Why Is It Getting Harder to Make Sales in 2026?
Yesterday, I walked into a room full of podcasters expecting to talk about podcasting as a marketing strategy. We were supposed to be talking about questions like:
"Why have a podcast?"
How does it support your business?"
"What is the actual purpose of spending all this time creating content?"
Instead, we accidentally had business group therapy.
There were only about five or six of us in the room, and because the group was small, the conversation got real pretty quickly. Every person there was also a business owner, and underneath all the conversations about podcasts, marketing, strategy, and visibility was a much bigger question:
Why is it getting so much harder to make a sale?
People are taking longer to decide. Leads aren't converting the way they used to. Strategies that worked before aren't necessarily working now. Business owners are:
putting themselves out there,
creating content,
networking,
marketing, and
doing all the things we're told we're supposed to do.
And still, closing the deal feels harder.
Then one of the business owners used a phrase that completely shifted the conversation:
"We're in a trust recession."
And suddenly my sex-therapist brain went, "Oh. I know this problem."
I've Been Studying Trust for 20 Years
I've spent about 20 years working as a marriage and sex therapist, and two of the most common issues I've treated throughout my career are desire discrepancies and infidelity.
At first glance, those might sound like completely different problems.
They're not.
Both require people to learn how to build trust.
When couples are trying to rebuild their sexual relationship, they have to learn how to:
communicate more openly,
understand each other better,
listen to each other's experiences,
respect boundaries, and
work collaboratively rather than trying to convince, pressure, avoid, or control each other.
That's trust building.
And infidelity?
That's trust building under some of the most grueling circumstances imaginable.
Someone lied. Someone broke an agreement. Someone thought the relationship was one thing and discovered it was something else.
Now the question becomes: "How do I believe you again?"
I've spent years sitting in rooms helping people answer that question.
So, guess who's an expert in trust?
This gal.
And once I started looking at what's happening in business through that lens, I couldn't unsee it.
Your Customer Doesn't Just Have to Trust You
Here's the problem for good business owners:
Your customer isn't walking into your business with a clean slate.
They're bringing every other business with them.
They're bringing the product that promised something and didn't deliver.
They're bringing the course that was supposed to change their life.
They're bringing the subscription they couldn't cancel.
They're bringing the company that claimed something was "natural," "healthy," "sustainable," or "scientifically proven."
They're bringing fake reviews, influencers who didn't disclose what they were selling, perfectly curated testimonials, AI-generated content, targeted ads, scams, data collection, political promises, corporate promises, and institutions that said, "Trust us."
And then that trust was broken.
In fact, recent consumer research is finding exactly this. Consumers are becoming more cautious and skeptical, spending more time researching purchases and looking for reassurance before making decisions. Only 29% of consumers surveyed said they believe companies are open and honest about their business practices, and only 28% described companies as transparent.
So when someone arrives at your business, you aren't starting at zero.
You may be starting with a trust deficit.
We Got Really Good at Understanding Human Psychology
This is the part that makes me particularly uncomfortable as someone who has spent her career studying human behavior.
Businesses got really good at psychology.
We learned people's pain points. We learned what gets attention. We learned urgency. Scarcity. Fear of missing out. Social proof. Emotional triggers.
We learned what people worry about.
We learned what they're searching for at two in the morning when they're scared, lonely, frustrated, overwhelmed, or desperate for something to change.
And then we learned how to sell to that.
From a short-term sales perspective, some of it worked brilliantly.
But I think we missed something. We learned how to close the short sale while damaging the long relationship.
And eventually, humans learned too.
Our nervous systems started recognizing the pattern.
"You're selling to me."
"You're trying to manipulate me."
"You're exaggerating."
"There's going to be a catch."
"You want something from me."
"I don't believe you."
Marketing itself started to feel suspicious.
I Don't Even Trust My Coffee
I can see this happening in my own buying behavior.
There's a coffee I order called Fabula Coffee. It's expensive. The company talks about things that genuinely appeal to me: mold testing, organic sourcing, lower-acid options, and coffee that's potentially easier on your stomach.
And I want to believe them.
I really do.
I read the education. I look at the claims. I think, If this is true, this sounds great.
And then another part of me thinks: "Yeah, but is it actually true?"
