Difference between ranking and being trustworthy

Ranking isn't hard. Ranking without trust is. Most businesses obsess over visibility metrics. Map views. Click-throughs. Review counts. But they forget the invisible foundation that drives real growth. Trust isn’t keywords and photos. Trust is credibility. And credibility comes from one thing: Cadence. The weekly post you publish without fail. The daily habit of replying to every review even the bad ones. The consistent updates that show your business is alive and listening. Every Monday. Every message. Every signal. When the algorithm shifts (and it will), trust remains. When a competitor outranks you... Trust brings people back. When search trends change... Trust anchors your presence. Here’s the truth most SEO gurus won’t tell you: You can’t rank your way to trust. You can only build it through the daily cadence of communication and care. I post updates every Tuesday. We reply to every review within 24 hours. We treat our profile like a storefront clean, active, and welcoming. Simple? Yes. Easy? No. Transformative? Absolutely. While your competitors chase traffic spikes... You’re building something that compounds over time: A local presence people believe in.

Is anyone else feeling exhausted by the thought leadership race? If you're a consultant, you can take a different approach. ⬇️ The battle for attention is dangerous not because you might lose, but because of what it takes to win. I covered this in a recent newsletter: https://lnkd.in/eKfEmN2E Proof of work always tops thought leadership I want you to imagine two articles. 1. The first one is by a consultant who shares their new framework for SEO in 2024. It incorporates all the latest updates, is well-designed, and you learn a lot from it. 2. The second article is by a consultant who shares the before and after results with a recent client. It outlines exactly what they did, when they did it, and the results. Which consultant would you be more likely to hire? This is the difference between attention and trust. Trust is essentially someone’s degree of confidence in what you will do in the future. It’s a pretty simple formula in our context to understand. You have to be intentional about earning trust - not leave it to chance. People won’t trust you just because you’re a nice person sharing good content. They will trust you if you've shown the quality of your work. → You gain trust when you select a community to help and put down roots - not show up in a different community each month. Simply being a positive, helpful, community member will put you ahead of the attention swindlers. → You gain trust when you have a consistent, unique, message and proof that the message is correct. If you sound like everyone else, why should you be trusted? → You gain trust when you have direct, personal contact with people in the community and help them even when it does not benefit you. → You gain trust when you are consistent in how and when you communicate. → You gain trust by not resorting to clickbait headlines, making false promises, or using hyperbole. Don’t sound like the folks that people don’t trust. → You gain trust when you work forward from a place of honest belief, not trying to guess what the audience will find most popular. Do you want to be the person who follows the crowd or puts down a market of what they believe in? → You gain trust when you guide people who aren’t the right fit for you to others who can help them. When you put the interests of others before your own, you gain trust. → You gain trust over time. That time is a barrier which separates you from the fly-by-night folks who will show up tomorrow. But you need to lean into the process and not try to short-cut it. You only need 50 people at 50 companies to trust you and you'll have more work than you can handle. Focus on trust, not attention. (And ironically - subscribe to my newsletter to discover systems to scale your consultancy practice - https://lnkd.in/eKfEmN2E)

Early in my career, I made a frequent people management mistake. I hired and promoted based solely on skills and capabilities, ignoring the impact it had on the team. I thought I was driving success, but I was missing a critical element: behavior. Simon Sinek's pictured it right. He uses a Navy SEALs example to explain the balance between performance and trust. Performance covers skills and results, but trust is about reliability and character off the battlefield. The SEALs found: - High performers with low trust are often the most toxic, as their behavior erodes team cohesion. - Meanwhile, individuals with high trust, even if they're not top performers, are key to a strong team. Businesses often overlook this, focusing on results over trustworthiness, which can lead to promoting toxic behavior. High-trust individuals are the foundation of long-term success. Make trust a priority, and you’ll create a thriving, resilient organization. 😊 Do you prioritize capabilities, skills, performance, or behavior?

Another Paradox "It is mostly all about performances in annual appraisals but what really matters is the trust; trust over performance" I am asked why I prefer and place trust over performance in most of my interactions or operational activities. Even while conducting interviews I keep an open eye for identifying people with high integrity. I value trust over pure performance, an approach rooted in both personal experience and influential teachings. Integrity leads to building of trust. Decades ago, I had seen the video of Warren Buffet talking about Integrity. And in childhood I have heard story of Shree Krishna and how high His integrity was! Trust is indeed a critical factor that often doesn't receive the attention it deserves in business environments, where quantifiable metrics tend to sometimes overshadow qualitative measures like integrity. #psalmoflife Few years ago, I heard the story of Navy Seals from Simon Senek and the performance vs trust matrix. One of the key things Simon Sinek learned with his time with the Navy is how they select people who would join the Navy SEAL Team Six. This can very well be the birth of the performance vs trust concept. They use a 2-axis matrix to determine whether someone has got what it takes to join this elite unit. The y-axis measures performance while the x-axis measures trust. The Navy SEALs’ “performance vs. trust matrix” provides a stark contrast to most corporate appraisal systems. By prioritizing trustworthiness, the SEALs recognize that reliability and ethical behavior are essential for teamwork, cohesion, and mission success—even more than skill alone. This makes sense, especially when stakes are high, as their work often involves life-or-death situations. A person who is only highly skilled but untrustworthy could jeopardize the whole team. Their approach aligns with Simon Sinek’s interpretation of leadership, emphasizing that the ability to trust someone with confidential matters and personal boundaries is invaluable. In most corporate settings, on the other hand, performance tends to be easier to measure and directly link to profit, which is why it usually and rightfully gets more weight in evaluations. People naturally feel safer and more motivated in environments where they know their colleagues and leaders can be trusted. Looking at people’s potential for trustworthiness and integrity is a more sustainable investment than pure technical skills alone. Skills can be taught, but the character is much harder to build and essential for genuine collaboration and long-term success. This aligns with the way Warren Buffet speaks about hiring for integrity: without it, performance has limited value. Here is the link of video by Simon Sinek - https://lnkd.in/drMa_eSf

In elite teams like the Navy SEALs, trustworthiness often surpasses individual performance. While skills and competence are essential, the SEALs prioritize members they can rely on both in and out of critical missions. This approach ensures cohesive units where each member depends on the others' integrity and support. In the business world, we often emphasize performance over trust. However, insights from top-performing teams reveal that it's more beneficial to choose individuals with moderate skills but high trustworthiness over high performers with low trust. Valuing employees who foster trust and collaboration leads to resilient teams that thrive collectively. As Simon Sinek highlights, the Navy SEALs use a performance vs. trust matrix to select team members, often opting for those with medium performance and high trust over high performers with lower trust. By focusing on trust, organisations can build strong, cohesive teams that excel together.  #teamwork #trust #highperformer #performance

In the military we were taught that rank and position gets you military courtesy. People will call you sir or ma’am and salute when appropriate. But rank and position don’t earn you respect or trust. Getting salutes and having your troops follow orders doesn't make you a leader. Earning your troops’ respect and trust through your courage, competence, and empathy make you a leader.