We knew the pandemic was going to change things…
…but, wow.
In 2021, 33,000+ people from 28 different countries were surveyed about trust.
The groundbreaking findings that had mind-blown marketers rubbing their eyes?
Business is the ONLY institution that people still see as both competent and ethical.
People trust businesses more than ever.
More than their governments.
More than their media outlets.
…and even more than nonprofits (NGOs)! 🤯
This is incredibly exciting for creative entrepreneurs, as the power has now shifted to individuals and brands.
Let that sink in, friend.
With all that trust in your hands, what do you want to do with it? Imagine what you can scale your brand to once you learn how to build loyalty and trust with your leads, clients, and customers.
But before you can grow, you have to learn the basic psychology and methods behind building brand trust in 2022.
Let’s dive in and get you there.
Why Is It Important to Build Trust with Customers?
So why is customer trust important, anyway?
Well, this massive study proved the pandemic changed trust and loyalty as we know it. It’s a huge deal. And you can hear me geek out about it in this podcast episode:
This monumental shift in society’s sources of trust is one of the many reasons why digital marketing is exploding. By 2024, content marketing will be worth a staggering $600B.
The way to your audience is through content, my friends. The data shows it’s the future. 📊
Before the pandemic, there were 3.6 billion searches/day. Now, it has exploded to nearly 8 billion/day.
Businesses weren’t the most trusted before. (…And yes, I’m calling you humble solopreneurs businesses, too.) 😉
But now, we’re the most trusted sources of information as of 2022 and beyond. This swing is why building trust with customers is more important than ever before.
The opportunity for business owners and budding entrepreneurs to tap into this is overwhelming — and your goal, if you choose to accept it, is to guide your audience to like you and then ultimately… trust you.
People are hungry for high-quality content that helps them learn something or solve a unique problem. Your leads are out there, looking for you — you just need to know how to get your brand on the internet for them to find you.
Here’s how that’s done.
9 Principles on How to Build Trust with Customers Through Your Online Content
Small businesses are now being freely handed trust, so how do we get in front of our audience to earn it?
Through trust-building content.
#1: Actually Solve a Problem
If you want to know how to build customer trust and loyalty, the most important tip is this:
Be helpful.
When you ask your ideal business persona for feedback (+ do a little research into your own niche and those pain points) it’s so simple to find problems people are having (and searching for online) and then tie your product/service into those.
You’ll connect with leads via their search and your shared knowledge which builds trust instantaneously. Strap in, because this can (and does) grow you a raving fan base and a flow of excited clients.
#2: Build a Content House
Social media empires can collapse in an instant — and all your brand’s trust goes with it.
I’ve seen it happen for too many entrepreneurs who have built a presence solely relying on third-party platforms like Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Vine/Blab (R.I.P.), etc. ⚰
Building on your own platform (e.g., a WordPress website) is absolutely essential. 🏠
That also means, when you go into the world and speak at events, post reels, talk on a podcast, etc., you should make a habit of sending people to your home (give them your website URL).
Why?
Your Content House is the one platform you 100% own and control.
#3: Dump Essay-Style Writing
You or your content writer may have knocked essay writing out of the park in school, but digital content is a whole new ballpark. ⚾
Luckily, you can learn how to write for the web by simply understanding the basics of online writing. Skimmable, helpful, organized, in-depth content matters for trust, now more than ever before.
…and, it’s fun! 🤓
Watching a ton of people go from stranger to trustful customer is super rewarding, whether they purchased something from an email you wrote or converted after reading your ultimate guide.
This is how you can cultivate a relationship between your brand and your leads “while you sleep,” as your copywriting does the work for you.
#4: Rank #1 in Google Search
Building off of your new content writing skills from step #3, you also need to learn and practice search engine optimization (SEO) to become a business that thrives online. You can use an SEO writer for this, but you have to learn basic SEO writing techniques first so you can make sure they’re delivering. ✔️✔️
SEO can sound scary to learn, but in its purest form, it’s simply an attempt to give Google/web searchers the best results. If your content meets all right the requirements, you’ll be climbing your way to the top spot as more and more organic leads come to you through Google search. 📈
#5: Create Video Content
As you’re learning how to build trust with customers AND trust in business, you’ll see that video content has become more powerful than ever.
In fact, 54% of buyers are wanting more video content from the brands they support!
And not surprisingly, YouTube is the most popular way to get it done.
Source: Wyzowl
Not only can you monetize your videos on their platform, but once you learn how to make awesome YouTube videos, you’ll start building truth with viewers and create a new channel for incoming leads. (Just remember to send viewers back to your content house, always.)
#6: Stick to Your Topic Areas
Be specific with the problem you can solve.
If you can consistently provide your target audience with high-quality content that truly helps them, you’re going to get an avalanche of leads thrilled to spend their money with you. And part of keeping your content great (and saving yourself from wasting time, money, and energy) is to write about the correct topics.
You don’t want to get into the trap so many beginner entrepreneurs do with writing blogs just to write them.
Instead, do a little research! Look at which content topics are hot for your niche and stick to your expertise. This way, your audience 100% knows they’re in the right place with you — go too broad and you risk confusing Google AND your people.
