Reasons to care about online security
The relationship with your customers is based on trust. That is why to strengthen the relationship and to increase customer loyalty, you must think strategically about how you will earn their trust. Below, we will give you some tips to implement in your business that will help you build customer trust online, receive payments and generate sales online.
Reliable e-commerce equals real business
To generate real trust in your customers, make sure that your business is reliable (or at least, that it appears to be so). Putting the logo, the images of the place, the team and the offices or products, are a guarantee of confidence for customers. Also, keep in mind that this data must be updated as much as possible. Regarding the design, it is also important that your website is as up to date as your social media, make sure to have a consistent image on all social profiles with the same logo, typography and colors according to your brand or business. This will help your customer identify you better and have no doubts that you are who you say you are when making purchases online.
Safety conveyed in design
Only a good design on your website can convey security to your customers. Imagine a website that uses low quality images, different typographies of different fonts, an unorganized home page full of information and clutter: a customer would never enter their bank or credit card information there. Having a simple website can improve your customers' shopping experience. You don't have to be an expert in design but you can simplify what you show on your website so that your customers feel at ease which will inspire customer confidence when making purchases. If you don't have good images, don't look for some low quality standards on Google, it is better to wait for your customers to generate content for you.
Furthermore, do not fill your website with unnecessary or confusing information and generate visual clutter for your customers. If you still cannot ensure a complete website, you can invite them to contact you by other means such as phone, email or WhatsApp, and offer them the information they need in a more personalized and reliable way.
Secure e-commerce: PCI DSS
A real online security guarantee that prevents online fraud, for example PCI DSS certificates, is necessary if you want to transact with credit cards or store customer data. This certificate is the most secure certificate on the online environment today, so companies that are PCI DSS certified are reliable. It is important to look at your business and industry to see what you can implement to make the online environment of your business the most reliable.
Keys to building online trust
Sometimes it may seem that we have a super clear idea of what our customers choose or what their preferences are, but often we have to simplify the processes, especially when they are online, because at the last step of they may abandon the cart and not finish the purchase process.
Diversity in methods of payment
If your business has the possibility to offer different payment methods, take the opportunity and learn about the configurations and tools that each payment method or gateway has to offer. Besides being much more convenient for your customers, you will get better and greater sales opportunities if you have different payment methods to offer to your customers. Flexibility in terms of payment possibilities, in addition to the online security that each of them has, simplifies the customer's decision process and is better at guaranteeing secure payments.
Errors yes, but only a few.
Some of the most common errors of an online store is the lack of speed when the site is full and stores a lot of product information, for example. But this is not the biggest or most serious problem, since it is something technical that can be improved with the help of an IT team or with performance improvements in general.The mistakes you should not make are those that are simple and basic: grammar or punctuation errors or poor wording of a product or service. This generates a lot of distrust for customers. Simple language, short and clear words, are the basis of a neat, understandable and transparent website, where there are no doubtful or worried customers.
Customer opinions
Have you thought about including customer reviews? It would be good to include section on your website where you can put customer reviews on google, as the opinions and feedback from your happy buyers can be essential for those customers who do not know you yet, or are not sure that you are a legitimate or reliable business. Ideally it would be best to add three or four real reviews, from happy customers, who have uploaded images or have unboxed the product or something to that extent. Why? This will boost your sales, reducing the indecision gap of customers who don't know you. The best advertising is from happy customers, so take full advantage of them.
E-commerce confidence
One word: update. What about it? The basics. The most important thing to understand and focus on is to update the content on your website. If there have been product adjustments, limited editions, sold out sales, new launches, whatever, you have to update it. You can't expect to build trust if the last update on your website was six months ago or more. Try to always have as much updated content as possible as you don't know when customers will be entering your website to see what you have. It s best to be up to date with everything, so you don't miss any sale opportunities.
No to spam
We already know how tedious social media ads advertising in general are. Discounts, promotions, exclusive benefits, we want customers to buy from us and therefore we are willing to offer free memberships and even products at zero cost. However, we must bear in mind that all the advertising we do online and all the spam we generate can generate (and do generate) the opposite effect to the one we want: the rejection of customers.
It is very easy, if we are not careful, to fall into the marketing trap. If we offer many free products, we generate distrust because the customer may think that if the benefit is too good to be true, it is probably a scam. If we want customers to trust our business and consume our products, we have to be as professional as we can. Simplicity, in this case, is the key to achieving our customer loyalty objectives.
Build trust with your customers
Be accessible to your customers. There is nothing better than showing them that they can contact you wherever and whenever they want and that they can find you on different platforms and social networks. If you provide all your contact details, your customers will trust you more, as it will show that you have nothing to hide. They can double-check if they have doubts, and look at your other social profiles. Keep in mind that your customers will trust you if you are available to them, through different channels for them to contact and learn more about the business. It is important to keep them up to date, and to keep one channel in line with another so as not to generate the opposite effect, and cause doubts. Keep all your channels updated and give your customers the best online service.
