"With care and protection, with safe havens in the ocean, there is still a good chance that we can turn things around."

Sylvia Earle

Trust is the ocean we all operate in and it’s been heavily polluted by pressure tactics, empty promises, short-term thinking, and empty suits.

Applying the above-mentioned quote to salespeople, this becomes a gentle reminder that with care and protection many of you just might be able to relational turn things around with your clients.

When salespeople choose genuine authenticity over scripts and meaningful value over manipulation, they begin restoring what many crave most; a safe place to think, decide, and engage without fear.

When salespeople protect trust and create safe, value-driven relationships, they give themselves a real chance to turn struggling deals and reputations around.

When salespeople lead with care, protect trust, and create safe spaces for honest conversations, they can turn a broken environment around.

Protect trust and create safe relationships, that’s how sales gets turned around.

Just as Sylvia speaks to protecting ecosystems so recovery is possible, sales requires psychological safety, authenticity, and trust. Without those safe havens, clients simply disengage. With them, momentum returns and trust flourishes.

Sales doesn’t turn around through pressure, it turns around when trust is protected and clients feel safe engaging with you.

Here’s your mirror moment... If your opportunities are stalling, trust is eroding, or clients are pulling away, then what part of the relationship are you failing to protect?

Your sales don't just break down overnight, they break down the moment care, consistency, or authenticity slips and when you choose not to look in the mirror.

Allow Proverbs 4:23 to sink in for a moment, as it reads,

“Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”

Let’s get uncomfortably honest for a moment.

Somewhere along the way, there are some of you who stopped selling and started babysitting. Not because you don’t care but because comfort slowly crept in.

The hunger that once fueled late work days, the drive that drove you to go above and beyond, the relentless curiosity, and deep care for clients slowly got replaced by routine.

The largest accounts became a safe playground of comfort. The relationships became assumed, and the effort became transactional.

I'm here to tell you that this is exactly where risk lives.

If you’re a sales leader or a seasoned salesperson, here’s the gut-check question you can’t afford to avoid... What would happen emotionally, financially, and culturally, if you lost your largest account tomorrow?

If that question makes you massively uncomfortable, good.

Discomfort is often the doorway back to growth.

The Silent Threat No One Sees Coming

Most large accounts aren’t lost overnight, they erode quietly.

Not because of one ginormous failure, but because of a thousand small moments where the client no longer feels seen, heard, challenged, or valued.

The sad part is that most salespeople who lose their largest accounts never saw it coming.

They’ll say things like...

• We service the heck out of them

• They love us

• I own this account

• They’d never leave

Until one day they leave.

This is all about silent erosion. It's the slow accumulation of not enough's. Not enough listening, presence, and genuine curiosity.

When you say, we service the heck out of them, this places the focus on the transaction while the soul of the relationship is starving.

True loyalty isn't bought with a contract or a polished deliverable; it's cultivated in the quiet spaces between the work.

When you say, I own this account, there's some subtle arrogance. You cannot own a relationship; you can only steward its growth.

You do this through...

• Relevance, by staying in step with their evolving needs.

• Relational depth, by truly knowing their fears, goals, aspirations and vision.

• Trust building, as this the oxygen and when it stops circulating, the connection suffocates.

Scripture will remind you,

“Let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.”

1 John 3:18

Consistency is the highest form of respect. It's the practice of showing up when it isn't sales season. It's the courage to challenge a client because you care about their future more than your current comfort.

Loyalty is the fruit of feeling truly seen. Clients do not leave when they're understood; they leave when they've become a line item on someone else's balance sheet.

Trust Isn't Static, It Either Grows or Decays

When it come to trust, this isn't something you earn once and then put on autopilot, it’s a living thing.

If you’re not intentionally strengthening it, it’s weakening.

If you're not nourishing your clients through shared experiences and deeper understanding, then all you're doing is starving them of the growth needed to flourish.

To serve a client is a duty, a calling; it's to witness their growth and evolve alongside them.

When you stop being curious about your clients changing world, you've already begun the process of losing them.

Sales professionals who protect and grow their largest accounts understand one foundational truth...

Past performance does not guarantee future loyalty.

Your competitors know this as well. They’re calling on your clients, they’re listening to them, they’re asking them better questions, and most of all, they’re offering fresh perspectives.

If all you’re offering is comfort and continuity, then don’t be surprised when your client chooses curiosity over complacency.

Complacency says... We’ve always done it this way.

A heart-centered approach says... How can I better serve you?

Loyalty is not a debt your clients owe you for past work; it's a gift they give you because of your presence and integrity.