#7: Become a Voice of Authority
Books are incredibly trustworthy sources of content. Having the title of “author” in your bio goes a long way for your brand. 📚
Between 2016-2021, I used the repeatable strategy in The Content Transformation System I teach to get six books self-published.
If you’re an entrepreneur or business creator researching how to build customer loyalty and trust, you should absolutely write a book if you want to scale.
It’s a lot of work, but it’s simpler than you think to write and promote a self-published book. You can absolutely do it with the right strategy.
#8: Be Strategic
Speaking of strategy…
You simply can’t do any of the above trust-builders over and over again by memory. That’s a recipe for surefire burnout. 🥵
So, if you’re getting serious about your business’ content game — you simply have to build a content marketing strategy to plug the above skills into.
Too many would-be great brands fail to take off because a business creator is lost in the swampy day-to-day grind of meticulous and energy-draining tasks. (And this totally makes sense… If I’ve learned anything running and scaling my businesses it’s that you need space and clarity to look ahead and captain the ship that is your brand!) 👨✈️
So, make building and following a strategic business and marketing plan part of your mission for building trust with your customers. You’ll get lost without it.
And inside your strategy, always focus on the big three content types that grow your business, too. I talk about this more in this video:
#9: Create High-Quality Everything
Want people to know, like, and trust you? Ask yourself how well you’re presenting what you’re selling.
Because whether it’s your sales landing pages, blog articles, emails, YouTube videos, or anything in between, it needs to be great.
Make your content 100% BS-free. Here’s how:
- Be honest and upfront: Don’t exaggerate or lie about your numbers, etc.
- Be transparent and authentic: Show up as your vulnerable, genuine self.
- Don’t waste your audience’s time: Make your content clean, clear, concise, and error-free.
- Have a fast and secure website: If you haven’t already, add a web developer to your rockstar contractor team and delegate security tasks and monitoring to that person.
How do you rebuild trust with customers? By never losing it. 🤷
You’d be surprised how quickly someone goes from thinking about working with you to them losing trust and turning around forever. The second someone spots something disingenuous, they’re out.
So, make sure you only create honest, helpful, high-quality content. And, once you learn how to delegate and hire a content writer, make sure you communicate your high standards to them as well.
Since people are now listening to small businesses more than their governments and news outlets — take this opportunity to be heard and massively scale your brand through an audience that is ready and willing to trust you deeply when you help solve their problems.
Bonus Steps: How to Build Trust with Your Customers
We’ve covered the tenants of powerful trust-building content, but let’s not forget the foundational pieces to having trust with customers across any niche or industry, specifically in a digital world:
#1: Have Great Customer Service
It’s so important to have good customer service, even online. 🌐
This comes through in everything you do, down to your words in your content. To offer excellent customer support, always:
- Be honest at all times
- Be responsive
- Follow through and be good on your word
- Don’t over-automate
When it comes to avoiding over-automation, be wary of using things like chatbots.
Personally, I’m NOT a fan of bots on websites to serve your audience at all (yes, even for eCommerce brands). We tested bots at the writing agency I built, and the live chat performed way better with just a simple popup of a real human.
Source: Intercom
Bots work against our goal to establish trust, so even if they look slick and promise to save you tons of time and boost your conversions, bots usually fall into the “overly automated” trap of digital business. 🤖
#2: Be Transparent
Being honest and transparent in the content marketing world means getting rock-solid clarity on who you help and what you’ll do for them. Then, include that in everything you produce. Starting with your website.
Because you’ve got to rock your website branding, period. And you have to be so transparent that you attract the right people and send the others away. To do this, make sure you’ve got:
- Clean and concise copy
- CTA buttons to your services
- An effective “About Me” page
…and other best practices for website conversion.
Let me clarify… YOU don’t need to learn all this. You want to get a professional involved — don’t get lost in WordPress land all by yourself. (Trust me, I’ve seen many a business idea die because the creator never escaped the underbelly of trying to build their own website.)
#3: Use Testimonials
According to a survey done by Dimensional Research, a mind-blowing 90% of customers say their buying decisions are influenced by reviews.
Testimonials are fantastic for tapping into social proof psychology in marketing. You can ask your happy customers to write or record their feedback, and then the options of where you can use this within your content are nearly limitless.
For example, not only do I use them in emails, but I’ve built a testimonial section on my coaching program’s sales landing page:
This is a great way to build trust with your leads by showing the real faces of your paying clients.
How to Build Trust With Your Customers in 2022
Many of you know I’m no stranger to the power of trusted content. Content marketing is the foundation of all of my successes across multiple industries in the last ten years.
And last fall, I sold my thriving content writing agency for a 13,000x ROI to start teaching other passion-fueled entrepreneurs how to succeed with a content-based business. I’ve been deeply entrenched in this research and data, so I know there’s NEVER been a better time for you to learn how to build trust with customers online. 🎉
So, if you don’t know how exactly to create trust-building content, I can show you the exact skills, strategy, and system I use. Everything you learn can be plugged directly into your existing or new brand to create a business that earns tons of organic traffic, leads, and sales on autopilot.
If you’re ready to build the business of your dreams, one that frees you to leave a lasting legacy on this world, the steps and methodology to do it are available to you inside The Content Transformation System.
Ready to take that first step? Watch my free class and get instant access today!
