Selling Via Your Story – Build Trust & Rapport Etc.

On the landing page optimisation and website design side of our business we constantly get approached to do work for existing and potential customers and one thing that we notice is people expecting to make a sale instantly on their websites, they expect that a user will land, see the item that they want and then, if the price is right, buy it.

Online sales just isn’t that straight forward for most sites certain boxes have to be ticked in a user’s mind before they feel comfortable to make the commitment to buy, helping users do this is selling via your story.

People have never been more online savvy yet lazy, hence Amazon storming ahead with it’s easy to use service, you simply login, select what you want and checkout, you know that you can trust them, you’ll get what you order in a reasonable timescale (often next day!) for a fair postage and packing price, if you are uber lazy you can just use their “one click” ordering too! So what can you do as a merchant to help users make the buying decision?

You need to build trust and rapport with users, show them that you have the service or product they require, you are a real business, can be contacted, can deliver and have been delivering to others and that you can be trusted to deliver etc.

Below are our top tips for making the sale by telling your story.

1) Use strong brand Identity – Say who you are, don’t complicate things with whacky logo.

2) Be Contactable – Use prominent telephone numbers (freephone work better too!)

3)  Encourage Interaction – Use contact forms and “Call Me Back” boxes

4) Strong Call To Actions – Use call to actions that resonate with users, test often!

5) Use Value Propositions – Tell users what you can do for them (true value propositions are not quick to write, they take a lot of thought.

6)  Use Targeted Sub Headings – Extoll the benefit to users of your product or service

7) Build Trust Via 3rd Party Trust Indicators – Use social proof here, show all the people that you have worked with, let potential users bathe in your awesomeness!

8) Pre-empt Questions – Answer FAQ’s before they are asked, only a fraction of users will bother to email a question, most will buy somewhere else so pre-empt questions and answer them.

9) Use Video To Boost Profile And Integrity – Show any clips that count, industry, PR, TV segments etc.

10) Use Testimonials – Let others tell potential customers how awesome you are, ensure that they are genuine and believable, use full names where possible. Nothing builds trust faster than someone else saying how great you are!

11) Use Product Videos – Build trust and transparency with videos, show the product or service, if it’s a static product show it 360 degrees, show it next to an everyday object so customers can see the size of it. If you can’t use video use high quality pictures!

12) Trust Links – Ensure you have a privacy policy, Terms and Conditions, Who we are page etc. to build trust and show users you are a real business.

Additional Points :

The above example is landing page so the navigation is a little stripped back, contact us, about us pages would also help on a general site. On the contact page it’d be wise to have a map and even image of your building. About us pages feel more real when there are team photographs on them.

In closing, think about what a user would need to see to be comfortable to buy from you, go surfing, find sites you’d buy on and ones you wouldn’t, notice what the differences are and why, above all test and analyse the data and make your own decisions.