Companies in the north-east have long been characterised as professional, hard-working and - most importantly - personable.

Whether the organisation is based in Redcar, Hartlepool or Tow Law, clients find the more friendly traits of this working relationship to be a unique selling point.

However, as technology evolves, the business playing field is changing and the temptation to become less personal becomes greater.

With this in mind, it's more important than ever to focus on direct interactions and avoid succumbing to this growing trend. Naturally, the way people maintain this balance is by having as many face-to-face sales and meetings as possible.

This is because a lot of trust is lost by simply working through text-based interactions on computer monitors and mobile phone screens.

This was demonstrated in a 2010 study by Kevin Rockmann of George Mason University and Gregory Northcraft, an executive leadership professor at the University of Illinois.

The pair, who specialise in workplace collaboration, discovered that high-tech communications like e-mail and videoconferencing - classified as "lean communication" because they have fewer cues such as eye contact and posture - remove many elements of personal interaction required to build trust.

Businesses rely on a number of methods to get themselves noticed by the general public, yet the ever-increasing popularity of online marketing is forcing businesses to improve their web offerings, whether it's through a central website, email communications or newsletters.

Many people are integrating this into other more tried-and-tested (and increasingly overlooked) methods of communication, such as simple, affordable business card designs.

Whether it's an organised conference or a chance meeting, the ability to keep someone in touch with you through this cheap, wallet-friendly slip is extremely useful - though many people simply use them to give email addresses or websites.

With these cards, it's important to promote the newer means of technology as a point of contact, but it's also necessary to provide a dedicated phone line or a personal email to encourage the more subjective approach and convert further sales through arranged meetings.

Of course, you can print two different business cards - one for you directly and another for the company in general - in order to prioritise clients and not get too overloaded with relationships, should you not have the manpower to cope with this approach on a full-time basis.

With this in mind, using technology productively should revolve around delegation in order to maintain the best working relationship possible with every potential client.

If you want to aim high, you need a strong team of well-trained workers who are able to work with all forms of media, or assign certain individuals to specialised roles such as emails, phone calls, website-led inquiries or responses to blog posts and other media.

As Gregory Northcraft said in the aforementioned study, it's necessary that the ways you embrace technology complement, and do not override or replace, direct interaction with clients.

Ultimately, trust encourages effective cooperation between businesses and their customers.

Northcraft rightly explained: "Technology has made us much more efficient but much less effective. Something is being gained, but something is being lost. The something gained is time, and the something lost is the quality of relationships. And quality of relationships matters."