Think about the relationships you have in your life. Now, think about the most important, underlying quality of each.
What is it? If I had to guess – it’s trust.
Trust is by far the leading quality that humans look for (and need) in the relationships we maintain – whether it’s in our personal life, at work, or with the brands we choose to purchase from. In fact, 81% of global consumers say that trusting a brand is a deciding factor in their purchase decisions.
For brands, building this trust is easier said than done. It’s not easy to understand each unique customer and then treat them in a way that shows you understand them.
How to initiate, build, and keep trust
So, how can brands rise to this challenge?
They must listen and deliver on their customers’ intentions across all channels. This starts with identifying the places (online and offline) where they share information and then securing explicit consent from the customer that they are willing to allow the company to gather data from those sources.
Brands can then use this consent to track customers, collect data, and use it to inform the way they deliver value.
Sound simple? We haven’t gotten to the most important part: protecting this data.
If customers are willing to share their personal information, they expect the brands they engage with to protect it, respect it, and use it to improve their experience.
Consumers see transparency with data as an essential, non-negotiable part of their brand relationships. This is especially true now in the wake of incidents where brands have betrayed customers by collecting and using their data without their knowledge.
Establish trust with customers, get rewarded
Once brands show they are trustworthy – and use the data they collect to improve the lives of their customers – they will be rewarded with loyalty. Because at the end of the day, it’s the customer’s experience that is the ultimate competitive differentiator, will keep customers around and will ultimately grow the business.
Put simply, companies that want to stand the test of time must build a connected customer journey that is based on trust and empathy.
