The Zero Moment of Truth and how to influence it

One of the biggest reasons online businesses go under is because they fail to position their business as a trusted authority — to instil a sense of security in the buyer.

Think about it.

They've landed on your page. Big tick for you.

They want to buy your product. Another big tick.

But just as they're about to push the ‘Buy' button, they stop. They pause, fingers hovering over the mouse. At that precise moment, which Google has termed the ZMOT (Zero Moment of Truth), your site's positioning — its credibility — is being weighed up. In the blink of an eye, everything they've ever heard, seen or experienced about your brand comes zooming into their brain like a tsunami and when it ebbs away, equally rapidly, it leaves its detritus: an impression, a feeling, that is staggering in its simplicity. It's either, ‘Yes, we trust you' or ‘No, we don't'.

Let's clarify what we're asking customers to do here: we're asking them to give us the most cherished piece of data they possess — their credit-card details — to a stranger ‘in the cloud' in the hope that we are who we say we are. To people like my dad, it's akin to signing a blank cheque, giving it to a stranger and saying, ‘Just fill in the missing bits and bank it'. It's no wonder some online businesses go under; they fail to realise the gravitas of what they are asking their customers to do at that final moment of purchase.

Think about your site from your customers' point of view. Objectively. Dispassionately. Would you buy from it? Would you trust you?

How to build trust and minimise risk

So the real question for all online entrepreneurs is, ‘How can we build trust in our sites so that people from around the world (or just around the corner) feel comfortable buying from us?' The good news is there are lots of ways to achieve this. Most are inexpensive, within your control and can be achieved quite quickly.

Sure, as you'll discover, creating trust is all a bit of ‘smoke and mirrors', but perception is everything in online business and although in isolation these strategies seem quite basic, the sum of each is much greater than the parts. Each piece becomes yet another brick in your ‘wall of trust'.

On-page factors also have a massive impact on whether the shopper completes their purchase.

‘More people abandon their purchase at the check-out page than at any other time on the site,' says Phil Leahy, founder of the online retailing industry's premiere event, Internet Conference (www.internetconference.com.au), and a former powerseller on eBay.

It doesn't take much to put people off; a slow-loading page, onerous terms and conditions, a request to log in and create a password. All these reduce the credibility factor, and therefore the conversion rate, so these risk factors need to be either eliminated altogether or addressed before the shopper gets to the check-out page.

So how is this ‘yes, we trust you/no, we don't' feeling created?

That's the province of consumer psychologists and cutting-edge behavioural science and although we'll truly never know what makes people buy what they do, there are proven strategies we can apply to our businesses that help increase the trust quotient and reduce the perceived risk of buying online.

What we do know for certain is that prior to the internet and social media, tracking the path to purchase and building trust was a whole lot easier.

Take a look at the limited number of touch points advertisers had to play with in the early 2000s to position a brand, build trust and drive sales:

• TV
• radio
• print (magazines)
• press (newspaper)
• PR
• direct mail
• direct sales.

Now compare this with the number of touch points advertisers have to play with now:

Is it any wonder recruitment agencies say the biggest demand for jobs is for data analysts? Anyone who can interpret the big data these sites throw up, and provide measureable insights about what's working and what's not, deserves the big bucks these jobs are paying.

Nine ways to increase your trust quotient

So how do you build trust and credibility for your online business? Believe it or not, you can manufacture trust. That sounds hypocritical, but it's not. All it means is that you don't have to wait for years to build a ‘trusted' brand. There are practical steps you can take to build credibility for your company and in particular, your website, which will encourage people to entrust you with their credit card details.

Let's have a look at each of these in detail.

The power of awards: $800 000 reasons to apply for them

One of the fastest ways to position your site as a trusted, credible business is to win, or even just apply for, an award.

I know a lot of offline entrepreneurs who steer clear of awards, averring them to be a ‘waste of time', a ‘wank', an ‘ego-building' exercise. But almost every online entrepreneur I interviewed believed passionately in the value of business awards and how they can absolutely affect the bottom line.

In fact, you don't have to win, or even become a finalist, to reap the benefits of said awards. You just have to be nominated. Can you nominate yourself? Sure you can, or get a friend to do it for you. No-one has to know you nominated yourself. If you feel uncomfortable, get your mum to do it. Like I said, smoke and mirrors.

I once nominated my friend for Australian of the Year. He didn't win, but now he can say on his website, ‘Nominated for Australian of the Year'. Is it true? Yes. Does it help build trust? Sure does. Will it create a sale? Not necessarily. Awards and testimonials work best when the customer is ready to buy but just needs a little nudge in the right direction.

Tony Nash, co-founder of Booktopia, discovered that the placement of one award logo on his home page equated to an increase in revenue of more than $800 000 in one year. And he's got the proof to back it up.

