10 Ways to Help Your Visitors Trust You
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10 Ways to Help Your Visitors Trust You
Creating a website that conveys trust can be tricky. There are rarely any answers that are always "right" for every visitor. There are, however, several factors that have universal appeal to the weary shopper.
*** Company info ***
Provide your visitors information about your company and its primary owners and operators. Treat your shoppers with a company history and links to frequently asked questions, policies and physical location. The more information you provide the better satisfied any concerned shopper will tend to be.
*** Prompt responses ***
Shoppers want to know that they can rely on a company to meet their needs and concerns quickly once contacted. Be sure to respond promptly and professionally to all customer inquiries. Don't let email or phone messages go unanswered for more than a couple of hours, especially if requests are urgent.
*** Feedback options ***
Create ways for visitors to provide user feedback regarding your products or services and encourage them to do so. Be sure to follow up with feedback and use it to better your services.
*** Transaction security ***
Emphasize that online transactions will be handled securely and that privacy is a top priority. Using secure logos and links to privacy policies page is a must.
*** Offer discounts ***
Sometimes discounts can be a negative, making you appear desperate. However when implemented properly and professionally, percent-off discounts and coupons can be effective and giving visitors an added desire to move forward.
*** Delivery options ***
Be sure to provide low cost and/or varied delivery options. Having more options available allow visitors to select the delivery method they prefer and trust the most, which will then lend additional trust to you.
*** Brand and product quality ***
If you sell brand-name products, be sure to emphasis this as your customers will be more likely to purchase a product brand they recognize. If you don't have brand name products, create a brand and emphasize that. An unknown brand name product is still better than a no-name brand product.
*** Off-line retailer comparison ***
Provide your visitors compelling reasons why they should purchase products from you rather than an offline competitor. Highlight free shipping, lower prices, easy access customer support, etc.
*** Return policy ***
Adding a no-hassle return policy can clinch a sale. Be sure to have return policy information easily available and spell out exactly what is required to return a product and/or get a refund.
*** Minimal / clearly distinguishable ads ***
Don't clutter up your space with ads. Keep your visitors focused on purchasing your products. If you have ads in informational areas of the site keep them to a minimum and make sure they don't overpower your own information.
In an anonymous world where customers cannot examine a product or meet with company reps face to face, trust is much harder to come by. Online businesses have many more hurdles than offline businesses when it comes to establishing trust with their customer base. This means that as an online business, you have to do more than just create a compelling reason to convince people "why you" rather than a competitor. Establishing trust is the key. Your shoppers need to believe without a doubt that, as a business, you're not just in it for yourself, but that you care and will take care of the customer. Without having established any sort of trust there really is no sale.
10 Ways to Help Your Visitors Trust You - To learn more about this author, visit Stoney G deGeyter's Website.
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Trust is a key usability issue when it comes to running a successful online business. Most people automatically view web businesses with a bias against them compared to their brick and mortar counterparts. Your ability to convince your visitors that yours is a trustworthy business is one of the key components to getting visitors to convert into customers.
Creating a website that conveys trust can be tricky. There are rarely any answers that are always "right" for every visitor. There are, however, several factors that have universal appeal to the weary shopper.
*** Company info ***
Provide your visitors information about your company and its primary owners and operators. Treat your shoppers with a company history and links to frequently asked questions, policies and physical location. The more information you provide the better satisfied any concerned shopper will tend to be.
*** Prompt responses ***
Shoppers want to know that they can rely on a company to meet their needs and concerns quickly once contacted. Be sure to respond promptly and professionally to all customer inquiries. Don't let email or phone messages go unanswered for more than a couple of hours, especially if requests are urgent.
*** Feedback options ***
Create ways for visitors to provide user feedback regarding your products or services and encourage them to do so. Be sure to follow up with feedback and use it to better your services.
*** Transaction security ***
Emphasize that online transactions will be handled securely and that privacy is a top priority. Using secure logos and links to privacy policies page is a must.
*** Offer discounts ***
Sometimes discounts can be a negative, making you appear desperate. However when implemented properly and professionally, percent-off discounts and coupons can be effective and giving visitors an added desire to move forward.
*** Delivery options ***
Be sure to provide low cost and/or varied delivery options. Having more options available allow visitors to select the delivery method they prefer and trust the most, which will then lend additional trust to you.
*** Brand and product quality ***
If you sell brand-name products, be sure to emphasis this as your customers will be more likely to purchase a product brand they recognize. If you don't have brand name products, create a brand and emphasize that. An unknown brand name product is still better than a no-name brand product.
*** Off-line retailer comparison ***
Provide your visitors compelling reasons why they should purchase products from you rather than an offline competitor. Highlight free shipping, lower prices, easy access customer support, etc.
*** Return policy ***
Adding a no-hassle return policy can clinch a sale. Be sure to have return policy information easily available and spell out exactly what is required to return a product and/or get a refund.
*** Minimal / clearly distinguishable ads ***
Don't clutter up your space with ads. Keep your visitors focused on purchasing your products. If you have ads in informational areas of the site keep them to a minimum and make sure they don't overpower your own information.
In an anonymous world where customers cannot examine a product or meet with company reps face to face, trust is much harder to come by. Online businesses have many more hurdles than offline businesses when it comes to establishing trust with their customer base. This means that as an online business, you have to do more than just create a compelling reason to convince people "why you" rather than a competitor. Establishing trust is the key. Your shoppers need to believe without a doubt that, as a business, you're not just in it for yourself, but that you care and will take care of the customer. Without having established any sort of trust there really is no sale.
10 Ways to Help Your Visitors Trust You - To learn more about this author, visit Stoney G deGeyter's Website.
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Dianne CramptonDianne Crampton is an executive leadership coach, team culture consultant, author and president of TIGERS Success Series, Inc. Dianne has been helping CEO's and Executives connect their employees to their core values and goals for over 20 years using the trademarked TIGERS team culture process, which stands for trust, interdependence, genuineness, empathy, risk and success. To download a free white paper on behaviors that build strong teams and behaviors that will predictably tear them down go here. Dianne's contribution to the 2010 Pfeiffer Consulting Journal (an imprint of John Wiley and Sons Publishers) entitled TIGERS Hearted Teams is available in November 2009. Her new book TIGERS Among Us: 5 Winning Business Team Cultures And Why, Three Creeks Publishing will release in March 2010. To receive publishing discounts, subscribe to the free TigerTracks Newsletter here. - Visit Dianne Crampton's Website |
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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