How to Win the Trust of Online Customers

As I say in 8 Rules for a Successful Ecommerce Site, if you want people to buy products or services from your website, you have to win their trust and persuade them that your company is the kind of company they want to do business with.

Mary Bowling expands on this theme in Establishing Trust in Your Local Business (ClickZ). Some of her suggestions for ways to win the trust of online customers include:

• displaying symbols of the commerce, community, professional, and trade organizations to which you belong;
• showing friendly pictures of you and your staff;
• offering guarantees.

There are quite a few more in her article. One of the more interesting, I think, is her suggestion of producing video testimonials, showing real customers recommending your products. I hadn't thought of these, but I can see that they could be a lot more powerful than the standard text testimonials that so many websites have.

More on Selling Online

• 11 Ways to Sell Online Well
• 7 Tips for Selling on eBay
• 10 Ways to Increase eBay Holiday Sales