Building Consumer Trust Online
Today we are talking about 10 things that you can do to build consumer trust online. This is a topic that is so important for everyone to understand and to start incorporating into their business. Whether it’s online, on your website, or just in your marketing.
These principles can apply in so many ways. It doesn’t matter if you’re a service based business, it doesn’t matter if you sell products. These things will help you to be more successful online. So let’s get started.
What are the 10 things you need to do to build trust?
The first one is have a website
I know I’m a website designer. I’m probably just saying this because of that is what you’re thinking, but no. Did you know that the majority of people who go online to check on a business, go directly to your website first?
If they’ve been referred to you by someone else, they’re going to check online to see if you are a legitimate business. If they don’t find a website, they’re going to think twice about calling you because they are not sure that you’re really in this. You have to be committed and showing that you have a web presence is one small step to show that you are a real business.
It shows you’re up and running and you are advertising to the world and that shows them that you’re committed and you’re going to be around. This is super important. If you are a business that has services that will be ongoing, people want to know and trust that you’re going to be around for them, not just be a fly by night company. A website presence builds that trust.
Be sure that it is also a PROFESSIONAL looking website – the only thing worse than not having a website is having a bad one! If you look like a jumbled mess you will turn people away as well.
The next thing that you can do to build your online presence is gather testimonials
This is so important and so easy to do in today’s online world. A couple of places that you could do this is through your Facebook page. Be sure you are asking people for referrals and to go on and recommend you.
Also Google reviews. Those are great places but you can also gather those testimonies yourself, ask people to send you their feedback, how it was to work with you so you can start marketing with that material in your proposals, in your online marketing all over the place to start showing other customers what it’s like to work with you.
Another super important key to build trust online is using an SSL certificate
In today’s online world, if you are not using an SSL certificate when somebody goes to your website, they are going to get a notice that your site is not secure.
I don’t know about you but that’s kind of a turnoff when I go to a website and it says not secure, super important that if you are asking people to put their information into your website, whether through buying something or on a form that they feel comfortable giving you that information and don’t feel like you will misuse that.
Easy fix if you don’t have one. Generally you can either buy one or some of your hosts actually even include one for free depending on who you’re hosting with. You can have that SSL installed usually within a day. If you’re with Godaddy and some of the others where you have to actually purchase one, or you are an E-Commerce store and need an upgraded certificate, it may take you up to two to three days to get an SSL installed. But make sure you have that and that you have “https” before your website, not just http.
It encrypts people’s information and makes them feel secure. Very important when you’re building trust online.
Use trust symbols and icons on your website to help gain trust
Use Visa and Mastercard symbols. Also having lock icons as they are paying or maybe even having a money back guarantee, depending on what your product is, will help people feel safe and secure using your product, buying your product, knowing that you’re going to stand behind it and also that you’re keeping their information safe.
So again, you need to make sure you’re using that SSL to actually encrypt it. Don’t just put symbols that show that, actually do it, but then also giving them some other symbols as they go that will make them feel good alike the money-back guarantee. That lock symbol as they’re putting in their credit card information and showing that you accept major credit cards.
Another great way to build trust online is be active on social media
I know you don’t want to be on everything and that’s okay, but be on a few. Always have a Facebook profile. Pinterest is good, Instagram is good. You don’t have to be on everything. If you don’t like Twitter, don’t be on Twitter. If you don’t like being on Instagram, don’t be on Instagram, but be on the major business channels.
Social media outlets help establish you as an actual business, not a fly by night company. So make sure that you’re on them in some way and regularly update. That’s the other part of this.
You can’t just have a page. You have to actually use the page for people to feel like you’re actually legitimate. It was talking to someone last night and they said they looked at a website and no updates, nothing new had had been added since 2015, and if you haven’t made updates, people are going to start to think that maybe you are not actively in business and they’re going to wonder about doing business with you. So make sure that you’re making some updates of some sort once a week, once a month, whatever your schedule is, make sure you’re doing some sort of updates.
One of the next things that I really recommend to help build trust is having quality content on your website
I can’t stress this enough to anyone, but especially online business owners. I know back in the days where people were telling you to blog, the big thing was just a throw junk out and get as many blogs up as possible, but that is so not the way you want to do it!
You want to actually have quality content that people will actually read so that they can gain understanding of what you do, your industry, your expertise and all of those things. I can’t tell you how many times I have been told I went to your website and I read a blog and that’s why I decided to hire you because you sound like you know what you’re talking about. That little bit of effort to actually blog about my industry, to actually talk about the things that are important to my customers is helping me to gain business and gain their trust more importantly.
