How to Build Better Relationships with Your Leads - Guide for 2025

10 Key Concepts from This Guide

1. Face-to-Face Connection Priority: "People buy from people they trust - whether in person or through video."
2. Video Marketing Foundation: "Making videos is the next best thing to meeting someone face-to-face."
3. The Nike Shoe Strategy: "Be everywhere your audience looks - create an omnipresence."
4. Name Recognition Power: "Remember and use names - it shows you care and builds relationships."
5. Engagement First Principle: "Always engage first - comment, support, and show genuine interest."
6. Three-Month Follow-up Rule: "Follow up for at least three months - some convert after three years."
7. Community Building: "Create a space where people feel part of your team."
8. 1,000 True Fans Focus: "Build an unbreakable business with 1,000 true supporters."
9. Content Multiplication: "One video can create 730 pieces of content."
10. Start Small Philosophy: "Begin with 10 true fans and scale from there."

Hey there, my name is Brad Smith, Owner of AutomationLinks. Today, I want to talk about relationships - the number one thing that has grown my YouTube channel to over 100,000 subscribers, my social media platforms to be able to get 25,000 email subscribers, and also being in business for over nine years and lucky enough to have helped over 25 people.

I will walk you through all the different relationship builders I've implemented to build relationships that drive sales without having to do sales calls. If you don't like doing sales calls, you need more leads, you need more customers, and you need to be relationship-focused, not sales-focused.

The Foundation: Face-to-Face Connections What's the next best thing to meeting someone face-to-face? We all know that if we meet face to face, we shake each other's hands, and we have a relationship - those are the best leads and the best customers besides word-of-mouth referrals.

Real-World Example: I recently did an in-person meeting with a local business here:

• We shook hands
• We chatted for 45 minutes
• We're pretty much instantly friends
• We laughed, we joked
• We made connections
• We built a relationship based on the local business being local where we live

The result? If I see him out in person, I'll remember his name, we'll shake hands, we'll say hello, and he'll become a customer.

The Online Challenge: But you can't do that online. It's not so easy online. So, what are you doing right now to build relationships online? Or are you just selling? That's the problem I see - a lot of people are just selling:

• "Hey, by the way, this helps you gain strength; go do this"
• "Hey, by the way, you are missing out on conversions; go do this"

Most likely, your copywriting is about selling, talking about yourself when it should be about the pain points."

Video Marketing: Creating Virtual Face-to-Face Connections

"My favorite way, I think the best way, is by making videos. So you're seeing my face, we're interacting, you're seeing that I'm different than everyone else. I was able to tell you and share my story - I've been doing this for nine years, 25 people, and all this stuff, and now you probably feel like you know me a little bit.

The Journey to First Videos It took me six months to make my first video. What changed over those six months to help me make my first videos? Two things:

1. I stopped trying to memorize it and stopped trying to be perfect
2. I started educating instead of selling

Educational Approach If you're new:

• Share things that you're learning along the way
• Share when you tried something and failed
• Share what you're going to do next
• Share when something finally worked

If you're experienced:

• Start educating
• Be a specialist
• Share your expertise

The College Professor Mindset What helped me with my videos:

• Don't think you're going to post a video and get a million views
• A business needs to focus on helping the small audience you want to attract
• Think of making a video for 30 people
• Become the college professor in your head
• Just teach a room of college students who are learning something

Video Creation Strategy How I make videos:

• Use bullet points from your book
• Write down a few bullet points
• Cover each bullet point in your head
• Keep eyes on the camera when stopping talking
• Look down at notes
• Look back up and make eye contact again
• Start talking

Professional Video Tips:

• You can pause between bullet points
• Keep consistent eye contact before and after
• Edit the video - no one will know you paused
• I made over 600 YouTube videos like this

Content Distribution After creating videos:

• Post them on YouTube
• YouTube will recommend your new videos
• Embed those YouTube videos on your website
• When somebody visits a website and plays a YouTube video
• Next time they're on YouTube, they'll see your face again

The Learning Factor:

• Not everyone wants to see my face again
• But they want to learn again
• They want to be educated on something they weren't searching for
• This creates continuous engagement"

The Nike Shoe Strategy: Being Everywhere

Think about how Nike appears everywhere you look. That's the strategy we want to implement for your business. When someone discovers you, they should start seeing you across multiple platforms naturally.

