These tactics will help you build consumer trust and grow your business

Put yourself in the position of a modern-day consumer. You’re looking to buy something, and there are a wealth of options available to you. What’s one of the key things that push you towards one business over another one? Trust.

As a consumer, you need to trust the company you’re doing business with. After all, you’re spending your hard earned cash, so you need to be assured that you’re getting value for your money. This applies to any consumers that see your business as well. If they don’t trust your brand, then they’re not going to spend any of their money anytime soon. Consequently, it becomes a top priority to build consumer trust, if you want to increase sales and grow your business.

The good news is, modern technology has made it very easy for any business to easily establish itself as a trustworthy brand. The bad news is, it’s just as easy for the opposite to happen. To ensure you fall into the first category, use these tactics to build consumer trust.

Build a professional website

It sounds easy, but one of the first things you can do is build a professional website. It’s somewhat remarkable how your opinion can change based on the way a website looks. Imagine you go on a site, and it just looks really old and outdated. The pages take a long time to load, the buttons are unresponsive, and it seems like it was designed using Microsoft Paint. Then, imagine you leave that site and visit another one that’s nice and sleek, everything is fluid and responsive, and it just feels more modern.

Which site are you likely to trust more? The second one, obviously! Consumers won’t give you a chance to start building any trust if your site isn’t up to scratch. Thus, make it your mission to create a site that fits modern web design trends and functions perfectly. A key thing here is making your site secure, or else no one will trust it. No one wants that message before a site loads up saying “this site is not secure”, they’ll just go back right away. But, it also helps protect your online business, which is a bonus for you! So, build a professional and secure site, and this will go a long way to building trust.

Establish a top search ranking

Search rankings are one of the hottest topics in the business world. We all lust for that number one search ranking in our keywords; it gives us more exposure, leading to more clicks, and an improved bottom line. But, an underrated feature of having a top search ranking is that you make your business an authority source.

Sites in the top ranking spots are considered authoritative sources because consumers associate these ranking spots with established, professional, businesses. Normally, if you search for something, you trust the first few websites that show up in the results. It’s purely a mental thing from the consumer point of view; these sites must be trustworthy because they’re the first ones you see! It’s a common fact that consumers are more likely to trust a business that’s in the first few search results compared to one lower down the page, or – heaven forbid – on the second page of search results! If you’re lingering beyond page one, then you need to sharpen up your SEO and establish a top ranking as soon as possible. We’re talking about organic rankings here as well, a paid search result won’t do anything when it comes to building trust.

List your site in online directories

Remember the Yellow Pages and all those other massive directories that would sit by your phone in the house? In ye olden days (like, 15 years ago) if you were looking for a business or service, you’d look them up in a directory book. It would be a sign that you can trust them because they’re listed in this professional book full of other local businesses.

Nowadays, these books are pretty much dead, but their online versions live on. There are loads of sites that allow you to list your business, making it easy for consumers to find. Something like local business directory Search Frog has thousands of local businesses listed, along with reviews. These types of website are so beneficial for a small business trying to build trust. The simple fact your site is in an online directory is enough to build a small layer of trust. But, the fact people can leave reviews helps establish that trust even further. We won’t talk about that too much, as I have a whole section on reviews coming up shortly! The main tactic here is to find as many online directories as possible, then list your business on them.

Generate as many positive reviews as possible

Right, let’s talk about reviews then. It’s fairly obvious how reviews determine if a business is worth trusting or not. Good reviews indicate customer satisfaction, while bad reviews suggest your business is doing something wrong. One of the easiest ways for a consumer to determine if you’re trustworthy or not is to look at reviews and see if they’re positive.

Therefore, you need to try and generate as many positive reviews as possible. This is easier said than done, but not impossible. Whenever someone buys a product/service, encourage them to leave a review. Send an email out asking for reviews, or put a section on your website after the purchase screen that they can fill in. An excellent idea I’ve seen is to offer incentives for reviews. You could have an offer where a customer gets something for free or gets a percentage off just by leaving a review. This will encourage more reviews, and you can build trust quickly. Of course, if you want positive reviews, then you need to provide a great customer service first and foremost!

Building trust is the first stage in growing your business. When people trust you, they’re more likely to pay for your products/service. As a result, you keep getting more and more customers, while your trustworthiness helps retain old ones too. This is the perfect cocktail for success, and you’ll soon see accelerated growth.