Trust-building is a secret weapon of any start-up, but you may have to face many challenges. You must be patient and consistent with start-up challenges.
From hiring decisions to locating headquarters, and securing your business, make all the decisions wisely. The major decisions you take in the start-ups can have immediate and long-term effects.
Trust in the foundation of all relationships; it might seem hard to build at the start. But, when your customers trust you, they are more likely to buy your products or services. After earning their trust, you can command a higher price and boost every customer’s lifetime value.
You cannot make your customers trust you overnight. It is a process in which you must remain consistent, understand your buyer behavior, and deliver what you promise over time.
Here I will discuss some ultimate strategies by which start-ups can earn customer trust easily.
1. Transparent business model
To incorporate trust into your business, you need a transparent business model where everything is clear, like water. It is prolific in many other ways, as it allows the early adopters to provide input and feedback. That’s how you will be able to meet the expectations and requirements of your customers.
For instance: Try the systematic online surveys to ask a couple of questions to your customers. It can be, how can we serve you best? Or how will you rate our services or products? It will help to fill the void between the customers and the startups.
When you show concern to your customers, they will trust you and your products. Moreover, you can also determine how to benefit your customers, which feature or product is more suitable for them, what product or service is in demand, etc.
Try these surveys or small questionnaires to find useful information and strengthen your relationship with your customers by knowing them more.
2. Be accessible to your customers
Always create the environment of your business in which your customer can easily reach you. Be available 24/7 and allow them to interact with you in a friendly way.
For example: If your customer has questions about your brand or services, but you are not there to answer them, they might lose interest. They will find another relevant company to buy anything or to get the answers to their questions. In this way, you will lose credibility and customer trust.
Make sure to be available for them on social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram. These are the platforms where your customers will try to connect with you. Also, if you have business emails, keep checking them to provide your customer with timely support.
There are a few more practical ways to make yourself available to your customers. Build a blog on your website and share content that your readers want to read. Let them find the problems, and solutions through your content. Try to create engaging content that converts and drive leads. You can also try brand awareness campaigns. You can advertise them online or offline according to your startup needs. Moreover, online communities and events may also help to increase your accessibility and business credibility.
3. Offer reliable products or services
Quality is always the priority when you are offering products and services. Offer reliable products to achieve the goals of returning buyers. People emotionally attach to your business if you offer them the exact thing they are looking for. It is because people tend to buy emotion, not logic.
Your startup may face challenges when your product arrives in the market. Offer a reliable product so that your customer will be impressed by your product’s quality to justify their purchase.
With the best product, you will be able to earn customer trust and good reviews. While on the other end, when you sell a low-quality product, you might be successful in selling it once, but your customer won’t trust you. Also, it will draw negative reviews that will decrease the credibility of your business in the market.
To ensure the quality of your product, put it through a continuous testing process. Also, involve your audience to ask what they are expecting and what are their needs? Or what type of product will solve their issues?
Likewise, if you are offering any service, please satisfy your client by answering their queries, so they would trust you and don’t be hesitant to make a buying decision.
4. Offer free products at start
Offering free products at the start is a strong way to influence them to become loyal. It is because offering something for free is appealing. They see it as a risk-free interaction to get free products in exchange for an email or testing/review purposes.
For example: If you are integrating a new product and giveaway for free to some limited number of people, you can make other audiences trust your business. Plus, if your product is best, they will surely leave some positive feedback, and it will aid in generating more sales.
You can use a lead magnet on your website to get the subscriptions by giving them something valuable in exchange for their email. It can be an e-book, guide, limited access to some services or premium courses, etc.
When you can grab your targeted customers’ emails, you can send them offers and discounts to delight them. The email marketing strategy will help you to build goodwill and make your customers trust you easily.
5. Always put your customer first
The success secret of any startup is hidden in bringing value to their customer. Between the revenue and customers, always put your customer first. Your customer is wise; they know when you are just seeing them as a dollar sign or giving them value.
Valuing your customers is easy; you just have to sell them products that solve their challenges. It will build a long-term relationship and encourage returning buyers.
Moreover, when you value your customers, they prefer to buy products from you instead of buying from other random sellers. You can find some interesting email newsletter in your email inbox, where businesses send value-adding emails to gain customers’ trust.
6. Maintain consistency
A consistent brand helps to increase the value of a company by reinforcing its position in the market. When you maintain consistency in the startup, your customers will know what to expect from you. You can set internal and external goals to maintain service quality.
Also, when you are consistent, you can attract better customers with higher retention rates that raise your products’ value.
Consistency includes the following steps:
- Your brand identity: Create a credible image of your brand/business across your social platforms, logo, websites, print materials, or any other marketing campaigns. Work on your business identity at the start because you are going to get stuck with that. It is an easy win that will help you to earn customer trust.
- Your business message: Your business message is the extension of your actions and behaviors. The overall tone of your brand or business also affects your message. In your message, your message helps you to position better in the market. Try to focus on the image of your business; you developed at the start.
- Focus on what you deliver: How you communicate with your audience and how often you communicate matters a lot. Knowing your audience will help you to deliver what they are expecting. Write attractive posts on social media and lure them with iconic images.
7. Provide excellent customer support
Businesses, especially startups, need excellent customer care service to respond to all customer concerns. It is vital to respond to customer issues and queries as soon as possible.
Handling the customer’s problems effectively can help you to grow your business. When you care about your customer and show them that you care, they turn into loyal customers.
Though it is quite challenging for startups to provide great customer care, you can consider outsourcing your staff if you are short on the house’s staff. If your startup includes websites, integrate live chat, and social media to better interaction.
Furthermore, it works on the contact forms as many customers try to reach out by these forms. It will help to get customer feedback and issues.
Final Note
We have discussed all the possible solutions for startups to earn customer trust. Trust is a byproduct of commitment, excellence, and quality. If you can deliver the right products to the right people, they will trust you and your products.
You may face different challenges in startups. It can be a lack of experience, staff, or resources. You can overcome these disadvantages by following the steps above to build that trust. It will be rewarding when you overcome startup challenges.
Your business will grow by increased sales when you can earn your customer trust. The more you manage them to serve them, the more trustworthy you will become in the public eye.
