Business is all about trust, so if your customers have any reason to doubt your brand they won’t work with you.
If you are looking to build your business online, and you’re a new company or brand, there are a few things you should consider to make your business more trustworthy.
Whether you are selling online, or even if you are just using your website as a landing page, building trust with your customers will help you make more sales.
Reviews / Testimonials / Case Studies
The best way of showing customers what you can do is by showing them examples.
If you in an industry where you can show photos of your work it helps to build trust as customers will see the quality of your work.
If you work on bigger projects then why not write up case studies to show what your business does and how it works. (We are working on this for our own website).
In some cases you can’t specify who your customers are (you work as a subcontractor or on a white-label basis), even then having some testimonials on your site can show you’ve already worked in the industry before.
A great way of getting testimonials is to email your clients and send them a small example of what you want them to say.
They can then edit as necessary and send it back to you, for use on your website.
Brand Icons / Logos
If you have worked with some other high profile companies why not share them on your website?
By showing others the calibre of companies you have worked with it will help build trust that you are equally reliable.
You can show brand icons and logos in a carousel on your website home page or spread out throughout the site.
Make sure you get permission from clients before you use their logos.
Social Media Profiles
The vast majority of companies should complement their websites with social media profiles.
Social media profiles are free and keep track of your posts in a timeline, so customers can see how long you have been active for.
Even if you set up a new profile and it is completely empty, it’s still better than clients not finding you and going to a competitor instead.
Email Signatures
Having an email signature looks more professional and allows you to add all of your contact details to the emails you send.
Many customers prefer seeing contact details of whoever is emailing them.
By showing an email signature you can include your contact number, company address, links to social media – all of these will help show you are a legitimate business.
You can create your own email signature by using a generator such as here.
Flexible Payment Options
If you are asking for a lot of money upfront it can put your customers off, especially if they have never worked with you before.
Unless they know you, or you have been referred by someone else, it can take time to build up trust before a customer parts with cash.
That’s why showing flexibility with payments, maybe with a deposit payment or instalments helps spread the risk between you and your new customer.
Accept Card Payments
If you are dealing with a new company or supplier it is far easier to pay by card rather having to do a bank transfer.
Investing in the ability to take card payments on your site will help give customers control over how they pay.
Paying by card also gives your customers added protection under Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act.
People are more likely to do business with you if they feel comfortable and safe in parting with their cash.
Show Your Company Details
Having a Limited Company or one that is registered with Companies House gives you an extra layer of legitimacy.
Even though being a Ltd company doesn’t guarantee you are safe to deal with, it gives the perception of you being more established.
If you set up as a Ltd company show those details on your website or invoice, and you can also add VAT details if you are registered.
Summary
The points listed above are things you should seriously consider doing in order to get more sales.
By putting your customers at ease, you will give them more incentive to pay you and overcome any doubts they may have about doing business with you.
If you need further help or assistance with your website then speak to us and we can give you our recommendations.