You've done it: the traffic from Google or other sources travels to your website. But now you have to be more convincing so that visitors stay, look around and ultimately become loyal customers. It's about communicating a clear impression of your company so that visitors identify with its messages. The clearer and more transparent the communication, the higher the credibility, from which the trust needed for purchases develops.
If the overall package fits the bill, your arguments will be accepted. Trustworthiness is a parameter that can decide whether a sale is made or lost. Our 5-point plan shows you how to positively influence visitors' emotions and intuition.
5 points that create trust
1. Simplify decisions
Give readers easy-to-understand facts and arguments, based on which they are able to clearly weigh up the pros and cons of various products. This means that readers don't simply have to believe what you're promising them. With the facts to hand, readers can make their own conclusions as to whether a service or product meets their needs or not. Present examples, features and benefits that come from making the purchase, and ideally avoid advertising slang completely. This creates trust.
2. Give a voice to partners and customers
Customers naturally trust the experiences and recommendations of other customers. How buyers value products and services can determine other customers' decisions considerably. Photos, statements and names of customers prove that their stories are genuine.
The same goes for cooperation partners. Use them as advocates. This once again gets round the problem of first-person narrative. Others testify to your expertise and trustworthiness.
3. Direct customer approach and customer perspectives
Our customers ask us time and time again about what form of address to use: Do I speak to my readers directly, or am I better to use neutral, impersonal formulations? The answer is clear: trust is created through dialogue. A personal approach involves the individual. Even if the dialogue on websites is not real, the personal approach gets better results. With the personal form of address, the customer's perspective is automatically incorporate. The trick is to keep the balance right. A staccato of personal prompts has more of an intrusive character than it has appeal.
4. Authentic imagery
Customers' eyes are now trained and can spot photos from databases straight away. Arbitrariness is quickly spotted if the website is populated with stock images. Readers want to get to know the maker behind the brand, they want to see who is talking to them on the phone, who is processing their orders, what the working environment looks like or where products are made. And this is especially true if the products concerned are made by craftsmen or their regional provenance is used as a sales argument. Identification fosters trust. Which would you prefer? To buy your ice cream from the friendly Italian in the ice cream van or buy it from a vending machine with a coin slot?
5. Feedback and confirmations
Small articles with a big impact: Every conversion is associated with activity from a user. During this process, he enjoys every type of verbal support you can offer him. Take the example of registering for the newsletter: Right at the start of the registration process, tell them how often the newsletter is sent and confirm the registration with a statement that reinforces the decision further. And make it clear what happens to the user's data. Example of purchasing: Supplement the purchase confirmation with a friendly paragraph that differs from the usual formalities. More information on the processing status make the waiting time until the day of delivery easier for the customer to handle and reinforces the feeling that they have chosen the right online shop.
