KEY POINT: TRUST is perhaps the most “underutilized” opportunity for any business. Businesses rarely focus on actively building more TRUST, but they expect their audience to TRUST THEM…they don’t. There are some very prescriptive ways to build TRUST…I’ll talk about a few of these in this article.
KEY QUESTION: Do your customers tell their friends and colleagues they should buy from you because they TRUST you completely?
There’s a lot of “hype” about TRUST today…seems like more people are talking about it than ever before. Maybe it’s because TRUST IS IN TROUBLE, according to the 2022 Edelman Trust Barometer report. Even though TRUST is incredibly low, I believe there is a TREMENDOUS OPPORTUNITY for those who choose to focus on it rather than take it for granted.
Business is so fast-paced and competitive that TRUST ends up being something we “assume” is being built when just the opposite is often happening.
One key point of the latest Edelman report is that DISTRUST is incredibly high, meaning people start with a high degree of distrust. In essence, everyone starts behind the curve and “ten points down” when interacting with a potential customer. So their initial efforts are focused on “digging out” from the distrust to get to a place of TRUST.
Today, more than ever, TRUST HAS TO BE EARNED and BUILT. No longer can we expect a prospective customer to TRUST US…they don’t. We must change how we interact with our customers from the first interaction.
This phenomenon is actually relatively easy to see in today’s economy. You can see it clearly when you put “your customer hat” on and look at this issue from your perspective…as a customer. Ask yourself this question…
QUESTION: When you interact with a business, in-person or online, do you immediately trust that everything they say is true and everything they tell you will happen the way they say it will?
For most of us, the answer is NO. We don’t immediately trust the organization or its employees, and we have more distrust than trust. And we feel what they are telling us is not going to happen as they say it is. We, as customers, start off with the same degree of distrust our potential customers have when they first interact with us. Since we think this way when we are customers, it only makes sense our customers are feeling the same way…INITIAL DISTRUST.
If you believe this to be true, and the majority of research supports that it is, the real question is…
QUESTION: HOW CAN WE ELIMINATE OUR CUSTOMER'S DISTRUST (AS FAST AS POSSIBLE) AND START BUILDING TRUST (AS FAST AS POSSIBLE)?
Three ways you can get started at overcoming the issue of DISTRUST and start BUILDING TRUST…
It is impossible to go BEYOND DIFFERENTIATION™ if your customers (and others) don’t TRUST you. BEYOND DIFFERENTIATION™ is about the CULTURE BUILT ON TRUST.
You may recall from my earlier articles/posts where I talked about how going BEYOND DIFFERENTIATION™ is FOUNDATIONAL…going beyond the products and services you sell. It is rare for products and services to be long-term differentiators. New products and competitors are continuously entering your markets, making it nearly impossible to maintain the top position for any extended time. Even monopolies see these changes happening at some point in their lifecycle and lose their monopoly position.
There are various ways a company can build TRUST, and I’ll discuss these in subsequent articles/posts. To start, it is essential to assess your position concerning both DISTRUST and TRUST with respect to your customers and general audience. There are some quantitative and qualitative ways to measure how much trust you have and whether you are building it or eroding it. Understanding this and changing these FOUNDATIONAL components help companies achieve this elite status.
To help you start to change your thinking to a “trust mindset,” it is critically important to understand how you are viewed by your customers (and overall audience). If you have built an authentic CUSTOMER OBSESSED CULTURE, your audience sees it, feels it, and rewards you for it.
A PRESCRIPTIVE FOCUS ON BUILDING TRUST IS ONE OF THE REQUIREMENTS OF A CUSTOMER OBSESSED CULTURE. When your customers know you genuinely care about them, treat them like they matter, are special, and are important, it is much easier to BUILD TRUST.
Ask yourself, as a customer, if you would give a business more trust if they went out of their way to make you feel special, important, and show you how much you matter to them…all the time…every employee…every interaction. I think you’ll agree that your trust in them would happen much faster, be more profound, and last much longer than it would if they didn’t treat you this way. And the only way to do this consistently is if you have built it into your culture. This is why it is a FOUNDATIONAL component.
What To Do Next...
I highly recommend you continue to read (and learn) more about what it means to GO BEYOND DIFFERENTIATION™ on my website (WOM10.com) or by reading any of my books…they will give you some incredibly helpful information. I would also recommend you subscribe to my blog posts to get current information on WHY this is so critical, HOW you can make it happen in your organization, and WHAT you can start to change today to help build this FOUNDATION.
I would also encourage you to read more about CUSTOMER OBSESSED companies. These are generally great examples of how others are BUILDING TRUST and treating their customers in a way that shows how much they appreciate them. I will share more examples of these companies in future posts. The most important thing you can do today is to START CHANGING YOUR THINKING from “internally focused” to “externally focused.” This mind shift is a critical starting point.
Finally, put together a rough TRUST ANALYSIS of your current customers. Start by asking your leadership team if they feel these customers trust you entirely or not. It is a black and white answer…there are no “degrees of trust.” Either they trust you, or they don’t. This is a great place to get started. If you need some guidance in this area, shoot me a message, and I’ll give you some ideas. This should help get you started…until next time.
