You are probably the kind of person in your business dealings that people trust. When you walk into a room and talk to people, whether for the first time or the fiftieth, whether at your own company or at a customer’s, you know how to communicate in a way that conveys trust. The way you present yourself physically, the facial expressions you use, the way you show a genuine interest in others. All of these characteristics communicate that you can be trusted. And since you can be trusted, people are willing to listen to your ideas and to be influenced by you.
It’s a different story with your website or the website of your company. Visitors to your website don’t have the benefit of meeting you personally to decide whether they can trust your company and the information on your site. Since you aren’t there physically, what can you do to communicate trust?
1. Identify with the visitor. Indicate that you understand their problems and express your offer in terms of how they will benefit. Your visitors have genuine problems they are trying to solve. You have experience with these problems, so spend less of your site on what you do and more of your site on identifying with your visitor’s problems and what you know about solving them. Explain how you solve these problems in their terms. Less of “Here’s what we do” and more of “We understand the kinds of challenges you are facing and here are the benefits customers have received when they used our capabilities to solve these problems. Insert example here.”
2. Share your experience. It can be about your experience in your technology, your domain, or your industry. Your visitor probably has a narrow view, yours is broader. Your visitor just has the experience of one company, theirs. You have the experience of working with many customers who have had many variations of the kinds of challenges that are faced in your industry. Share it with your visitors.
3. Give away information. Leave the reader with valuable information and the feeling that “If they are so knowledgeable that they are willing to give this much away for free, they must know a lot more.” You can write articles, white papers, and top ten lists. Publish your support content, sponsor a support discussion forum, or write online books.
Comments on this entry are closed.