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Posted on 21st May 2018

Secure Privacy For E-Businesses (Part 2) Boosting Consumer Trust

Boosting Consumer Trust

In Part 1 of this blog, we looked at the role consumer trust plays in e-commerce. We saw how CEOs need to adapt fast and view privacy risk in the same way that consumers do. By doing so, you’ll avoid incurring hefty GDPR fines and you’ll also gain a competitive advantage over rivals.

Privacy protection is win-win for businesses. It’s an opportunity you can’t afford to miss. In this post, we’ll look at some practical ways to safeguard your company from a ruinous data breach whilst increasing your revenue. These ways consist of tips to enhance and secure your company website. This section is more hands-on and involves rolling up your web designer sleeves. In Part 3 we’ll return to a softer focus by looking at some corporate strategies on data privacy.

For now, let’s concentrate on the website. Everybody in business needs a web presence, from lawn mower manufacturers to landscape gardeners. Some companies manage with a social media presence, but for most, a website is the preferred platform.

Here’s six ways to boost consumer trust through your company website:

1. Practical, Easy-to-Use Design

If you have a budding Salvador Dali leading your web team, you may need to restrain him. Artistic licence is fine, but it doesn't always translate into profits. Your website should be plain, uncluttered and simple. Customers should be able to find the products they want with ease. They need to process their transaction without feeling like they're faced with cracking the da Vinci code. 

Use colours easy on the eye which set off your text well. Don't festoon your site with useless accessories and other dross. Text should be concise, readable, with clear product descriptions and delivery terms. Customers should be able to navigate the site without frustration. That includes the site having pages which load quickly.

Design your site so it’s clear and a joy to use. You'll gain repeat customers and the transparency will reflect on your brand, inspiring loyalty and trust.

2. Real Humans Not Robots

Unless you're selling to robots, give your website a human touch. Online customers like dealing with their own breed, humans.

Add full contact details to your Contact Us page, or better, on the home page. Enquiries@xyz.com does not inspire confidence. John.doe@xzy.com is far better. Anonymous email addresses breed mistrust. Customers may wonder what you have to hide. Include phone numbers too. After all, if you're hauling in the customer’s personal data, it's only fair you offer a little yourself in return.

Don't be shy with contact details. Include a Google map locating your premises. All this helps build a picture of a real, ethical business staffed by humans.

In the same vein, if you've installed a live chat service for your customers, make sure it’s always manned, at least during business hours.

Use a friendly tone of voice in all your site content. This reassures new visitors and helps build an effective brand.

An About Us page with photos of your staff and a few details about their personal interests doesn't hurt either in the quest to humanise your website. Robots don't have hobbies as a rule.

The key guideline for website presentation is “Don't be a stranger.” After all who trusts strangers with their money and their data?

3. No ‘Ye Olde’ Blogs or Fake Reviews

Blogs are great for driving Google traffic to your website, provided the content is fresh, relevant and not plagiarised. From a trust perspective, little demoralises a visitor more than when the latest blog is dated 2008. This implies the website has not been updated in years and was designed with Microsoft FrontPage. Visitors may assume you’ll put only about as much effort in fulfilling their order.

Don't forget to blow the dust off your blog section from time to time. Add fresh content every week, if possible, and always make sure it’s dated. That way, visitors know you're still in business. They’ll be more likely to trust you with their order and view you as an expert in your field.

Reviews should be current too as their value will diminish with time. A BrightLocal survey last year found that 85% of consumers rate online reviews as trustworthy as word-of-mouth. They will also read an average of seven reviews before they trust a business enough to use them.

Authenticity of reviews is as important as quantity. Fake or affiliated reviews can often be spotted and will turn visitors away from your site. Nothing but good reviews whiffs at duplicity. Most people are more likely to trust your company if they find a smattering of bad reviews mixed in with the good. It’s preferable if the good reviews outnumber the bad ones, but nobody expects any company to be perfect. Most visitors work for companies themselves and will have encountered complainants.

4. Stamped with the Seal You Can Trust

Loyalty to a company's website, the standard bearer of its brand, is proportional to a customer’s level of trust. Adding trust badges and SSL certificates proves to your customers you're serious about privacy.

Trust badges are third party assurances that the company behind the website is legitimate. They differ from SSL certificates, which prove the site has a secure, encrypted connection between browser and web server.

A 2013 study by the Baynard Institute looked at the commerce seals perceived to offer the most security and reassurance among web users.  Results showed the most trusted SSL certificates are those represented by the Norton and McAfee seals. These seals show that the website is more likely to be free from hackers, viruses and malware. Two other much respected trust badges are the distinctive green TRUSTe badge and the BBB badge.

The commerce seals given above are recognised by most web users even if their precise meanings are not so well known. You should also find a trust badge which applies to your niche market. This may involve research but the potential gains in revenue are well worth it.

Commerce seals should be prominently displayed in the payments section where they reassure the customer the most.

5. Plain Privacy

Anyone who buys something from your website will have to share their data. To maintain a loyal customer base, make sure you have an ethical and transparent best practice for data collection.

Your privacy policy, these days mandatory for all websites, will communicate this best practice to the visitor. Compliance with the GDPR requires that this privacy policy is written in clear, concise language and not arcane legalese. Dispense with the standard fine print and use a large font instead. You can link to the full set of terms and conditions, but the core principles of your privacy policy should be clearly shown on your home page. 

One of the first actions a visitor to your site will do is inform themselves about your privacy policy. Awareness should precede any sharing of data. If you think of your privacy policy as a marketing tool to gain competitive advantage, then it makes sense to show it as prominently as your products.

Drawing up a privacy policy needn’t be an uninspiring activity. Your text can be as creative as your sales copy. Just ensure you explain the following:

  • What types of personal data you collect, and why;
  • How and where the data is stored and what steps are taken to protect it from a security breach;
  • How visitors can opt in and out of sharing their data;
  • Whether data is shared with or sold to 3rd party data processors (who must also comply with GDPR);
  • How consumers gain from the collection and analysis of their personal data.

One other point: if you update your privacy policy email your existing customer base notification of the changes.

6. Transparent Transactions

Site user actions which are both transparent and safe are vital if you wish to maintain consumer trust and protect your brand reputation. All visitors will complete actions on your site which may involve sharing their personal data, wittingly or not. This is the case even if they leave straight away.

Even before GDPR, there has been a legal obligation to warn about tracking cookies on websites. GDPR extends this legal need for authentication. Have your web designer set up an automated system which asks for consent at key stages of a process. This level of permissions is essential for compliance with GDPR. A payment transaction is a key example of a process where several permissions are needed.

Always state the reasons for collecting data and never collect data that isn’t needed. Data must never be exposed at any point, but encrypted from processing to storage.

Collection of data through authentication processes is only one side of the Bitcoin. Identification and authorisation of your visitors protects your customer base from fraudsters and hackers. Unauthorised users can dilute the marketing value of your customer base and cost you money in charge-backs. If your servers suffer a data breach, and a hacker cops off with your customers’ data, charge-backs will be the least of your worries. The only server on your radar will be the one serving you that class action lawsuit.

Keep your stored data secure and impenetrable. Get your data security systems verified by a third party team of experts. Deep clean your customer base often to remove unauthorised users. Tell your customers who secures your data, and whether it’s stored in the cloud or in a data centre. 

Be upfront with your customers about your data security systems. Draw up an effective and transparent privacy policy. Put a human face on your website while ensuring a pleasant user experience. Add relevant commerce seals and regular blogs and reviews. If you do all this, you will build consumer trust in your company and expand your customer base.

For more on this subject, check out these blog posts: