Building Trust Online – What Not to Do

Building trust online is one of the first 'orders of business' you will need to tend to in order for business success to be yours. Establishing online trust with the people you promote to will serve to significantly increase your marketing effectiveness saving you time and money. With that being said there are a few common marketing strategies in use that will do nothing for you in terms of building the online trust you will need to succeed. Here are 3 particularly irritating strategies you may want to think twice about before using.

Avoid the Darn Pop-Ups

When people land on your page you want to supply them with useful content that is relevant to the ad or keywords that brought them to your site. If someone chooses to leave your page try to avoid the temptation of bombarding them with those irritating pop-ups that will not allow them to leave. How much online trust do you expect to build when you are literally holding people captive on your site?

By placing pop-ups that activate when people open your page is another very irritating strategy that compels many to immediately leave the page. When you land on a site you obviously have an interest in viewing it. However when the site administrator blocks your view and attempts to 'force' information on you or capture your contact information most people understandably tend to immediately lose interest. Remember a key component for business success online is developing relationships and trust which is hard to do when you are driving many away with tactics such as these.

Avoid the GO,GO,Go Strategy

Is this even a strategy? Nothing is more pushy or makes people feel more hurried/bullied into a buying decision than this eloquent closing phrase. Sell used cars if you must but people online do not want to be subjected to these type tactics. Now there are many who believe in the marketing effectiveness of using such 'call to action' copy, however, if building long term relationship and trust is your objective this is not the way to do it! Think about it, the very idea behind closing a sales pitch with go, go, go is to literally 'push' people into a decision! In some cases you may get the sale but do you want to be associated with these types of pushy antics?

Offer Free Info with an Opt-In

Care should be taken when considering how to word such an offer! This applies in particular to correspondences sent to people who are already on your list. How many times do you need for them to leave their contact information? If something requires an opt-in clearly indicate so up front so folks will not be irritated or feel they have been deceived.

You are only as good as your word, or the 'words' you speak. Speak straight and clearly always striving to make a positive impression and avoid deliberately misleading people, especially those who have already joined your list!

Building trust online is one of the most important things you can do if you are developing a business. Earning the trust of others will serve to increase your marketing effectiveness which in turn will save you much time and energy. In order for business success to be achieved however, you can not afford to irritate or mislead people and the strategies discussed above tend to do just. By focusing on developing trust early on you are actually creating a stronger foundation for business success later on. So be mindful of the tactics you use because they can slow or even sabotage both your business development as well as your success.