Why We Don’t Trust Companies Part I
People don't trust companies very much. Sure, we trust some companies more than others, and sometimes we trust them more than government (sometimes not), but when you think of someone…
So You Don’t Have Time to Be a Trusted Advisor?
One of the more frequent comments I get in talking about being a trusted advisor is this: "We'd love to practice all the things you talk about, Charlie, we agree…
When You Can’t Get No Respect
Some will recall comic Rodney Dangerfield's catch phrase. Others may remember Aretha Franklin's iconic spelling, R-E-S-P-E-C-T. When you respect someone, it's a verb. When you get respect, it's a noun. Either way, it…
When Being Trustworthy Isn’t Enough to be Trusted
In sales, you sometimes hear, "They were pursuing an aggressive strategy – aggressively waiting for the phone to ring." In other words, sometimes you've got to take action. Much the…
What Sales Winners Do Differently: Q&A with Mike Schultz
For many years now I have been a contributing editor at RainToday.com, the premier online resource for professional services sales and marketing. Besides a ton of articles, books, special programs,…
Half of What You’ve Learned About Sales is Wrong
Maybe you've heard the old line, "Half of advertising dollars are wasted – you just don't know which half." Something like that is true in sales – except that you've got…
I’m Selling Hammers, You Look Like a Nail
You know the old line, "If you've got a hammer, everything looks like a nail." It means we tend to see the world through our own frames of reference. It's…
Part 2: Why Aren’t There High Trust Strategies in a Low Trust Industry?
In my last post, I asked the question: If financial services are such a low-trust industry (on average), then why isn't someone pursuing the obvious differentiation strategy of forming a high-trust…
Would Manti Te’o Trust Lance Armstrong?
King Kong vs. Godzilla. The immeasurable force and the immoveable object. The mountain and Muhammed. To these historic pairings, add Manti Te'o and Lance Armstrong, in the roles of trustor and trustee respectively. (For…
Brutal Honesty Isn’t
Oh it's brutal, all right. But it's not honest. Real honesty is empathetic. Here's how. I suppose you could be honest in a vacuum – but who cares? Was Robinson…