Trust is the foundation of any good B2C relationship. As far as marketing goes, trust is a strong influential factor in customer purchasing decisions. Consumers today consider trust, authenticity, and transparency as key factors in deciding to buy from and become a loyal customer with a business. This blog will offer some useful tips and practices to help you build trust with your audience. If you follow these tips closely and apply them to your strategy, you will be well on your way to developing strong, trusting, and loyal relationships with your customers.
Share Relevant Content
This tip almost speaks for itself. You need to create, publish, and share relevant and important content to your audience if you want to gain their trust. If you share content that is not relevant, your audience will see no reason to keep following your social pages or return to your website.
You can figure out which types of content are most relevant by conducting some research into your audience’s demographics and characteristics. Once you know more about them, in the form of demographics such as age, geolocation, career types, marital status, and so on, you can create content that speaks to their lifestyles. These demographics are still quite vague. You can gain greater insight by using web analytics tools to discover their online habits, favourite brands, and user and customer preferences.
Be Consistent
Consistency demonstrates professionalism and builds trust. Post consistently on your website or social channels to let your audience and customers know when to expect your content. Email consistently so that those who subscribe to your newsletter will know which days you will email them. Consistency is also key to generating revenue. Revenue has been found to increase by up to 23 percent when brands and businesses are consistent with their voice, personality, and posting schedule. (Inc.)
Deliver Excellent Customer Service
Your customer service quality can make or break a customer’s decision to remain loyal to your brand. We all make mistakes, people and businesses alike. It’s almost inevitable that, at some point, a customer will be dissatisfied. What matters most is not the fact that you have a dissatisfied customer, but how you deal with that customer. Poor customer service leads to a poor customer experience, which can deter up to 66 percent of your customer base. (SuperOffice)
Deliver warm, compassionate customer service that actively listens to customer issues and complaints. Make sure you have a customer service team that takes the time to communicate on a human level. When you do this, you will likely not only keep your customers happy but keep them in general!
Some customers might call or email your business directly and privately. Others might use your social media accounts to voice their issues, concerns, and complaints. Again, some people may express dissatisfaction, but this does not have to reflect on your business.
When a customer publicly expresses an issue, resolve the issue publicly. Reply to their post with a warm, empathetic voice and a promise to resolve the issues, or explain how the issue has been resolved. This improves your reputation in the public eye and makes you a much more trustworthy business.
Personalise
A personalised customer experience can result in significant customer satisfaction, leading to trusting, loyal customers and greater business growth. Over 70 percent of marketers worldwide credit personalisation as one of the keys to marketing success. (AdWeek)
Customer data, such as behavioural habits and preferences, are key insights that help you personalise your campaign. Once you discover important data about your customer base, you can segment them into subgroups and deliver content that speaks to each subgroup on a personal level. The more you can segment your audience, the better.
You can personalise your content by delivering relevant ads or suggestions for other content. You can also personalise by interacting with your audience and customers with an authentic, human tone. Open your newsletters and emails with customer names, and sign off your newsletters with a team member’s name.
Leverage Social Proof
Social proof is a way of showing your customers and your audience that your business is trusted and successful. It can be leveraged by sharing online reviews, testimonials, and through the success and level of activity on your social channels.
Research has found that almost 90 percent of online customers trust reviews as much as personal recommendations. (SearchEngineLand) You can use both positive and negative reviews to showcase your brand voice and personality.
Positive reviews show others that customers have enjoyed their experience with your business. Negative reviews can also be used as social proof. When you have a dissatisfied customer who shares their experience in a review, you can share that review and explain how you aim to resolve their issue. This helps you build trust because it shows that you take the time to listen to your customers’ concerns.
Conclusion
Trust can take a long time to build but takes only one bad experience to break. Though it is fragile, it can be cultivated and strengthened by acknowledging the customer and their wants and needs, consistency with your posting schedule, a personalised customer experience, and examples of social proof.
Trust is key to marketing success, so make sure that your campaign reflects your honesty, authenticity, and transparency as a business.
