Some marketing formats carry more trust than others. These are the best ones to focus on because you’ve got a better chance of connecting with your audience and convincing them to learn more, buy a product and so on.
In the same breathe, you should steer clear of any highly untrustworthy methods because they’re not worth your money. Below, you shall see four of the best (and four of the worst) marketing tactics in terms of trust.
Most Trustworthy Forms Of Marketing
Starting with the most trustworthy forms of marketing, here are the four formats most consumers tend to prefer over anything else:
- Word-of-Mouth
- Customer Reviews
- OOH Advertising
- Micro Influencer Marketing
Word-of-Mouth
This will always be the most trusted form of marketing because people value what their close friends and family say above anyone else. If someone’s best friend recommends a service, they are far more likely to go ahead and try that service because they trust their opinion. It’s why most small businesses leverage word-of-mouth marketing during the startup process; it spreads the word, builds trust and is usually free.
Customer Reviews
Customer reviews are just a step down from word-of-mouth marketing. A review is basically someone recommending a product or service – the only difference is that the consumer doesn’t have a personal connection to that person. They’re trusting a stranger instead of someone they know. Reviews always carry a lot of weight, and businesses should invest in trying to generate as many reviews as possible.
OOH Advertising
Out-of-home advertising is a surprisingly trustworthy marketing format. Why? Because consumers believe a brand has legitimacy if they see a billboard advert for it in their local area. It seems impossible to imagine an illegitimate company having the money or resources for this type of marketing. As detailed by Billboard Marketing, a whopping 61% of adults trust this type of advertising – and 46% go on to visit the brand’s website.
Micro Influencer Marketing
This is where things get interesting. If you’ve scanned ahead, you’ll notice that another form of influencer marketing is in the least trustworthy section. How can influencer marketing end up as both trustworthy and untrustworthy? Well, it depends on the type of influencers a company works with.
Micro influencer marketing is best described as working with an influencer who has between 10,000 and 100,000 followers. They’re seen as the most trustworthy group because they don’t have the almost-celeb status of major influencers, yet have a loyal selection of followers. Their lack of sizes makes them appear more trustworthy to followers, and the influencer is well aware of that. As such, when a micro influencer promotes something, people tend to listen and trust what they have to say. It looks less like a money-grabbing situation and more like someone talking about a product/service they genuinely like.
Micro influencer marketing works because the influencer also has a niche audience. In turn, this limits what they can promote; they have to work with brands that appeal to their audience. It ends up being the perfect combination to build trust.
Least Trustworthy Forms Of Marketing
What do things look like on the other side of the spectrum? Truthfully, you could create a much longer list of untrustworthy marketing formats because consumers are very sceptical. But in the interest of being fair, here are the four worst forms of marketing:
- AI-Generated Content
- Cold Messaging
- Interrupting Adverts
- Mega Influencer Marketing
AI-Generated Content
Consumers don’t trust any form of content that is blatantly created by AI and not humans. A fascinating report by Getty Images showed the extent of this distrust:
- 98% of consumers believe that authentic images and videos are key in establishing trust
- 87% of consumers say it’s important for an image to be authentic and not AI-generated
People hate coming into contact with AI marketing content because there’s no heart or soul to it. It looks like an afterthought – and consumers have every right to doubt it. Why would someone trust a blog post or an advert that was made by AI instead of a human being? It fosters no connection to the company and looks like the business doesn’t care enough about its audience to put in any effort.
Cold Messaging
Cold calls, cold emails or cold social media DMs are all examples of this form of marketing. It’s one of the oldest out there – you may even get people turning up on your doorstep trying to sell you stuff. Cold messaging has never been trustworthy because it’s too direct and salesy. Nobody wants to be told that they should buy something; it’s a decision they want to come to by themselves.
Interrupting Adverts
Similarly, consumers dislike and distrust any type of advert that interrupts them. This could be an ad that pops up on a webpage while reading an article, or a video that starts playing when they’re watching YouTube.
Interrupting adverts get in your face and take you away from what you’re doing. They’re too invasive and overly promotion, which is why people don’t trust them.
Mega Influencer Marketing
A mega influencer is at the top of the influencer food chain. This means they have over 1 million followers, which is both a good and a bad thing. It’s good because you’ve got a much wider audience to promote your products/services to, which in theory means there’s a better chance of people actually going ahead and buying something.
It’s bad because consumers don’t trust mega influencers. They’re too big, and this means there’s no authenticity behind what they say. Consumers will never take the word of a mega influencer – they usually have less interaction with their audience and just don’t seem like they care as much as a micro influencer. That’s because someone with only 10,000 followers cares about losing followers if they advertise some rubbish stuff. Someone with over a million followers won’t care because they still have over a million followers!
If you’re looking to build trust with your audience and see improvements in lead generation and conversion, then focus on the most trustworthy forms of marketing. Avoid the rest because they usually result in a waste of money, time and resources.
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