How to make trust your competitive differentiator in AI

If you’re a large corporation, AI is the wind at your back and the tide going your way. Your positioning, competitive differentiation, and reputation are tied down. It looks like smooth sailing ahead.

If you’re an SMB or you serve that marketplace, AI can feel like a maelstrom of Shakespearean proportions, shivering your positioning and competitive differentiation to the timbers.

“Sometime the flood prevails, and then the wind;
Now one the better, then another best,
Both tugging to be victors, breast to breast,
Yet neither conqueror nor conquerèd.”

— William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 3, Act 2, Scene 5

How to calm the waters and find your way? Follow the only true north star — long-term profitability. In an AI-driven market, make trust your competitive differentiator. Reaching safe harbor requires you to rely on your superpower: you.

Only you can create and nourish the human-to-human bond of trust that enables long-term relationships. B2B is, and always was, personal. Use these new tools effectively and deliver the human touch.

Creating happier customers who stay longer and buy more

The key metric of long-term profitability is customer lifetime value (CLV). It’s how you know from period to period, year to year, if you’re on the right course.

Here’s a simple way to understand CLV and a formula to get you going:

• First, calculate your customer lifetime rate. The central number is the customer churn rate (which, by itself, indicates the success of your retention efforts).
• Divide 1 by this customer churn rate. Let’s say the churn rate is 5%. 1/0.05 = 20.
• Dividing total sales by the number of customers yields the average sales per account. Let’s say total sales are $1,000,000 and there are 500 customers. The average revenue per account is then $2,000.
• Last, multiply the customer lifetime rate (20) by the average revenue per account ($2,000). Thus, the CLV for this period = 20 x $2,000 = $40,000.

A robust CLV is a clear indication your customers trust you with their future. Further analysis that identifies which customers and customer groups have the highest CLV helps you zoom in on your ideal customer profile (ICP). You’ll find that customers with lower CLV scores tend to leave earlier, require more maintenance, and produce less revenue. It pays to retool prospecting to focus on your ICP.

Stand out, don’t fit in

You are brilliant, gorgeous, and funny, and your company is nothing short of amazing. No one cares. All your customers care about is how you’ll help them succeed. “What’s in it for me?”

Step out from behind the technology and demonstrate your commitment in person. Visibly walk the talk. Empathy and gratitude are concepts that are much discussed. Sending your notetaker to Zooms you don’t attend doesn’t cut it.

Let empathy and gratitude guide you. Show your client your commitment to their success by showing up. It says, louder than words, that you care, that they are your priority. These are the ways you earn trust. These are the stepping stones to success. That human focus becomes especially important as AI takes on a larger role in marketing.

Marketing is for sure a logical AI application. However, many of the implementations I’ve seen are without metrics or a business plan, and some seem FOMO-driven. While this experimentation may yield breakthroughs, the short term will bring significant turbulence.

The number of touches to gain a meaningful response is steadily increasing, from about 5-10 touches to 10-20. As the power of AI is poured into the 75% of the buying process that occurs before engagement, its speed and cost savings will be touted.

The quality of the communication is what’s really important. Prospects and customers are looking for value. The real danger is that this creative velocity will muddy rather than clarify competitive differentiation and buyers’ readiness to engage.

Trust is your human advantage in AI

B2B is personal. Always was, always will be. Trust is human-to-human.

Here’s an example. Company A is relatively new to its market. It provides supply chain management software as a service. It believes its product is competitive, if not better than the competition. It believes its staff, both subject matter experts and tech support, are superior.

It responded to an RFP and made it to the shortlist. There were five other companies, each larger and more established, with impressive track records. Company A won the bid.

I spoke to the head of the buying committee and asked, “Why did you choose Company A?” He said, “They were the only ones who wanted to know more about our challenges before they started the demo.”

As Humphrey Bogart said to Claude Rains in Casablanca, “This is the beginning of a beautiful relationship.”

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