As an online retailer we need to do everything we can to reduce the perceived risk of buying from us. So when we won the Telstra Business Award we put the logo of the award on the top, right-hand side of our site. But we wanted to test it to see if the logo made any difference. It did. A big difference. We conducted split testing where one version of the home page (with the award logo) gets served up and then another version of the page (without the logo) gets served up. It's called A/B testing and it's super easy to do — all you need is a bit of code and you can test and measure a variety of elements.

Well, after two weeks the results were clear. The page with the logo generated an extra 2 per cent in sales compared to the page without the logo. This may not sound like a lot, but on our turnover of $40 million, that translates to more than $800 000 in sales in one year!

Not a bad return for putting a logo on your home page. Who says awards don't make a difference to the bottom line?

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... we wanted to test it to see if the logo made any difference. It did. A big difference.

Tony Nash

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Kate Morris found awards immensely helpful in all sorts of ways. One of Kate's major challenges in getting her online business, Adore Beauty, off the ground was the unwillingness of major beauty brands to come on board as suppliers. But without the premium players, she knew her site would not cut it as the ‘go to' site for the world's best brands.

Awards really build credibility. Not just with your customers, but also with your strategic partners, so for us it was a big deal with the brands we wanted to work with. Certainly people do return your emails when you have the Telstra Business Women's Awards logo in your email signature! Personally, I am part of the Adore Beauty brand and we do use me a lot as the face of the brand, so as a brand-building exercise it was really important. It's great PR too.

Shoes of Prey's Jodie Fox had other reasons for applying for awards.

They're important because, as an entrepreneur, you can lose sight of the successes you have along the way. Awards help you see what you're achieving and they help our team see their part in the success of the company. We have a team of 75 people around the globe and it's important for us to stop and say, ‘Hey, you guys are doing an amazing job', because they are. It's pretty important to the culture of a team.

In addition to promoting your award on your site, you'll also get a big brownie point from Google if you win or get nominated. When I searched online for information on one of my interviewees, Simon Griffiths, founder of the online social enterprise Who Gives a Crap, the award sites mentioning him were often ranked higher than his own sites. This ‘earned media' is the holy grail of trust and credibility. Simon didn't have to work too hard to prove his credibility. The award nomination did it for him.

Social media and why people don't trust advertising anymore

People often refer to social media as word-of-mouth on steroids. And they're right. How else can one post, one comment, one thought-bubble be transmitted to millions of people around the world in a millisecond? In 25 years of working in marketing, I have never seen anything as transformational as social media.

Everyone in the advertising agency game is feeling the heat. Why? Because advertising's once unchallenged power to shape public opinion and influence the purchase decision has been severely challenged. Yes, advertising is still relevant. Yes, it still works. But these days, you need a lot of green stuff to throw at it to make a ripple.

And in any case, for the thousands of 20-something-year-old start-up entrepreneurs working out of the spare room at their parents' house, finding a lazy $1 million to spend on a TV campaign to create awareness for their new killer app is just a tad outside their reach.

Fysh Rutherford, co-founder and creative director of the very successful t20 digital and social advertising agency, an elder statesmen of the advertising industry and a funny, wise old geezer to boot, said this to me a while back.

Fysh: Bernie, when I write an advertisement for the paper, I have to be more thorough, more honest and more truthful than any other person in the communications game, including politicians, PR agents and promoters. It's a pain.

Bernadette: What do you mean, Fysh?

Fysh: Look at it this way. In PR and social media I can pretty much say what I like because it's a personal comment — an opinion — and no-one's going to go and fact-check a personal opinion. But an ad? Watch the competitors crawl all over it, looking for even a hint of untruth, a stretched idea, a glimmer of exaggeration. We have to be more careful with what we say, and be more exacting than practically any other communications professional.

Note: Sure, the law around social media is catching up and owners of all social-media channels are responsible for the truth and accuracy of what comes up, but from what I can see, the watchdog that is the ACCC has yet to formulate and apply the tough consumer protection laws that all advertisers must adhere to in the mainstream media.

Why PR now works better than paid advertising

Harry M. Miller, the former theatrical agent and celebrity promoter always maintained: ‘If you want to be famous, get your photo in the paper!'

Simple advice, and although it was dispensed to me more than 20 years ago, it still remains true.

Despite me bleating on about the demise of the printed metropolitan newspapers, there's no question their editorial content still holds enormous power to sway public opinion. Shock jocks and breakfast TV shows, still use the papers as the number-one source of content for their shows, simply because they represent what most people consumed as news that day, and we all know that shock jocks have the power to set the public agenda. So, the newspaper still matters.

Now that they're running on the smell of an oily rag, in some ways it should be easier to get your media release seen, especially if you write a good story and help the journalist find the angle. Here's how one positive news story in The Age newspaper helped sell out my copywriting courses for months on end.

