How to Establish a Relationship with a Prospect: Take the Trip®

You’ve seen it happen: a rep secures the meeting, asks strong discovery questions... and still hits a wall. The decision-maker’s perspective is completely opposed to theirs. The rep sees the North Pole, the customer sees the South. And instead of building a relationship, the conversation freezes.

When that happens, the rep’s next move matters, but your response matters more. Some leaders push for stronger messaging. Others move on. But neither approach addresses the root issue: misalignment in belief, not information.

Your job isn’t to help reps win the argument. It’s to equip them with a move that resets the conversation entirely. One that shifts the emotional temperature and reopens the door to influence.

In other words, you need to help them Take the Trip®.

What It Means to Take the Trip®

The concept is simple, yet difficult. To influence someone with a polarized point of view, reps must first leave their own position and fully understand the customer’s. Only then will the customer even consider exploring a new perspective.

To achieve this, you need to do three things:

• Validate their point of view: Articulate it as well (or better) than the customer can, so they feel genuinely understood.
• Demonstrate empathy: Show awareness of not just the facts, but the motives, pressures, and emotions behind the position.
• Remove pressure: Replace persuasion with receptivity, signaling that the customer is free to choose.

Then, two things happen. First, the “Oh” moment: frustration gives way to empathy as the rep finally sees why the customer believes what they believe. Second, the customer feels validated, meeting one of their deepest emotional needs. This creates the conditions for trust.

And for that to happen consistently, leaders need to help reps recognize when to make the shift, and coach them through how to do it.

The Implications for Sales Leaders

On the surface, Take the Trip® looks like a conversation skill for individual reps. But for leaders, it carries broader implications for pipeline health, forecast accuracy, and team culture.

When reps fail to take the trip, leaders see the consequences:

• Pipeline waste: Reps chase opportunities that will never move forward. Forecasts bloat with deals that are “active” in name only. This often forces leaders into difficult conversations with executives about why numbers don’t line up with reality.
• Forecast inaccuracy: Leaders get blindsided at quarter’s end when “best case” deals vanish because core resistance was never addressed. It erodes credibility internally and makes it harder to advocate for resources.
• Damaged trust: Customers leave conversations feeling argued with, not served. That reputational hit doesn’t just hurt one rep; it affects the entire brand.

But when leaders coach this consistently, the payoff compounds:

• Opportunities advance more quickly because resistance is lowered early in the cycle.
• Forecasts become more reliable as reps qualify based on receptivity, not optimism.
• Teams build a culture of curiosity and empathy that customers notice and remember.

The leadership takeaway: Take the Trip® isn’t just a tip for better conversations. It’s a lever to transform how your team influences at scale.

How Sales Leaders Can Coach Reps to Take the Trip®

Turning this principle into habit requires intentional leadership. Here’s how to embed it into the rhythm of coaching.

1. Diagnose When It’s Needed

Help reps recognize the signs that they’re stuck at the North Pole, and teach them what those signals mean. For example:

• A customer objection resurfaces across multiple calls with no progress. This might mean the rep hasn’t validated the buyer’s perspective. Instead of coaching them to “push harder,” help them identify what belief is driving the objection and how to acknowledge it.
• The rep describes the buyer as “difficult” or “just not getting it.” That’s a signal the rep is in debate mode, focused on winning instead of understanding. In coaching, pause and ask: “What might they be seeing that you’re not?” to redirect the focus back to the buyer’s perspective.
• CRM updates list vague next steps like “circle back in a few weeks.” This is often code for: “The customer isn’t receptive, and I didn’t know how to move forward.” Challenge reps to uncover what the customer truly believes before setting next steps.

By expanding these signals into coaching conversations, you help reps see that the problem isn’t the buyer; it’s their own approach.

2. Model the Language

Imagine you’re in a role play or a call review with a member of your team, and they say: “The CFO shut me down immediately. They said they’ve frozen all spending until next quarter.”

This is where you could step in to model the alternative. Instead of showing the rep how to argue with ROI numbers, the leader can demonstrate a validating response: “I can see why a budget freeze makes sense after a year of cuts. But in this kind of situation, you might explore where the organization is still investing, especially in areas that reduce ongoing expenses.”

Notice what’s happening: the leader isn’t giving the rep a script, but they are modeling tone, phrasing, and the sequence of validate-first-then-explore. This is how reps learn what effective validation feels like, and why it lowers resistance.

Leaders can use live coaching moments, role plays, or team practice sessions to model this kind of language. The point is not to give reps canned lines, but to demonstrate a mindset and conversational approach they can adapt to their own style.

3. Reinforce in Coaching

Validation becomes a habit when it’s consistently reinforced—not just in deal reviews, but in how leaders coach after every call. Start by asking a simple question: “Where did you Take the Trip® in this conversation?” If the rep can’t identify a moment, that’s your coaching cue. Pull up the call, find the point of resistance, and walk through it together.

Use those moments to:

• Pause and explore what the customer might have been thinking or feeling
• Ask how the rep might lower resistance next time—before offering their perspective
• Practice new language until it feels natural

For instance, if a customer says, “We’re already committed to another vendor,” most reps jump straight to differentiation. But the better move starts with validation: “It makes sense you’d want to stick with a partner you’ve invested in. Consistency matters.” Only after that can the rep explore something like: “Are there areas where the relationship could be even stronger?”

These small moments are where habits form. Celebrate the reps who try, even if they don’t nail the phrasing. It’s the mindset shift that matters most.

Turning Polarization into Partnership

Polarized prospects aren’t dead ends. They’re inflection points. They reveal the gap between what your reps believe and what customers believe. And that’s exactly where leaders can make the biggest impact.

When your team learns to Take the Trip®, they stop pushing against resistance and start building trust. That shift accelerates deals, sharpens forecasts, and creates a culture where customers consistently feel understood.

For leaders, the challenge (and opportunity) is to move this beyond individual reps. Make it a team standard. When you do, you don’t just improve conversations. You transform outcomes.

Ready to equip your team to Take the Trip®? Other-Centered® Selling help leaders turn resistance into receptivity at scale. Schedule a consultation to explore how we can support your team.