How to make your website more trustworthy (a simple model to apply)
Trust is everything in business. As your company website is the visible face of your business, you’ll want it to quickly build reassurance and confidence in what you do.
Many websites fall short of the mark on trust. All too often we are left lacking belief that these people can help us with our problem, or with a niggling feeling of suspicion and disquiet that makes us instantly click away.
Trust is an elusive beast - easy to lose, harder to win. So what does it take for your website to build it?
Thankfully, there’s a simple, practical model you can use to understand it and rules you can apply to dramatically improve the trustworthiness and success of your site.
A simple model for trustworthiness
I’ve long been a big fan of Charles H. Green’s work on trust in the business sphere. His book - The Trusted Advisor, was the first business book I ever purchased, way back in the day when I was working as a sales person in consultancy world. I find it as useful today as I did back then.
In the book, Charlie and his co-authors share an ingeniously simple Trust Equation, using four objective variables to measure trustworthiness.
These four variables are: Credibility, Reliability, Intimacy and Self-Orientation.
Trustworthiness = (Credibility + Reliability + Intimacy) / Self-orientation
Let’s have a look at each of these four variables in turn:
Credibility. Does this person/business have competence, capability, relevant credentials. Do they know things we need? Do we have confidence in them?
Reliability. Can we trust them to do what they say they’d do? Do they have a good track record. Are they consistent?
Intimacy. A surprising but important concept in the business realm. This has to do with feeling of emotional security. Do we feel safe sharing information with this person / business? Intimacy shows up as empathy, vulnerability, emotional intelligence - soft human qualities that drive connection, both in the real world, and online.
Self orientation. This is the most important element in the Trust Equation and the greatest destroyer of trust. It shows up as self-obsession - ‘does this person have my interests at heart, or are they all wrapped up in themselves?’ - and refers to a person’s focus: whether the person or business focus is primarily on themselves, or on the other person - the visitor, the client, the prospect.
You can learn more about The Trust Equation in Charlie’s short video.
Trust in business requires good ‘scores’ on all four variables in the equation. You want high credibility, reliability and intimacy, and low self-orientation.
I think that the trustworthiness of your website can be assessed using the exact same criteria.
Applying the Trust Equation to improve your website
When it comes to a good website, all these four trust-building variables come into play.
1. High credibility
“Does this person/business have competence, capability, relevant credentials. Do they know things we need? Do we have confidence in them?”
Your website can build credibility by sharing social proof. Trustworthy websites share lots of positive customer stories, case studies, testimonials. Success stories from others are powerful evidence of your capability.
You can create further confidence in your competence through sharing what you know, in the shape of valuable content: helpful articles, guides, lessons learned all help to demonstrate your expertise.
2. High reliability
“Can we trust the person/business to do what they say they’d do? Do they have a good track record. Are they reliable and consistent?”
This is harder to assess via a website than face-to-face interactions but signals can still be found.
A fast, relevant, personal response to enquiring, completing a form or purchasing from the site builds trust. Evidence of regularly updated content does the same.
Avoid sluggish responses to visitor action, and remember, no tumbleweed - keep your blog and stories up to date.
3. High intimacy
“Do we feel safe sharing information with this person / business? Do we connect with them on a human level?”
You can build a sense of intimacy through your website. When visiting a site we’re looking for signs of life and humanity. You can build a sense of intimacy and connection through the way you weave the story of the company, its over-arching purpose and values, through the tone of voice you choose to use, and importantly by showcasing the people behind the business.
Empathy, vulnerability, emotional intelligence - these may sounds strange in a professional sphere, but they play a vital role if you’re going to win people’s trust. Show your human side.
4. Low self orientation, high customer focus
“Does this person have my interests at heart, or are they all wrapped up in themselves?”
This is so important. A good website is highly customer-focused, and many websites fall down by being too company-oriented in their copy and content. Your website is the perfect opportunity to demonstrate your customer focus, and draw people in.
If you want your website to work for you, focus more on the visitor than you do you your business. To do this, talk about them and their needs. Visitors don’t care about your business until they know your business cares about them and their experience.
Try the We We Test
This is a brilliant little tool to assess the customer focus of your website: https://www.customerfocuscalculator.com/. Previously known as the We We test, it balances the number of self-oriented ‘we’ words against the number of customer-focused ‘you’ words on your site. I’ve found it to be a surprisingly accurate predictor of a website’s effectiveness. It doesn’t work on all sites but give it a go.
Examples of valuable, trust-building websites
To show you what’s possible, here are a few website examples from organisations big and small scoring strongly on digital trustworthiness.
Notice how they demonstrate empathy and low self-orientation: much more You, You, You than We, We, We in tone.
You’ll find plenty of credibility-building social proof on these sites - stories and testimonials - all regularly updated. No tumbleweed, and plenty of signs of life and humanity too!
Newfangled: www.newfangled.com
UiPath: www.uipath.com
Dr Helen McCarthy, The Appetite Doctor: theappetitedoctor.co.uk
Arup: www.arup.com
The Co-Foundry: thecofoundry.co.uk
Community Organisers: www.corganisers.org.uk
How trustworthy is your website?
I use the Trust Equation in my work to help me assess and score the effectiveness of an existing website and to help shape a better content strategy for my clients. You can use it to assess how well your website is performing and to help you improve your site too.
Credibility, reliability, intimacy, self-orientation - where do the strengths and weaknesses lie when it comes to the trustworthiness of your site? How can you address any weaknesses so that your business is loved and trusted?
PS: If you’d like a copy of my Website Trust Assessment Questionnaire, send me an email: sonja@valuablecontent.co.uk.