The devil is in the detail: why contact details are so important

Tony Nash recalls the early days of Booktopia.

The phone would ring. ‘Hello, this is Tony from Booktopia. How can I help you?' They'd say, ‘No, it's okay. I just wanted to see if you were real'. And they'd hang up!

People like to know there's someone behind the computer. That's so important, even these days when it's commonplace to buy online without needing to speak to a real person. I often find prospects of my copywriting course ring up just before they push the ‘Buy' button to ask a final question, just to check if we're ‘real'. For the most part, however, if you haven't convinced them of your credibility prior to that, they won't even bother contacting you via phone or email.

Phil Leahy, founder of The Internet Conference, explains it this way.

Online business is about trust and you have to do everything you can to build up that sense of trust. You have to have a phone number on the site. You have to have a physical address or at least a PO box. You have to have an email address. You have to have lots of photos showing the product, and if you're a service, a photo of you, and if relevant, your staff. You have to have a generous returns policy. You have to have a money-back guarantee. These things all used to be ‘optional'; in fact, lots of online retailers prided themselves on not providing any of these. Times have changed. Without these basic components, no-one will buy from you. And of course video is the best way to demonstrate your credibility.

Note: Beware, of course, that anyone at any time can look up your place of business on Google Maps. Only list your street address if it is safe to do so. Personal safety always trumps commercial considerations.

Photos and product descriptions

Dean Ramler, co-founder of the online designer furniture company Milan Direct, invests heavily in 360-degree photography, for credibility reasons.

We need to show people exactly what our products look like from every angle. And we are very particular and spend a lot of time writing great content that describes our products in detail.

Photography like that is not cheap, but Dean knows he's in the visual business and without accurate representations of what the product looks like, it can cause massive headaches for everyone: the customer, because it arrives and it's not what they want, and himself, because he has to manage a disgruntled customer and the return.

Brian Shanahan, co-founder of the homewares site Temple & Webster, concurs with Dean. His photography is lush and stylish, but it needs to be, he says.

We're a shopping experience that inspires and excites through curation, strong visual styling and stunning photography. Online you can only shop with your eyes, and great imagery and editorial is everything.

Someone who isn't that concerned about 360-degree photography is Stephanie Alexander. I asked her how important photography was in showcasing the recipes for her Cook's Companion app. Thinking her answer would be ‘very', I was surprised by her response.

I think that for what we do, when the image will generally only be seen on a tablet or a mobile device, we needn't have invested in photography the way we did. It was expensive and I don't think, in hindsight, it was justified.

‘Borrowing' other company's logos: the fast-track method for building trust

Unlike millions of people around the world, I still read the newspaper. The hardcopy kind. Call me old fashioned but I still love it. The thud as it lands in a puddle on my front lawn; the challenge of unravelling the plastic wrap without tearing my hair out in frustration (am I the only one who struggles with this?); the thrill of discovering what treats the editor has curated for me. I occasionally check out breaking news online to get up-to-date feeds on topics of interest, but I really love the ritual of reading the paper, in bed, with my two slices of Vegemite toast and a steaming mug of hot coffee. Simple pleasures.

One morning, as I was spilling coffee and dropping crumbs onto the bed, I saw an advertisement for a course on ‘how to massage your baby'. Apparently, you need a certificate to do it these days. As I read on, I noticed the course was endorsed by the Royal Children's Hospital (RCH). Hang on a tic! That sounds weird. Since when did the RCH endorse baby massage courses? Hospitals rarely endorse things like that. ‘Sounds a bit dodgy to me,' I thought.

So I looked closer and, as I expected, the RCH did not indeed endorse it. What the RCH is in fact doing is renting the venue to the course provider, like any hotel or function centre would, and the course organisers are using the hospital venue as a major selling point to add credibility to their offering. Nice one, baby massage people!

I'm not suggesting for a moment that this is unethical or illegal. In fact, I applaud the baby massage people for their lateral thinking. What they have successfully done by choosing this venue for their course is ‘borrowed' the RCH brand to effectively ‘endorse' their course, adding enormous credibility to their course in the process.

Now, this strategy of ‘borrowing' credibility can work for online and offline businesses, but it works particularly well with online businesses in the educational, medical, real estate and financial industries where credibility is everything and options to demonstrate that credibility are limited, especially if you're a start-up.

The power of testimonials: I'll have what she's having

‘Getting testimonials from existing customers is one of the easiest and most effective ways to build trust,' says Mark Middo, author of 5 Minute Business.

Bernadette: So how do you get testimonials?

Mark: It's quite simple. By asking for them.

Massive tip. Thanks Mark. But he did have more to add.

