Building up your credibility on your website is an important part of making you stand out in a horde of faceless or sketchy websites out there. You want your users to trust you and your site.
Credibility
Having credibility isn’t something that just happens, especially if you are a new site or brand. Most people will trust companies Nike, LEGO or similar big brands, as they know a lot about them and have some relationship to them. This isn’t always the case for every brand, especially if they are smaller or more niche, then people may not have heard of them. We can’t all be Google.
So, building credibility for lesser known companies can be a bit harder as you can’t simply rely on word of mouth and need people who don’t have previous knowledge to know about you too.
We have gathered a few tips on how you make sure that your site becomes as trustworthy as possible, so you, hopefully, can get more users to use your site.
Security
One of the most important parts of having a trustworthy site is to have a secure site. You don’t want to interact or give information to a site if you suspect that they will then get hacked and other will suddenly have access to your information.
There are many ways to make sure that your site is more secure and most platforms, you use to build your site, usually have some level of protection against hackers and similar things, but they aren’t always enough and it might be a good idea to have additional security.
If you have a good hosting provider, then they might also additional security features, so it can be a good thing to have in mind when you are choosing a provider.
But it is a good idea to research security for your type of site, so you can know kinds of security you need and how to get it.
It is also important to note that security isn’t a onetime thing. It is an ongoing process that you need to keep an eye on. Keep yourself updated and regularly check-up on it.
You can’t a 100 % guarantee that your site will never have any issues, but there are definitely steps, you can take, to make it less likely.
Actions you can do to help this
There are a lot of extra measures you can take to keep up security. As previously mentioned, hosting providers can help you a lot with additional security, but you can also use a plugin. There are a lot of plugins out there to help you with security. Some are made to give you more security overall, while others help you with specific tasks or issues.
If you have a specific problem then there is probably a solution out there for you.
User experience
It is a good idea to have the user experience in mind, when building your site. But it is also important for the credibility of your site as the way that users’ experience and use your site greatly affect the way they view you and your site. If they struggle using it, that will build up frustration and that frustration will then be associated with you.
Making your site easy to navigate and understand can help you greatly. The users need to understand where to go and what to do, so you get your users to do what you want them to.
It is also important to get make your content easy to understand and make sure it contains all of the important information. Some things might be easy for you to understand, as you deal with these things a lot, but that is not always the case for your users.
You should also keep your target audience in mind, as communication might look different depending on who you are talking to. If you are talking to professionals or beginners in a field it won’t look the same and maybe you need two different versions of a page to the different audiences.
Actions you can do to help this
It is always important to think about how your users would experience your site. So, always take time to go through your website and look at it as a user would. What works and what doesn’t? Is everything that needs explaining explained properly?
You can look for:
- Navigation: Is it easy to find the different things that people need to find?
- Understanding: Is the content easy to understand and are you using enough keyword from the topic?
- Functionality: Does the features you have places, like links, images, videos etc. work the way you need them to?
Have other people you know go through, it works best if they aren’t familiar with your field, so they have a fresh pair of eyes or if they are in your target audience, and then have them give you feedback.
If you are still unsure then you can look at what other people in your field does and what you think might work for you as well.
Build your ethos
Building your ethos is crucial for getting people to trust your words. If you don’t already have an established level of trust in you and your brand, then you might need other people’s words to vouch for you.
This can be establishing connections with other trusted sources or companies that have some level of recognition in the industry. This can be that you use a specific company for part of your process, that you have a certification in something or a partnership with someone.
You can also include reviews from your users and customers, as other people are more likely to trust you if other people like them have a good experience. Trustpilot is always good for this as it is a trusted review source. It is also important to not delete bad or medium reviews, on sites like Trustpilot, but instead just respond, explain or offer to help these users. T hat gives you more points than if it gets out that you delete your negative reviews.
Having third parties vouch for you is a good way to build credibility as the more people, who can say something is right or good, the more people are likely to listen.
Actions you can do to help this
It is good to think about what would be relevant for you, your website and industry. Is there a specific third party whose approval is important in your industry? Do customer reviews make sense for you? Would it be a good idea to include different types of reviews both for the company or for the products?
If users don’t naturally give you reviews, then it is possible for you to reach out to them. Are there people who have bought something from you or used your services? Send an email, it can be a very standard one or a more personal one to ask them to review you. The closer you work with people the more personal the mail can be.
It is also a good idea to look into what trusted third parties there are in your field and look for ways to use them and make that work for you on your site.
Transparency with purpose and prices
The best way to make people buy what you are selling is to be transparent, so they can make an informed decision about your products or services. This means that you need to include the important information about your products/services and the conditions of purchase, like price.
Making sure that information is readily available makes it easy to make a decision and makes you look trustworthy as you aren’t hiding things.
It can also be something like including information about you and your business, to show what drives you. Show them why you are doing what you are doing, as this is a good way to build a connection between you and your users as they get to know you.
Actions you can do to help this
One way to tell people about yourself and your business is to include an ‘about’ page for your site, so people know where to look when they want to know more about you.
On products and services it is important to include instructions, conditions and other important information about the product/service too. You can also include alternative information, other than text, like images, prices, reviews or ingredient lists to provide more information.
Create presence
Creating a presence on your site is a good way to make it clear that there is an actual person behind the website.
This presence can be something like including a support page on your site, so that people have a way to contact you if they need to. It is important to have a way for your users to voice their opinions, complaints and questions directly to you.
This shows that you value the opinion and experiences of the people, who uses your site. It can also be doing something like showing activity on your site, like a blog, updates, cases or something similar. This shows that you are active in the business and that it is alive and still active, which is a good message to send to your users.
You can also create this presence on social media. Then link together the social media and your website, so there is a cleat route from one to another.
Design
The design is an crucial part of a good website. The look of the website is the most important impression to the users. It is hard to focus on the other content on your site if the design is confusing.
To make a site look credible it needs to look professional for the industry you are part of. It also needs to fit with your brand and your message.
Keeping a cohesive theme across is a good way to make it look professional.
Actions you can do to help this
One way to achieve this is by using a professional looking theme to create this cohesiveness and make it easy for you.
It is also a good idea to make sure that your site is coded right, so that all features on your site works the way it is supposed to as this is equally as important a part of a site looking professional.
Make you real
There is a person behind your website and that is important to show. Making it clear, that there are something behind the screen that is tangible.
Actions you can do to help this
This can be something like including pictures of the people working for the business or just of you.
It is also important to include things like, phone number, address and important information that prove that you are a real business, so that people have information to look up. A phone number is also a good way for people to be able to have a direct line of communication, so even if they don’t end up using it they know you are available.
Conclusion
There are many ways to build up your credibility and choosing a variety of the above mentioned that fit with you website or business is a good start to build up your userbase and get people to trust you, your website and your business. Selling products or services online or simply having people interact with your content requires a lot of trust between the user and you, so it is a good idea to start building your credibility now.