasting, meaningful connections that can drive the success of your business.
Good client relationships are also essential for maintaining a steady stream of revenue and attracting new clients through referrals. Overall, building and maintaining good client relationships is an important investment in the future of your business or practice.
In this episode, we discuss how thought leaders build strong, lasting relationships with their clients. We cover the importance of effective communication, trust-building, and going above and beyond in client interactions.
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Atiba de Souza: Hey, are you looking to build better relationships with your clients? Well, we're gonna dive into that topic today here on Thoughts on Thought Leadership with Atiba.
Atiba de Souza: Hey, everybody! Welcome to Thoughts on Thought Leadership with Atiba. I am your host. Yep, that's me, Atiba. And today we are going to be diving into this conversation about client relationships and building and creating meaningful and strong client relationships.
Now, most people who talk on this topic want to talk about after you've landed the client and sustaining the relationship. Yeah. If you're worried about client relationship at that point, you've already missed the boat. You've already missed the boat because client relationships start long before you ever know that this person is interested in becoming your client. And that's what we're gonna look at today here on Thoughts on Thought Leadership, but you know, what am I really saying? So what I'm saying is it actually starts guys in your marketing. It starts in your marketing, your relationship with the client, that long lasting relationship that you're looking to create with your client starts in your marketing.
The very first things that they see from you. And one of the interesting things that's happened over the last couple of years is for those of us in the B2B space. So businesses selling to other businesses, marketing has kinda started to change some, right? The rise of social media and social media influences, then coronavirus and the pandemic, people being more virtual it's really started to change the way B2B marketing is happening. And what's actually happening, if you're really paying attention you'll see what's actually happening is the difference, the gap between B2B marketing and B2C marketing is actually closing and starting to overlap. And so some of the principles from B2C marketing are what we need now in B2B marketing. Now, that wasn't so forever. Right? For a long time, they were very different because there were different places that people went for different information. So if you were looking to market to your business clients, then maybe you went to trade magazines and put out ads or wrote articles or spoke at their conferences.
And you found in those ways you went to networking events and shared information with other people. But now all of that, thanks to social media and really exacerbated by the stoppage of work that happened globally because of the pandemic. Everything has moved online and with everything moving online, we now have the reality that the exact same channels that we use to market from businesses to consumers are the same channels we're using to market business to business. You're marketing your business on Instagram, just like Dove is marketing their soap on Instagram. You're both in the same channels. You're both in the same channels, which means that the framework, the mindset of your customer when you're marketing to them, isn't even always business anymore. It isn't always business anymore. It used to be not that way, as we all know, right? Because it used to be that, of course, they went to a conference and they saw you at a trade show, alright, in a trade conference and they saw your booth and they were there for business. Or they received a magazine that had your ad in it. Heck, even if the stuff that was online emails and some of the websites that they went to were all geared to their business. And when you were at work, you were doing business stuff on your business computer and your business machines. And then when you went home, you had your personal stuff.
And that's how businesses used to function. Now, because of the pandemic, because so many people went home and were home and are still home and have gone remote and are remote working now, we're having this crossover, this absolute crossover of when does business end and consumer start? Those roles are starting to intertwine with each other, your customers who are your B2B customers are starting to act like B2C customers because the roles are intertwining because they're doing both of them at the same time now.
So, client relationships start in your marketing. Okay. That's the premise. That's what we're focused on. Client relationships start in your marketing and it's time for us as business owners, marketing to other business owners to start looking at how consumers are marketed to. And the lessons from marketing to consumers over the last five, six years of social media and start to apply that to how we market our businesses to other business owners. Okay. So, how does that all look? And as we're talking about client relationships, how does this all play together? Well, one of the biggest lessons that we've learned in B2C communications really in the last decade and this is- it actually isn't anything new. This theory was created decades ago, I think back in the 1950s to be exact, right?
And it focused on a term called moments of truth marketing, right? And the axiom, if you will, that we've learned and kind of really seen in B2C communications and B2C marketing communications with social media in the last five, six years is this, people buy because of moments, not facts. People buy because of moments not facts. Now, when I got into marketing, when I got into sales, one of the early things that I learned, that I was taught rather, was people buy on emotions and they justify with facts. Maybe you've heard that too. That's what got the screaming car salesman, right? Trying to rally emotion. But the reality is everything that you purchase, whether it's for your business or as a consumer, you first buy on emotion and then you justify with facts. I've taken that axiom a little bit further and say people buy because of moments not facts. Is it because those emotions create moments with a brand? Those emotions create a situation where there's something memorable about this brand that I then define as that was the moment, and I had this recently. I had this recently, I just bought my wife a new car and we knew which car we wanted to buy. And yeah, I chose a dealership which was a dealership I didn't wanna choose because of a moment. Now you're gonna say, "Okay, there are moments. What do you mean by moments?" Well, there was a moment when something happened and I said, "You know what? I can trust these guys. I can trust these guys. I can go and buy my car. I can feel comfortable buying my car here. I can trust these guys."
