Trust can’t be explained or diagrammed. Trust comes through experience.
There are moments of trust in my near-death that I’ll never be able to explain. Late September 2021, my atrophied body was shriveled and motionless. Karen, my wife, said my face was sunken in. The chart said anorexic. If I were a black and white photograph, you’d see what looked like a POW who couldn’t stand, sit, or eat on their own. Karen sat on the edge of my bed and cried over all that COVID had taken from me. But when I looked up at her, I saw safety, hope, and trust.
It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about business or personal. The spark of trust is the magic of relationships. And you can design an experience that ignites that spark.
My journey of trust began at the turn of the new millennium. A friend named Ulrik designed an amplifier that was about to forever change the way mobile phones were built. My job was to market a product nobody had ever seen to one of the most cautious groups of buyers in the world… engineers. I had no idea how hard that would be.
Like speeding into a brick wall, I faced the same question. “Who else is using this part?”
“Nobody, but let me show you how awesome it is,” was my response.
“Hmmm…” they countered.
Ulrik designed an amplifier that forever changed how mobile phones were designed.
So, I looked to Hewlett Packard (HP) for inspiration. They didn’t always have the best product. But HP always had the trust of the engineers. I studied what they did… and I copied it… and it drove a half-billion in sales of Ulrik’s amplifier.
The path to those sales wasn’t found in facts or figures. It wasn’t the overly celebrated USP – Unique Selling Proposition. It came from connecting with the unique undercurrents that impassion the hearts of buyers. Later, I met Roy H. Williams who simplified it further:
“Win the heart and the mind will follow.” – Roy H. Williams
The spark of trust is the magic of relationships. Karen ignited that spark when she sang to me in my coma in 2021. And yes, I heard her from the darkness of my dreams. For the engineers, the music that ignited their spark was equipping them with expertise. It warmed their hearts, and they bought Ulrik’s amplifier by the millions.
I left the semiconductor industry in 2009 and started my own marketing agency. Like a lot of agencies, there have been a lot of ups and downs. One of the biggest ups was when we tripled revenue for a financial advisor in eighteen months. That was immediately followed by one of deepest downs.
The client came over to my office for lunch. As he started talking, my jaw could have shattered the table. It made no sense. We had just increased his revenue by tens of millions of dollars… in a year and a half. I didn’t expect him to cut us loose after growing his business that much. My stomach knotted up as I pictured a pie chart of revenue with his giant slice disappearing.
So, in 2018 I needed to find new business quickly. But my closing rate was too low. An opportunity would come in… I’d spend 20 hours pursuing and quoting… and then I’d lose the deal. I couldn’t work harder. There just weren’t enough hours in the day.
I remember saying “I’m in a referral-only business… and I just need more referrals.” But the truth is I had no system to build trust with strangers. 2018 was the year that changed.
Instead of looking to Hewlett Packard for inspiration, I looked to Columbia House Records. They had an irresistible deal in the 1980s and 1990s. You’d get thirteen albums for a penny when you join their record club. We call that a First-Time Offer (FTO). So, I started working on my own deal.
First-Time Offers make sales magical.
My first First-Time Offer failed. My second First-Time Offer failed. My third First-Time Offer failed… a little less. It took nearly eighteen months before I closed my first high-ticket deal from an FTO. But I learned two important lessons.
The first is it takes a complex First-Time Offer to sell a complex service. A simple offer like “thirteen albums for a penny” doesn’t close high-ticket deals.
The second lesson is trust can’t be explained, diagramed, or PowerPoint’ed. Trust is sparked through experience. So, effective First-Time Offers create experiences where you solve problems “shoulder-to-shoulder.” And when you help someone solve a problem, it releases oxytocin in the body. That’s the same bonding hormone that bonds babies to mothers. And oxytocin sparks trust that ignites the magic.
This magic increased my closing rate to 80% which felt like cool water in a hot desert. I wanted others to experience that magic. So, I started helping other high-ticket providers tap into the power that builds trust with strangers. In 2023, I published, Make Sales Magical, which lays out the exact formula.
Recently, I was talking to one of my clients who sells offshore software development services. He said, “Craig, we have three sales calls today. And I have no idea where one of them came from.” Six months earlier he had been a referral-only business. Now, he’s closing a new deal every week with strangers. That’s the magic that comes from building trust.
Karen and I often reflect on my hospital journey of 2021. She’d visit my room after work. And I’d light up and say, “There she is!”
The spark of trust is the magic of relationships. We build the blueprint of trust for trustworthy people who haven’t figured out how to build trust with strangers. I want the world to light up and say, “There they are!”
Craig Andrews
Principal Ally
allies4me
