A great comment from Barry Moltz:
“Many years ago small businesses wanted to appear large so customers would trust them. They produced fancy stationery and secured a respectable business address. This has all changed with the Internet, where customers value the human voice. Now every business wants to appear small and provide personal service to its customers.”
And I agree. I was quite happy to stop the renewal order of new stationery and envelopes and instead spent it on a better website. But still recognized that a website wasn’t enough, that customers expected a contact link that included phone and address. It was acceptable that the address wasn’t local as long as there was a viable address. More importantly was ensuring the phone was answered by a person instead of an automated system. At my small companies, everyone was the receptionist because the call rang to everyone if the frontline people were otherwise engaged.
The next level of trust that customers are looking for includes customer ratings. Think what eBay, Amazon and others started to ensure customer feedback is reflected back to prospects. Having peer ratings for Inquisix referrals was a key point to the system.
To build trust in today’s market, make it easy for the customer to research and buy your offerings. No more paper or offices but a well-designed website, a human answering the phone and trust ratings from customers are the new trust factors.
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