You'd be surprised how many times people let really happy, satisfied customers go without asking them for a testimonial. Sure, it's confronting to ask someone what they think about you, but once you get over that initial fear, and you get a glowing testimonial, that one testimonial could mean the difference between a future sale and a non-sale. It's worth overcoming the fear to ask for it.

Bernadette: But what if you can't get over that fear, Mark? What if you're just not sure if they like you or not?' I asked.

Mark: If you're uncomfortable asking in person, email them a survey after the transaction and ask for it then, or if you're really cowardly, ask for it via LinkedIn. If you're seriously shy, ask your administrative assistant (my tip: if you don't have a PA, ask your mum!) to send the email so that you don't have to have any contact with them at all. The wording might be: ‘Hi John, I was hoping that you might be able to jot down a few words outlining your recent experience with the company. Would that be okay with you? If so, the areas I'd like you to cover include our customer service, our responsiveness and the quality of our content …'

Bernadette: Is this the coward's way out of getting a testimonial?

Mark: Overcoming the fear to ask for testimonials is a small price to pay for the long-term value and revenue they can generate for your business.

If you have the chance, film the testimonial. Everyone knows you can fake a written testimonial, but videoed testimonials are hard to manufacture. They demonstrate in real time, in people's own voices the value that you offer.

If you ask the right questions, testimonials practically write themselves.

When the best service is no customer service at all

In the early days of online business (which wasn't that long ago), people were attracted to internet endeavours because it gave them a chance to (a) work from home (a big attraction for introverts) and (b) not speak to anyone (a big attraction for socially awkward types with strange obsessions with their mother and/or cats).

As such, technology enabled them to have the freedom to be themselves and still make money without having to engage with the outside world. Hurrah. Happy days.

The trouble was, this aversion to any contact extended to their customer-service policy too.

Call me old fashioned, but when I buy something and it breaks, or doesn't work, or is just a plain rip-off, I tend to want to speak to someone about getting it fixed. But could you get in touch with these people after the sale? Forget it. No email address. No street address. No phone number. No nothing. Try getting a response, let alone a refund! It was enough to make you cry. And on more than one occasion I did, as I got ripped off yet again with a dodgy American educational product that promised the world but delivered a pathetic PDF file. And it was one of the reasons Australians took their time becoming comfortable with online shopping. It was just too damn risky!

But now? Oh, how the tides have turned. Australian online retailers are setting the standard for customer service everywhere.

Shaun O'Brien, founder of the online eBay store Selby Acoustics is one of them.

Certainly six or seven years ago, everyone was getting online because they didn't want to deal with the customer. But now, you have to embrace customer service as an opportunity, whether it be a complaint or just an enquiry. My opinion on service is you need to do everything that you would do to a person if they were standing in front of you, but you've got to do it better because it's harder to communicate, especially as emails can get taken out of context.

I always say the best service is no service at all. A customer should be able to go onto the site, find out the information they want, order the product, get what they want quickly and have no problem with it. That's the best service you can provide.

So how can an online entrepreneur provide great customer service?

The first thing you have to get right is your product sourcing. If you get that and the quality of the product right you won't have any service problems.

And then you have to make sure your descriptions and information pages are easy to read and understand, so that people can understand what the product does; when there's no information missing, customers don't have to ask questions.

We do about two thousand transactions a week at the moment so that's about one hundred thousand transactions a year; but because our FAQ is so comprehensive, most customer questions are dealt with via the FAQ, which means we only need a person and a half in our customer service section to deal with any queries. It's a very cost-efficient way of doing business.

Money-back guarantee

This is a no-brainer. If you sell anything online (or offline for that matter), you must offer a 100 per cent, money-back guarantee. Don't worry, only a fraction of people will take it up (unless you've got a dreadful product) and the number of people who actually buy because of the money-back guarantee will more than make up for those lousy, stinking no-hopers who do come trudging back looking for a refund.

Like awards and testimonials, a money-back guarantee won't make people buy something they don't want, but it will help them overcome those last-minute jitters whenever they press the ‘Buy' button.

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Trust is without doubt the most important ingredient in any online success story. As you have seen, the entrepreneurs I interviewed invested heavily in creating it so that their customers would feel comfortable buying from them online.

If you don't have any customers yet, focus on how you can ‘borrow' credibility by using industry association logos or attaching your product to other reputable organisations until you do get some customers.

Trust is an accumulation of a dozen or more different elements, such as winning awards, showcasing testimonials, providing photos of the products, offering contact details and being fast to respond, making sure your website has detailed FAQs that answer all the questions people are asking, providing free shipping (if you can), making refunds easy to process and offering an iron-clad money-back guarantee.

In isolation, each may not seem like much, but combined, they accrue to become a powerful testament to you being considered a trusted authority — the ultimate aim for any online business.