Those are the moments that we want to master and those moments exist for you and your brand with your customer before they call you. Now Google coined that and they call it zero moments of truth. They coined that way back in 2011, way, way back in 2011. What their basic premise was, was that people with all of the access to information that we have today, and they said this in 2011 so imagine where we are in 2022, with all of the information that we have today, that people are making more decisions about what they want, what brand they want and who they want to buy it from before they ever contact a company or a salesperson.
So there are moments that happen that created emotions that allowed someone to say, "I want to buy from you", long before you ever even knew they exist. The key is, can you master those moments? And that's what we can learn from the B2C industry is that, if we master those moments before they make a decision to buy and before we know that they're even considering, if we can master those moments, the thing that it does for us, guys, is number one, it builds loyalty. It builds trust before they ever even contact you, which then leads to great longer term client relationships. As long as you continue to deliver on your promise, right? So at this point, you're probably asking me a question and oh, at least you should be thinking about this question. All right. So I get this, you've probably heard that people buy on emotion and justify with fact. Okay. And you've probably heard you've gotta create those emotions. And you've probably wondered, like I did for a long time, even. How do I create these emotions in someone? And now here I come telling you, let's take it a little bit further it's about moments, those emotions add up and then create moments. So how do I create these moments?
What is the nexus? What is the genesis of those moments? Where do they start? How do I identify the building blocks of them so that I can create those emotions and those moments to build strong client relationships? The answer's actually ridiculously simple. It is ridiculously, ridiculously simple, my friends. And the answer is this, you have to answer people's questions. You see, that's the thing. That is the common thread. When you are in a dating relationship and you're thinking about this person, and you are wondering, "Could this person become my spouse?" What are you doing? You're asking a question. Right? And now when you say, "Could this person become my spouse?" Then that breaks down into some categories and those categories break down into more questions. Are they trustworthy? Do they want children? How many children? Where do they want to live? And all of these things have to start to line up. You have to get answers to those questions. And as you start to get answers to those questions, emotions start to build which grow into moments where you say, "You know what? I think I love you". And then you love them because they answered all of the questions that you had. It's the same thing in B2B marketing in 2022 and beyond. We have to figure out what are the questions that your customer is asking that they need answers to before they ever call you and answer them. Answer them. That's what we have to do for our customers. That's how we build strong client relationships with our customers that last. Okay. We've got to build those relationships through answering questions because it's those questions that are the building blocks to the emotions, which create the moments and those moments of what sustain you through. Those moments of what sustain you through. Because let's face it. You and I both know we've been in business, you've been in business, I've been in business a long time. We've had times when we screwed up but the client didn't leave and the client didn't leave because of moments that we've had in the past where they realize this is just a momentary thing. I know I can trust them. But those moments happened because there were emotions attached to them that were created through questions that the client had, that you knowingly or unknowingly answered. And my point to you, my friends, right now is it's time to stop unknowingly answering and figure out what those questions are and answer them. And answer them.
Now, it does a couple things for you when you do that. Number one, it helps establish authority, right? It establishes your authority as a thought leader when you're answering questions. It also establishes your credibility. Establishes your credibility and it builds social proof because as you answer the questions, people will start to see it. People will start to comment. People will start to recognize that you have an answer and that will start to build social proof for you. And this is the most important one, which I said earlier, it builds the bedrock for loyalty. Builds the absolute, absolute bedrock for loyalty. And that is the hallmark of a great client relationship. That right there, my friend. That right there. But it starts long before they become your client. It starts all the way back in your marketing and answering the questions that they actually have. So that's it right now. You've gotta go figure out what are those questions that your potential clients are asking before they ever contact you. What are those questions that they have? What are they? Maybe you know 'em already. Maybe you've already done this research. Great! Start answering them. Start answering them and putting the answers out there in video form. Put the answers out there. And if you don't know what they are, do me a favor. Let me know. I could probably help you figure some of those out, as well. Okay. But that is your key. Your key is figuring out those questions that your customers are asking before they get to you and answering them. The answers to those questions, as small as minute, as odd as they may be, are going to help you build an emotional connection with your client which will lead to more moments, which lead to them trusting you and buying from you and becoming loyal.
All right, everybody. As always, if you have any questions, drop me a question down below. Love to answer your questions. I'll see you real soon. Bye bye.