01 Oct
Building customer’s trust is a critical part of any business and this is especially true within ecommerce where users have a myriad of choices.
Having a reliable, trustworthy site is the foundation of building loyalty and there are many ways in which this trust can be built. Also, trust signals are important to Google as well. Virtually every trust signal is a ranking factor in determining your site’s search position.
Moreover, trust signals on your ecommerce site can help to build trust and consumer confidence from the get-go. They can help to reassure customers that the site is legitimate, which reduces the risk factors to them making a purchase.
What are trust signals?
Generally speaking, trust signals are visuals and graphics assets that make the customers feel safe when they shop from an online store. For instance, these can be logos, premium fonts, etc. but can also be testimonials of satisfied customers.
Why is customer trust important?
When you shop from a brick and mortar store you feel comfortable. You might see an employee at the register or stocking shelves, letting you know that there’s a person to talk to if you need help. and You can physically touch the items for sale and inspect the quality before you decide to purchase. You might also see other customers shopping and making purchases, indicating that other people trust the business, too.
But the online shopping experience is different. You can’t see the people running the site, you can’t see if other people are shopping there, and your interaction with the products for sale is limited to photos, videos and written descriptions.
The lack of trust signals you’d see in person means there’s much more uncertainty when it comes to shopping online and much more at stake. Will I receive my order as promised? Will they take my money and run? or Will the quality of my purchase meet my expectations? Will my credit card be safe? Will my email be spammed? These are just a few of the many questions that may run through customers’ minds if they don’t fully trust an ecommerce website.
The effects of customer distrust
With so many options easily accessible to them, online customers can simply abandon a questionable site in favor of one they trust more. And they do – nearly 70% of carts are abandoned on average. The most common trust issue causing cart abandonment is the concern about business legitimacy, concerns about the security of credit card information and order fulfillment also top the list.
Abandoned carts unfortunately mean lower conversion rates, as well as wasted ad budget and marketing effort that was used to bring in visitors.
Beyond conversion issues, customer distrust can lead to negative reviews and word of mouth, both online and offline, which can be even more difficult to repair in the long run. With so many channels available for customers to report a poor experience, from social media to online reviews sites, negative perception of your brand can spread faster and reach more people than ever before.
Trust signals to use on your online store
When you sell things online, you’re expecting customers to trust that what they see is what they’ll get. Instead of asking them to do this blindly, you can include trust signals on your site to prove that your business is legitimate and secure.Here are 10 ways to incorporate trust signals in your online store to create confident and loyal customers.
1. Include customer reviews across your website
Customer reviews are a really effective way to build trust on your ecommerce store. They are a form of social proof to potential customers, showing that because other people have had a good experience with your company, that they are also likely to as well.
No matter how great your product photos and descriptions might be, a first-time customer knows you have an incentive to sell and may suspect bias. Displaying customer reviews is a great way to say, “Don’t believe on what we say; see for yourself what our customers think.”
This allows new buyers to verify your claims themselves — and often learn even more details along the way, like whether the color is the same in real life as it appears in the photo, if the product is made to last, or whether an item fits comfortably. Ecommerce stores commonly include customer reviews on:
- Product pages
- Product category pages
- Homepages
- Reviews pages
Product pages are one of the most effective places to include customer reviews, because that’s where customers are looking to find details about individual products. A standard way to display them is to include the star rating near the top of the page and linking that to the full reviews section in a lower area.
Also, Including star ratings accumulated from customer reviews on product category pages can be helpful to customers because it gives them a quick side-by-side view of the most highly rated products. Customer reviews and testimonials can also be displayed on homepages to help show first-time visitors that the site has a good reputation.
2. Make your return and exchange policy easy to find
One of the biggest fears while shopping online is that they can’t physically see and inspect the product. But a fair return policy can help eliminate some of the customer’s perceived risk of buying a product they haven’t seen before.
You can’t reduce that fear if customers don’t know about your return policy. If you only include the terms of returns on your FAQs or shipping policy page, you’re creating extra work for customers to find it. That’s not to say you shouldn’t include the information there, but you need to ensure that customers have easy access to it when they are in the heat of the decision-making process. Give customers a push to click the add to cart button by including a snippet about your return and exchange policy on product pages.
Tips for effective return and exchange policy placement
No need to go into detail when mentioning your return policy on product pages. You likely have a product description copy taking up important real estate. Instead, use a short statement like “Free Shipping & Returns” (if returns aren’t free, include an asterisk). Make the statement clickable to open a module or page with the full details of the policy. Additionally, display the text in a color that stands out from the rest of the text on the page.