Take a moment to think about your most secure client relationship, however you define it, and ask yourself... If I were my competitor, what questions would I ask this client that I have stopped asking?

Now that I have you thinking a bit, here are three heart-centered disciplines to help protect your largest, most precious accounts. These aren't tactics, they're disciplines and disciplines reveal what you value most.

1. Crave Feedback Even When It’s Hard to Hear

Proverbs 20:18 reads,

“Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed.”

High-trust sales professionals eat feedback for breakfast. This isn't about being defensive, it's about intentionality.

These professionals don’t wait for annual vanilla surveys or renewal conversations, they proactively ask questions...

• What are we doing that truly helps your business?

• Where are we falling short?

• If you were in my role, what would you do differently?

• What do you need from me now that you didn’t need a year ago?

Feedback is not criticism, it’s clarity, and clarity is the currency of trust.

To all the sales leaders out there, if your team isn’t coached to and encouraged to ask for real feedback, you’re not building a trust culture, you’re building a comfort culture.

You know what? Comfort cultures don’t last.

2. Grow Relationships Wider, Not Just Deeper

Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 reads,

“Two are better than one… If either of them falls down, one can help the other up.”

One of the most dangerous phrases in sales is... I’ve got a great relationship with the decision-maker.

Fantastic, and glad you do, but what happens when that person leaves, gets promoted, or loses influence?

Sales professionals who protect their largest accounts intentionally build relational breadth, not just depth.

They do this by...

• Developing multiple entry points across the organization

• Understanding different decision makers and influencers definitions of meaningful value

• Investing in relationships even when there’s no immediate upside

Sales professionals don’t hoard relationships, they steward them.

Through stewardship is how loyalty becomes organizational, not personal.

3. Continuously Bring Meaningful Value, Not Just Great Service

Proverbs 22:29 reads,

“Do you see someone skilled in their work? They will serve before kings.”

Service keeps accounts, meaningful value grows them.

Service responds, meaningful value anticipates.

Service fixes problems, meaningful value prevents them.

Service maintains, meaningful value transforms.

The most trusted sales professionals consistently ask...

• What’s changing in your world?

• Where are you trying to grow your business and what’s in the way?

These sales professionals confidentially challenge thinking, connect the dots, and help clients see around corners.

As they do this, they move from being seen as a vendor, to being seen as a trusted business partner.

Loyalty Is a Byproduct, Not a Strategy

Client loyalty doesn’t respond to pressure.

Loyalty doesn’t show up because it was requested, incentivized, or written into a contract.

You can't demand loyalty nor negotiate it. You can't assume loyalty will stay just because it once existed.

Loyalty is quietly formed in the small moments most people overlook. It’s earned daily through how you show up and build authentic relationships when nothing is at stake.

It's earned through conversations that aren’t transactional. It's earned through meaningful value that serves the other person, not your quota.

It's earned through inspirational experiences that leave people feeling seen, respected, and safe.

It's earned through disciplined habits that prove your words weren’t situational.

This is the Trust Formula at work, not as a tactic, but as a way of being.

Luke 16:10 reminds you,

“Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much.”

Loyalty doesn’t grow from grand gestures or occasional brilliance. Loyalty grows where trust is practiced consistently, especially when it would be easier not to.

If loyalty feels fragile, it’s not a loyalty problem, it’s a trust consistency problem.

Trust is built the same way every time, one intentional, authentic decision at a time.

A Final Gut Check for Sales Leaders and Sellers

As we bring our time together to a close, I'd like for you to answer honestly the following few questions...

• When was the last time you challenged your largest client’s thinking, not just their buying behavior?

• When was the last time you asked for honest feedback and resisted the urge to defend, explain, or fill the silence?

• When was the last time you invested in the relationship with no agenda, no quota pressure, and no expectation of immediate return?

If trust truly has a shelf life, ask yourself... Am I actively renewing it or quietly assuming it will still be there tomorrow?

The accounts you fight hardest to win are the very ones that require the most intention, humility, and care to keep.

As Galatians 6:9 reminds everyone,

“Let us not grow weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”

Sustainable sales growth isn’t built through pressure, persuasion, or positional authority. It’s built through consistent character when no one is watching. Through choosing courage over comfort in conversations. Through habits that honor people, not just numbers.

Trust isn’t protected by big grandiose moments, it’s protected in the small, daily decisions to lead with heart, humility, and discipline, especially when it would be easier not to.

Trust doesn’t renew itself and client loyalty doesn’t maintain itself. Both require a decision, made daily, in how you show up, speak up, and serve.

The question I will leave you with, isn’t whether trust still exists, it's what you will do today to prove it was deserved.

Originally published on Larry Levine's LinkedIn.