The Multi-Platform Presence I call it the Nike shoe strategy because it creates a natural flow of visibility. Someone might first discover you through YouTube, and then suddenly, they see your content everywhere:

Through Video Content:

• They find your YouTube content
• Learn something valuable from your channel
• See your embedded videos on your website
• Discover your Facebook videos
• Connect with you on Twitter
• Receive your automated emails

Face-to-face in the Virtual World Video calls are crucial for business-to-business relationships. One of my mentors taught me something powerful - always turn that camera on. Think about it: how many times have you been on Teams or Zoom meetings where cameras were off? There's no relationship-building happening there.

The key is showing your face because:

• It's the next best thing to meeting in person
• People can see your personality
• It builds trust faster than voice alone
• Creates a more memorable interaction

The Power of Remembering Names Here's a simple but powerful strategy I use daily. I keep detailed notes of people's names on my phone. Why? Because nothing builds relationships faster than remembering someone's name.

Real-World Application: When I see someone and say, "Hey Frank, haven't seen you in a few weeks," their reaction is always surprise and appreciation. This works with:

• Waiters at restaurants
• Fellow entrepreneurs
• Business contacts
• Local community members

Building Social Media Connections: Instead of just collecting followers focus on meaningful connections. My Approach is straightforward:

• Follow everyone you have meaningful interactions with
• Engage with their content regularly
• Let them see your:
• Zoom call interactions
• YouTube content
• Regular social posts

The Value-First Approach Everything in my business focuses on education and value. Here's why this works:

• Most people learn but don't implement
• When they're ready to implement, they remember who taught them
• They come back because of the relationship we built
• They trust the education I've provided

E-commerce Adaptation For e-commerce businesses, while you can't connect personally with every customer, you can:

Create Multiple Touch Points:

• Add social follow prompts on thank you pages
• Include social links in automated emails
• Focus on building long-term relationships

Remember: I'd rather have someone follow our social media than make an immediate purchase. Here's why:

• They'll buy when they're ready
• They'll become repeat customers
• They'll comment on posts
• They'll share with friends
• Word spreads organically

This Approach creates a sustainable cycle of engagement, trust, and eventual sales through genuine relationship building.

The Art of Engagement and Relationship Building

Engaging First: The Key to Building Relationships You need to engage first after following on social media and connecting. I always go and subscribe to their YouTube channel if they have one, leave a comment on a few of their posts, and show that I support them. In return, they'll support you.

Let me share a recent example: Someone came to my channel, subscribed to my YouTube channel, and joined my newsletter but didn't connect with me on X, where I post all my best stuff and build the best relationships. Here's what I did:

• Went and followed them on X
• Liked a bunch of their posts
• Left three comments on three posts over 3 days

The result? Without sending another word, they scheduled me and became a client. That's how you need to do it for your business - show support, reach out, leave comments. When you leave comments, it helps them by spreading them through the algorithm.

The Power of Open-Ended Questions

There are 3 key areas where open-ended questions make a difference:

1. Social Media Engagement When I leave a comment on someone's post, I ask them a question. This triggers the algorithm, so all of my followers will see their posts, and it boosts their posts.
2. Sales Calls: Instead of talking about myself, I:
3. Ask about them and their business
4. Focus on their pain points
5. Learn what's going to help them
6. Gather as much data as possible.
7. Email Communication: Asking open-ended questions in emails is crucial because:
8. When somebody responds to your email, you boost delivery rates
9. Higher open rates mean more people see your emails.
10. More people come back to your website

Following Up: The Three-Month Minimum I've had clients come back and work with me three years after joining my email list. This shows how important it is to have an email list and build relationships. Not everyone's ready to buy:

• Today
• Tomorrow
• Next week
• Next month
• Or even in three years

Follow-up Methods: Through automated emails, newsletters social media posts, continuous education

Education as Your Foundation I do this through:

• YouTube videos with tons of education
• Converting videos into blog posts and guides
• Creating downloadable cheat sheets

Posting everywhere: • LinkedIn • Medium • Reddit • Every social media channel available

The key is providing education everywhere, not just one channel. With AI, it's easy to distribute this education across platforms while maintaining authenticity.