3. Display contact information
Missing contact information on a website can make the online shopping experience just as frustrating, and some consumers even perceive that as a potential sign of fraud. Also, people will find it frustrating when they’ll not find a staff member to answer their queries. Hence making your site’s contact information readily available solves this problem by showing that there are real people behind the scenes who are easy to get in touch with.
Ensure that your site’s header includes at least one contact method so that shoppers can easily find it no matter what page they’re on. Many sites include a link to a contact page, but displaying a phone number or email address can be a more direct way to build trust.
Tips for displaying contact information
When choosing a place to display contact information, don’t forget to consider how shoppers on mobile devices will find it. If you don’t have room for additional text in your mobile site header, include contact information in the menu.
Additionally, including a live chat is another great way to help customers get in touch with you. Give the live chat experience a personal touch by including the name and photo of the operating agent.
4. Add trust badges
Trust badges, also known as trust seals or trustmarks, show online shoppers that a website has been verified or evaluated by a third party. There are a number of different ecommerce trust badge providers offering a range of verification services proving that a website:
- Is a legitimate or accredited business
- Does not contain viruses or malware
- Collects and stores data securely with encryption
- Does not send spam
Depending on the provider, your site may have to pass certain requirements before it can display those trust badges. Though it may require more effort on your part, it’s always better to use badges that your site has to earn because it shows visitors that you didn’t just pay for the right to display them.
Tips for adding trust badges to your ecommerce site
Choose a trust badge provider that helps you address a range of customer concerns, and display them throughout the customer journey on your site. TrustedSite offers a suite of certifications and trustmarks that are designed to be placed in the stages of the ecommerce journey where customers commonly drop off, like the shopping cart and checkout.
Be sure to use trust badges that are high resolution, easily recognizable to your visitors, and link back to the provider’s website to prove their authenticity.
5. Have an SSL certificate
A trusted ecommerce store usually has a Domain Validation Secure Sockets Layer seal or Extended Validation Secure Sockets Layer seal. This is because these let the customers know that online communication between them and your website is safe and secure as their data is encrypted and hence protected from online threats.
It’s important to install an SSL certificate on your ecommerce site to ensure that when customers enter sensitive data, it’s transmitted securely, with less risk of being intercepted by a malicious attacker.
In 2018, Google Chrome began labeling any site not using an SSL certificate as “Not Secure.” When online shoppers see that red warning symbol in their browser, they lose trust in the website and are likely to abandon it. Ensure that customers see the secure lock symbol in their browser when shopping on your site by purchasing an SSL certificate.
Tips for getting an SSL certificate
SSL certificates can easily be purchased from a number of sources. You can even get one for free from Let’s Encrypt. Be sure to pay attention to the expiration date of your certificate. If it expires, your site will be marked as “Not Secure” until you renew or purchase a new certificate.
6. Design the site experience for the customer
Your ecommerce store needs to look professional and reliable, and you can’t make that happen unless you perfect every small detail first. For instance, the quality of images, navigation features, user interface, etc. are some of the things that affect the overall experience of the users. If they get a “premium feel” from your website, then they will trust it easily.
If they run into frustrating design roadblocks while perusing your site, customers will question the trustworthiness of your business. But if you design your site with the customer experience in mind, you can wow shoppers and keep them coming back for more. Ensure your site doesn’t contain these design mistakes that can hinder the user experience and jeopardize conversion rates:
Slow-loading pages: Shoppers expect your site to load quickly. In fact, 53% of mobile visits are likely to be abandoned if pages take longer than 3 seconds to load. Optimize the performance of your pages so that customers can easily access your site without giving it a second thought.
Poor responsiveness: If your site isn’t as easy to navigate on mobile as it is on desktop, a large portion of visitors will be frustrated and discouraged from making a purchase. A mobile-first design approach is worth consideration.
Low resolution images: If your site displays images that appear grainy or unclear, visitors may question how professional your business really is. Using crisp, high resolution images will give your site a more polished look.
Tips for designing a great customer experience
Always keep in mind your customers’ goals and the hurdles they go through to achieve them. Revelry knows that brides and bridesmaids have tons of wedding planning to do, so they aim to make the dress shopping experience as efficient as possible. They offer a home try on service so that bridesmaids can be sure they are happy with the style and fit of their dress without any risk. They also have a “See Colors IRL” page that displays a feed of dresses photographed in different settings so that shoppers see the true colors before buying.