Because I've been sold "natural", "healthy", and "better for you" before.
I've watched companies make claims that later turned out to be misleading, exaggerated, or incomplete.
So sometimes I buy my expensive coffee, and sometimes I buy the cheaper coffee at the grocery store because it tastes good enough.
That's not necessarily because Fabula did something wrong. They're dealing with mistrust they didn't necessarily create. They're paying the trust bill left behind by everyone who came before them.
And so are you.
I Tried to Do the Right Thing With My Grocery Bags
Here's another example.
For years, I've tried to be responsible about plastic grocery bags. I would collect them and take them back to the recycling bins at my local grocery store because I genuinely care about the environment.
I thought I was doing my part.
Then I watched a documentary about what actually happens to plastic recycling and learned that collecting plastic doesn't necessarily mean all of that plastic ultimately gets recycled.
And I remember thinking: "Then what am I supposed to believe?"
I did what I was told to do. I put the bags where I was told to put them. I trusted that the system would do the rest.
Bad experiences like that accumulate.
It's not just recycling. It's:
government,
education,
healthcare,
the media,
social media,
corporations,
advertising,
food,
technology.
You could probably create your own list.
We've been given a lot of big promises. And we've watched a lot of those promises fail.
Eventually, mistrust becomes protective.
Your Customer's Skepticism May Actually Make Sense
This is where I think business owners need to change how we think about sales.
We can look at customers and think:
"Why won't they commit?"
"Why do they need so much information?"
"Why aren't they responding?"
"Why did they say they were interested and then disappear?"
"Why is it taking them three months to decide?"
But maybe they're not being indecisive.
Maybe they're cautious.
Maybe their nervous system has learned: "Don't believe everything you're sold!"
Current consumer research suggests buyers are doing exactly that. They're researching more, questioning recommendations, looking for validation, and becoming more deliberate about where they spend their money.
That means the solution probably isn't simply sell harder.
It may be to build trust longer.
Stop Winning the Short Game and Losing the Long Game
This is where businesses need to start examining their sales practices differently.
Instead of only asking: "Does this increase conversions?"
We need to start asking: "Does this increase trust?"
Those aren't always the same question.
A sales tactic might increase urgency today while decreasing trust tomorrow. You might get the sale and lose the customer, get the click and lose credibility, optimize the funnel and damage the relationship. You might win the short game while losing the long game.
And during a trust recession, I think that's becoming increasingly expensive.
What Does Trust-Building Sales Actually Look Like?
This is where my 20 years working with couples becomes surprisingly relevant to business.
You don't rebuild trust after infidelity by repeatedly saying: "Trust me."
You rebuild it by:
becoming trustworthy
telling the truth consistently
making promises you can actually keep
acknowledging mistakes instead of hiding them
no longer trying to control the other person's response
Give them enough information to make their own decision.
Understand that trust develops through repeated experiences over time.
Then do it again.
And again.
And again.
Business isn't marriage, obviously. But humans are still humans. And trust still works remarkably similarly in business relationships and in personal relationships.
So look at your marketing, your sales process, your website, your promises, your pricing, your testimonials, your follow-up emails. Look at what happens after somebody buys from you.
And ask: "Am I trying to convince people to trust me, or am I behaving in ways that give them evidence that they can?"
Because those are two very different business strategies.
Trust Might Be the New Long Game of Business
If you're a good business owner with a legitimate product or service and sales have gotten harder, I don't think the answer is automatically that you're doing something wrong.
The environment has changed.
Consumers are more cautious. They're spending more carefully. They're questioning claims. They're looking for proof. They're trying to figure out whom they can believe.
We're operating in a trust recession.
And we aren't going to repair that with another short-term sales hack.
We're going to repair it one interaction at a time.
One honest promise.
One delivered result.
One transparent conversation.
One customer experience where you said you would do something — and then actually did it.
That's the long game.
And I think the businesses willing to play it are going to have an enormous advantage.
Because when everybody is trying to close the sale, being someone worth trusting becomes remarkably valuable.
Want to Learn More?
Join me to learn more about the intersection of trust, human behavior, the nervous system, and business. This is exactly the work I'm exploring as I take what I've learned from 20 years in the therapy room and bring it from the bedroom to the boardroom.