Building Community: The Power of 1,000 True Fans

Community Foundation I recently started a community School for my nonprofit, where I give away all my courses for free. Previously, I had a Facebook group with 3,000 members. Here's what happens when someone joins our community:

Think of community as joining a team. When you join my community: "I'm gonna support you, thank you, you're part of my team, I'm gonna help you."

The Impact of Community Membership When people join your community, they:

• Trust you more deeply
• Lean on you for support
• Become your strongest advocates
• Turn into your best word-of-mouth referrals

They think, "This is my team, I'm part of this community, I'm gonna tell everyone about them."

My School Community Approach The focus is simple - I refer everyone to the best people out there:

• Want to learn Google ads? Learn it there
• Want to learn email? Learn it there
• Want to learn content strategy? Learn it there
• Want to learn AI? Learn it there

The community becomes a group of people supporting each other, who are friends and like each other.

The 1,000 True Fans Concept There's a book called "1,000 True Fans" - you just need 1,000 true fans that buy anything from you. When you:

• Personally help
• Focus on building relationships
• Leave comments
• Do zoom calls with your face
• Send personal emails
• Ask open-ended questions
• Have them in your community

With 1,000 people, you'll have an unbreakable business. It doesn't matter:

• What the economy does
• If it's Black Friday
• If everyone's on vacation

Those thousand people will support you because "this is my team; I'm gonna support them back."

Scaling Your Relationship Building One of my YouTube videos will actually produce 730 pieces of content:

• Creates newsletters
• Creates blog posts
• Creates social media posts
• Creates guides
• Creates infographics

But remember - it all starts with your face. If you're not showing your face, you're going to get beat as soon as one of your competitors starts showing theirs.

Starting Small Begin with 10 true fans: "See if you can build a relationship like this with 10 people. If you could build a relationship with these 10 people and all 10 people become customers, now you can pull the money back into your business to scale this."

Implementation and Strategy: Making It All Work

Getting Started Without Fear Don't be nervous - well, you can be nervous, but be nervous and make it happen. Start by: "Think about what you're gonna help people with. If you're not already, make a video, show your face, and start taking selfies as cringy as that is."

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Remember: You don't have to dance on TikTok. One of my best selfies was simply: "Me holding my laptop showing my content guide. If I had just shown the picture of my content guide, no one would have clicked on it. But I had to put my face on there to say, 'Hey, I'm a real person.'"

The Sunday Strategy - Why 5 PM? I used to send newsletters every Wednesday, but Sunday at 5 PM works better because:

• It's my most boring time of the week
• Football's on or ending
• Done with weekend activities
• Not out at restaurants
• People start thinking about the week ahead
• They check their Monday calendar
• Begin thinking about business growth

"Mentally prepare yourself for the week. I know I need to do this, so Brad just sent me an email; he told me a couple of quick steps on how to do this. Alright, I'm gonna do this; get my team to help me this week."

Follow-Up System Your follow-up should include:

• Automated emails that encourage replies
• Social media connection prompts
• Regular reminders
• Educational content that drives opens
• Clear paths to purchase when ready

Overcoming Common Challenges I see many business owners struggling with:

• Not knowing what to say
• Uncertainty about video content
• Confusion about community building
• Follow-up hesitation
• Social media posting fears

The Solution: "Just ask right - you'll never know if you don't ask. If you're struggling with any of these, if you're not sure how to build these relationships, hopefully, this video helped, but then just reach out and ask."

Support Options: "Even if you're too busy, I'll send you someone who can help you for a low cost to just get this thing going."

Final Thoughts on Implementation Remember:

• Start with showing your face
• Focus on education over selling
• Build relationships consistently
• Scale when ready
• Keep it personal even as you grow

"People buy from people they trust. Whether it's through videos, selfies, or educational content, show your face and build those relationships. Start small, be consistent, and focus on providing value before selling."

Ready to Build Stronger Business Relationships?

1. Get The Free Follow-Up Guide "Grab my follow-up guide that walks you through how to follow up with people using automation - the exact system we use. Click the link in the first comment below."
2. Join The Weekly Newsletter "Get relationship marketing tips every Sunday at 5 PM - perfect timing to plan your week ahead. I'll show you this stuff every single Sunday."
3. Access Free Resources "Join my school community where I give away all my courses for free and connect you with the best people in each specialty."
4. Need Personal Help? "Reach out if you're struggling with any aspect - I'll either guide you personally or connect you with affordable solutions to get started."