7. Provide detailed information in the product descriptions
Having excellent product photography is important, but photos can only communicate so much information. You can’t look at a photo of a couch and determine if it will fit in your space. You can’t look at a photo of a bluetooth speaker and know if it’s compatible with your smartphone. Products descriptions allow you to fill in those gaps with the nitty gritty details so that customers can decide if your products fit their needs.
Tips for detailed product descriptions
You may find that your product descriptions end up quite lengthy once you start adding more details. To make the information easier to navigate, divide the copy into sections and include shortcut links to each so that shoppers can easily jump to the section that most interests them.
8. Include social media links
Including links of your social media accounts (often in website footers) is another way to build trust. When visiting your social profiles, they will see that other people are interested in and engage with your business. This will show potential customers that you are an active company and gives them an idea of what your brand stands for.
If you’re actively maintaining your social channels, they’ll also see how your audience is engaging with you and get a sense of the attitude towards your brand. The best place to display your social media links is in your site footer. Design the icons to match your site’s theme, instead of using the standard colors of each individual logo.
Tips for displaying social media links
Make sure that the social media accounts you link to are active. If customers see your last post was from 2 years ago, they may wonder if your business is still in operation.
9. Write a clear About Us page
Ecommerce owners use the About Us page to tell customers who they are, their values, and what shoppers should expect to gain from visiting the site. You can provide information about your company’s history, employees, culture, supply chain, and community initiatives that give your organization a strong foundation with a human touch.
Customers who visit your site will see for how long you have been in operation, how you conduct business, and how you interact with the community, further building their confidence in your brand.
Spend time crafting the messaging on your About Us page so your brand’s voice really shines through. Include information about your company’s history, values, and any work you do in the community. Adding a bit about your employees and their roles is also a nice way to make your company seem more human. Ensure that your About Us page is linked in your main site navigation and footer.
Tips for creating an about us page
Don’t forget to include photos! Photos from your company history and of your team will show visitors that you’re an authentic and transparent company worthy of their trust.
10. Keep your promises
Offering a product guarantee or warranty can help customers feel more at ease purchasing from your site knowing that they can exchange or get a refund if they aren’t satisfied.
Whatever promise you make on your site, the most important thing is to keep that promise. Customers will be quick to write a negative review if they feel like you didn’t do what you said you would, which can damage your reputation and discourage new customers from trusting you.
Tips for keeping your promises
Don’t hide the details of your guarantees and other promises. Create a dedicated section of your help center or FAQ page that includes the fine print, and link to it whenever you mention the promise on your site. This way, customers won’t be upset or surprised to find out their purchase didn’t qualify for the guarantee.
Tips for using trust signals effectively
Adding trust signals to your site requires careful planning and consideration for them to be effective. Keep these tips in mind when working to build trust with your customers.
1. Be transparent about customer reviews and feedback
Even if you have an outstanding product and exemplary service, it’s inevitable that you’ll receive negative customer reviews on occasion. It’s impossible to please everybody. Your instinct may be to remove the negative reviews or comments, but that’s an untrustworthy practice that can actually backfire. If your site only displays positive reviews, customers may question the authenticity of the reviews and the credibility of your business.
Instead of deleting bad reviews, take the opportunity to demonstrate proactive customer service. If you made a mistake, own up to it and ask the customer how you can make it up to them. If there was a miscommunication, offer an apology and do what you can to resolve the issue. If the customer was actually in the wrong, thank them for their feedback. It’s always better to take the high road when it comes to customer service, just be sure to consider how you can prevent the situation from happening again in the future.
2. Moderation is key
There is such a thing as too many trust badges, so be careful not to go overboard with placements. Displaying too many in one area can look cluttered and may cause visitors to doubt your site’s security or legitimacy.
Limit trust badges in any one area to no more than three, and make sure each trust badge is sending just one discrete message. For example, in the checkout, you may want to have one badge that addresses payment security, one that addresses your returns and exchanges policy, and one that addresses concerns about identity theft. Whenever possible, conduct A/B tests to ensure you’ve optimized trust badge placements for increased conversions.
Final thoughts
Building trust of people on your ecommerce store won’t happen overnight. It is something that you will need to consistently work on as you learn to address different concerns or questions that are raised by your customers.
The more trust signals that are on-site, the more you will build confidence in your visitors. Knowing that the site is secure, legitimate and can be trusted will convert visitors into customers, which will help to begin building long-term customer relationships and loyalty.