Trust: The Ultimate Differentiator in Sales for 2025

In sales, the playing field has changed. Buyers are more sceptical, competition is fiercer, and revenue and revenue operations leaders face the additional challenge of aligning teams and optimising processes to cut through the sheer volume of noise in the market. For example, leaders often struggle to ensure their sales and marketing teams work in harmony, delivering consistent messaging and a unified approach that resonates with target audiences. This misalignment can lead to inefficiencies and missed opportunities, underscoring the need for processes that prioritise trust-building and collaboration.

But in 2025, one thing remains clear: trust is the ultimate differentiator.

For those who know me, also know that I work hard on developing my personal brand, politely reminding my network of who I am, what I'm known for, and that I'm a genuine guy that can add value and is worth having a chat with. The same is not true for 95% of teams in a relationship building role, as for the most part they are invisible to 95% of their network, that's if they are even connected to the people they want to do business with.

Take your top 5 accounts, how many connections (on LinkedIn) do you have in each account? Go on, take 10 minutes. 95% of people I work with have less than 10 connections in each of their top accounts-leaving them invisible to the people they are trying to do business with. Unless you are consistently visible for the right reasons, you have very little chance of build trust with the people you want to do business with.

Why Trust Matters Now More Than Ever

Think about the last time you responded to a cold call, opened a marketing email, or clicked on an outreach message. Chances are, it wasn’t because someone bombarded you with generic content or followed up ten times in a row. It was because something about that interaction made you feel like you already knew them—that they understood your challenges, your goals, and your world.

Here’s the hard truth: buyers don’t engage unless they feel a sense of trust before the conversation even starts. In a world where emails aren’t opened and cold calls aren’t answered, this trust can be measured by relevant network growth, warm engagement on a variety of content, and targeted commenting to build affinity and rapport in a credible way. These actions demonstrate that trust has been established before the first formal conversation.

For years, sales strategies have operated on the assumption that trust comes after a qualified opportunity has been created—that it’s something built during the sales process. But today, buyers expect trust to exist long before they ever enter the pipeline.

Without trust, outreach is ignored. Without trust, conversations don’t happen. And without conversations, there is no pipeline.

The Cost of a Lack of Trust

When trust is missing, the effects ripple across the entire sales and customer engagement process:

• Missed Opportunities: Buyers ghost reps because they see no value in engaging. It’s not that they’re too busy; they simply don’t trust that the interaction will be worth their time.
• Exhausted Teams: Reps who are grinding harder but achieving less lose morale. The constant rejection isn’t just demotivating—it’s unsustainable.
• Competitive Disadvantage: Your competitors who prioritise trust-building are having the conversations you’re missing out on, pulling further ahead with every passing quarter.

Trust isn’t just a differentiator; it’s the foundation on which your entire sales strategy is built. For revenue leaders, prioritising trust-building within their teams often feels like an uphill battle amidst competing demands and targets. But without it, even the best products and strongest pitches fall flat.

How to Build Trust in 2025

The good news is that trust isn’t intangible. It’s something that can be actively built, nurtured, and scaled. Here’s how:

1. Show Up Authentically

Buyers connect with people, not personas. Be real. Be human. Share your story, your perspective, and your expertise openly. Your ability to be authentic—to show up as more than a salesperson—is what separates you from the noise.

2. Be Consistently Visible

Trust is built through familiarity. Share your insights and ideas regularly, not sporadically. Whether it’s through LinkedIn posts, videos, or meaningful comments on industry conversations, your presence signals reliability and relevance.

3. Focus on Conversations, Not Transactions

Sales isn’t about hitting targets; it’s about solving problems. Buyers trust those who prioritise their needs over making the next sale. Ask questions. Listen more than you speak. Build relationships that outlast a single deal.

4. Lead with Value

Before a buyer ever takes a meeting with you, they should already know you bring value to the table. Share actionable insights, offer solutions to common challenges, and position yourself as someone who understands their world better than anyone else.

The Competitive Advantage of Trust

The teams who will dominate in 2025 understand one thing: trust creates momentum.

• Trusted sellers don’t have to chase buyers; buyers come to them.
• Trusted teams don’t burn out because their conversations are meaningful and energising.
• Trusted leaders build lasting relationships that lead to predictable revenue growth.

Trust isn’t just about winning deals today. It isn’t transactional, and it certainly isn’t built by adding to the sales noise. It’s developed over time, using humanised content to penetrate the buyer’s zone of resistance and leveraging insight and thought-leading content to cut through the noise and stand out consistently, developing trust over time. It’s about building a foundation that ensures success next quarter, next year, and beyond. Over the past three years, I’ve dedicated myself to creating the Conversation Operating System, a system built on real-world insights and reinforced by a two-year benchmark study. This system empowers teams such as Business Development Representatives, Sales Directors, Customer Success Managers, Account Executives, and Partnership teams, as well as their partners, across enterprise and mid-market organisations. Industries including SaaS, Technology, Professional Services, CX, and AdTech have benefitted from this approach.

The results speak for themselves. The benchmark study, which incorporates performance data from clients, partners, and associates, has shown increased:

• Territory penetration up to 15x
• Stakeholder engagement 6.4x
• Meeting creation rate up to 36x
• Sales velocity improvement by up to 9x, positively impacting the number of opportunities, average deal value, win rate, and reducing sales cycle length.

This system turns trust into a scalable, actionable strategy, enabling teams to build momentum and deliver predictable performance.

Making the Change: Why Urgency Matters

Here’s the reality: every day you delay prioritising trust, your competitors are pulling ahead.

They’re building influence in the same LinkedIn feeds your buyers are scrolling. They’re creating meaningful conversations while your emails sit unopened. And they’re capturing the loyalty of your future customers before you’ve even had a chance to engage. If you wait any longer, they will secure their position as trusted advisors in your market, leaving you in their wake. The truth is, in 2025, he who acts first wins.

2025 is the year to flip the script. Don’t rely on outdated tactics or hope the market conditions improve. Take control. Build trust before the conversation starts. Over the past three years, I’ve dedicated myself to developing the Conversation Operating System, a proven approach that helps revenue leaders empower their teams to establish trust and secure high-quality conversations. This system, backed by a two-year benchmark study, offers a clear path to creating predictable and scalable performance.

A Challenge for You

Ask yourself this: what’s one thing you can do differently today to earn your buyers’ trust?

• Could you share an insight that helps them solve a problem?
• Could you join an ongoing conversation and add real value?
• Could you reach out with authenticity and purpose?

Small changes, consistently applied, will transform your results. The choice is yours. Will you make 2025 the year you rise above the noise and become the trusted advisor your buyers need? For revenue leaders, advocating for change often comes with risks—whether it’s securing buy-in from senior stakeholders or reallocating budgets. That’s why I’ve dedicated the last three years to developing the Conversation Operating System, a proven framework designed to mitigate those risks. Backed by a two-year benchmark study, this system empowers leaders to confidently drive trust-building initiatives that deliver measurable, predictable outcomes.

Let's make 2025 the year you know it can be!