So if you are just throwing out junk blogs or are just doing 100 or 200 word blogs or just a picture graphic, stop, it’s not worth your time.
Instead, make sure you are putting out quality content for people to read and get an understanding of your industry and help set you up as the expert they should listen to.
Another great way to build trust on your website and online in general is to actually have an about us page or section on your website
An about us page helps visitors get to know you and what you do as well as your expertise and how you can help them. So I’ve seen a lot of about pages that have a one sentence or two sentence summary about who they are and that just isn’t enough online.
I really recommend that you have a picture of your face because people start to connect with you when they see you versus just an obscure person that’s hiding behind the shadows. They want to see who you are so they can trust you. If you don’t look trustworthy, they’re not likely to do business with you. But if you have a great headshot on your website, great photography showing you, you will start to establish yourself as the expert.
Have an about us page and actually expanded to give them real information as to why you started your business, how you want to help them, all those kinds of things. A great example of a amazing about us page is Amy Porterfield. I love her about us page. It’s fantastic.
Also Todd Herman. He has a great about us page and all of it is really geared towards you, the reader and not necessarily just about him, but it gives you enough information that you feel comfortable working with him because you understand that yes, he is the expert.
Have Contact Information if you want to build trust online
This next tip is one that so many people overlook and it is utterly important when you go online to buy something from a company or to look for services. The last thing you want to be doing is hunting for a phone number, hunting for an email address, hunting for a way to contact a company.
I really recommend that on your website you have your contact information either at the top or bottom of your website and you have so many options for people to get in contact with you that they’re never left wondering, how do I call her? How do I get in contact with them?
If they’re hunting for your phone number, they’re most likely not going to call you. If you really want business and you want to do business online, you have to give information out. And that means doing business the real way. Having a phone number, having an email address, having contact forms so people can get in contact you easy, don’t try to hide it. I know so many companies that do this and it really hurts them in the end.
If you don’t want my phone call, you really don’t want my business is how I feel about that.
Color Psychology Can Help You Build Trust
One of the last things that is super important when you’re building trust online is to actually use colors in a way that will help build trust psychologically, let’s say, behind the scenes without even really thinking about it.
Think about banks. What colors did they use most often in their marketing? It’s blue, right? That blue color psychologically inspires trust. And so they use that strategically to help you feel comfortable giving you, giving them your money to hold.
And it’s the same way with other businesses as well. If you use certain colors, you’re going to drive people away. And if you use other colors, you’re going to draw them in. If you want to build trust and inspire people to work with you, make sure you check out color psychology.
And I will do a whole video about that for you so that you can understand what colors are great for what industries, where on your website and more of the color psychology behind it. But start thinking about color psychology and why certain colors are better for your industry and your branding than others.
Under-Promise, Over-Deliver
Now, the last thing I want you to think about is under promising and over delivering, I can’t stress this enough. In the online space, people are leery of buying online. They’re leery of working with a company they’ve never heard of before. So if you will under-promise and over-deliver, you will start to gain a great following of loyal customers.
This is so important when you want to re sell to them again and want to re-market to past clients. If they’ve had an amazing experience, they’re going to be way more likely to buy from you in the future then they would have if you had over-promised and under-delivered. That is a key factor.
So customer service has to be top notch in your business. If you really want to build trust, they have to know that when you promise them that you’re going to do a certain thing that you’re going to come through for them. If you will start to incorporate these things and making sure your customer service is also top notch, you are going to build that loyal following and that loyal following will buy from you again and again and again and again.
Great ways to do this is good follow-up and good communication.
Over communicate with people. They would rather you over communicated than under communicated.
If you’re selling a program online, welcome them right away. Tell them where to log in. Now, don’t send them 50 million emails a day, but send them the information that they need to get started and know what to expect next from you. I
had a conversation with someone about someone else’s program and I won’t call them out on who it was, but they had a program and they had ways for you to sign up for one on one coaching calls. And those one on one coaching calls were booked out six months or more. People could not even get into them. The program itself, once they got in was terrible. And in my opinion, that’s really going to hurt your business in the long run rather than help it. So make sure those details are thought out and processes are in place ahead of time and you’ll keep those loyal customers.
So those are just a few of the things that you can start to do today to incorporate into your business to really gain that loyal following.
I recommend that you pick one or two that you can work on and start incorporating it today.
If you want any help with any of these things, of course always reach out to us. We’re happy to help with that. That’s what we do. We love to help people really uplevel their businesses online and help build trust for their customers when they have a great product to deliver.
You can find our contact information, wink, wink, on our website and get in contact with us if you’d like an estimate on some of our services to help you incorporate these into your business.
