Trust is more important than ever. How we engage with our customers has changed since COVID. Online trust is a fundamental building block for ensuring revenue in your business. This article provides you with a tick list to make sure you are covering off all of the online trust-building bases, plus takes you through how Starbucks engaged with their customers and increased revenue by 22%.
Why is trust so important?
Think of the last purchase you made online. You may not have consciously considered whether you trust the company. If you had already bought from that company before, your base level of trust would normally be higher (if you had a good customer experience, that is). You might even be willing to purchase again, or recommend them to others. For example, my level of trust for Amazon was very different (read: low) before my first online book purchase. Many years later, and many great experiences in, I’ve bought a zillion items and recommend them to others. Thinking back to your last purchase - was trust a factor? For most of us, the answer is more than likely ‘Yes’. It is hard to hand over our credit card details to companies we don’t trust. No matter the size or type of company you work with, you will face the same challenges as other firms in attracting and retaining customers. Trust is the foundation of any purchasing decision.
‘When the trust account is high, communication is easy, instant and effective’
Stephen Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Online trust is different
If your customers can’t easily trust you from the outset, it is very easy to go elsewhere online and look for someone else who can give them what they need. Due to the high level of uncertainly in online environments, developing trust is extremely important and extremely difficult. We can’t rely on the natural social cues we receive in face-to-face environments to develop rapport and trust. It isn’t always possible to touch and feel something before we purchase it. Ask yourself based on your online presence - Why should a customer choose your business instead of your competitors? Is it easy to believe they will receive the goods or service at a fair price? Are you showing that you can be trusted to deliver on what you say?
If you are second-guessing any of these questions, you may not be promoting how trustworthy you actually are. Are you doing enough in your online offer to help people understand they can trust you? Considering how trust develops is the first step.
How trust develops
There are lots of moving parts in achieving trust. Trust is a complex psychological state of mind and includes expectations, beliefs, perceptions of control, consistency in behaviour and attitudes to risk. On top of this, it is impacted by our social structures and develops over time. Let’s go back to my Amazon online purchasing experience. Trusting the company for my first purchases included: having friends recommend the service; having a simple, reliable online presence; using a payment method that was secure; understanding the delivery time frame; only buying products I knew were trustworthy (books, brands I have already used); and having a way to send back if anything was wrong. Since then Amazon has engaged me with new offerings (Amazon Prime, Video, One-Click Purchasing). This is because my trust in them is now very high. Ongoing engagement is important to build trusting customer relationships that drive revenue.
Engagement drives online trust
There are many strategies to help build online trust. Engaging effectively with your customers over a period of time has been proven as one of the most important (Connolly 2019). A common question companies ask is: ‘How do we engage our customers when we don’t really know who they are or what they want?’ Don’t guess - you need to use all of the data you have available to discover how to best engage with them to drive trust.
‘Customer engagement is the ongoing interactions between the company and customer, offered by the company and chosen by the customer.’
Paul Greenberg, Hubspot
Step 1: Use data to find out who your customer is and how they feel, think and behave. Use all of the available data in your business to discover trends, including customer surveys, phone interviews, exit surveys on your website, posts on your social media feeds and Google Analytics.
Step 2: Conduct customer research. If there is any data missing, the best way to gain insights is to interview 5-10 of your customers (more if you can). Try to understand what they were doing, thinking and feeling along the customer journey with your organisation.
Step 3: Apply your findings to your business. Segment your customers by how they behave, rather than on demographics. You will understand more about them as people this way. Then you can tailor your engagement strategy to your customer segments. You may also want to innovate your offer to ensure you deliver what your customers really want from you. This is especially important now that COVID has changed what consumers want.
7 Trust Building Bases
Now that you know your audience and are delivering what they want, make sure your offer covers off these trust-building bases:
Be transparent: Ensure that what the customer sees is what they get. Make your offer clear and eliminate all of the asterisks indicating there is extra ‘fine print’.
Show real value: Prove that what you are offering is what your customers actually value with stories of the results and benefits other customers have achieved.
Develop your credibility: Show you have the required expertise to carry out your role in the business transaction - with competence and reliability.
Reputation: Prove that others trust you by including evidence of past success and recommendations. Testimonials are powerful.
Incentives: Use financial rewards for purchasing or engaging with you over time instead of using these to attract people to churn to your firm for the first time.
Security: Show that your customers’ data and information is safe in your hands by outlining what you will and won’t do with their personal details.
Service delivery: Describe how you can provide and maintain your service to your customers after they have purchased. Support builds trust.
Once those trust-building bases are covered, apply your research-based understanding of your customer to consider how you might engage your customers in a more meaningful way.
How Starbucks engaged customers to build trust, innovate and increase revenue
In 2008, Starbucks launched the ‘My Starbucks Idea’ platform. It was created to engage customers and to encourage their ideas on the Starbucks experience. The platform gives customers insight into what the company is doing and makes them feel like an insider. My Starbucks Idea has had tremendous success and has been the source of ideas such as Cake Pops, Hazelnut Macchiato, and free Wi-Fi. At the five-year anniversary of the site launch (2013), My Starbucks Idea had generated more than 150,000 ideas and the company had implemented 277 of those ideas.
The ‘My Starbucks Idea’ Platform Results
The site is simple and transparent. Once you enter the website, you can pick from three options. One, you can submit a new idea. Two, you can view ideas – what have other people asked for. And three, you can see ideas in action – the ideas that have been recommended to key decision-makers. The transparency built into the website, with a section dedicated to ideas that have been recommended to key decision-makers and the up-to-date status of those projects, adds a sense of trust that the idea isn’t simply being sent into a black box. The crowdsourcing website is helping the company build engagement, plus stay receptive to its customers’ needs while helping drive the innovation engine within the company.
Soaring profits linked to customer strategy
Starbucks’ ongoing loyalty to its customers shows how a company can rebound and grow by directly connecting with the consumer, an important lesson for any business in today’s consumer-centric market.
More recently, Starbucks aggressively developed a mobile order and pay app service, thanks to suggestions made by customers, which now drive nearly 20% of its transactions. Starbuck’s most recent financial report shows that total net profits have exceeded all expectations. In the last quarter, profits jumped 22%. Analysts believe that Starbucks commitment to customer engagement is responsible.
In a recent interview, Chief Executive Howard Schultz said, ‘Consumer feedback continues to be our most important business driver.’
Starbucks’ customer-centred business model is thought-provoking. Like Starbucks, every business must understand to remain successful it has to openly and objectively evaluate every aspect of itself to adapt to our new consumer. Customer experiences built on trust are crucial to creating customer engagement, loyalty and increased revenue.
Recommended reading: Digital Trust: Social Media Strategies to Increase Trust and Engage Customers, Barry Connolly, 2020, Bloomsbury Publishing
Sarah Daly is undertaking a PhD at the Queensland University of Technology, investigating the role of trust in the adoption and diffusion of AI based innovation, particularly in the healthcare sector. She is also the Operations Director of CapFeather, a customer strategy and innovation consulting firm.