Big companies like Coca-Cola, Nestle, and McDonald’s are brands well-known throughout the world. When you go to those companies or buy their products, you get a certain feeling of authority and trust as a customer.
Why?
Because they are huge and established multinational companies.
Now, if you are just starting out with your business, you’re probably hoping to trigger the same feelings in your customers. In this article, we’ll share with you the best tips on how to establish business credibility.
Configure your auto attendant creatively
An auto attendant is a collection of voice menus and actions defined by the caller’s behavior. Depending on what you set it to, you can connect the caller to an extension, send them to a voicemail, play announcements, and more.
For instance, you can assign a voice menu that says, “To reach our sales department, press 1. For technical support, press 2. To talk directly to our receptionist, press 3.”
Even if you’re just a two-person business, you can assign yourself multiple extensions so that you can handle incoming calls for both sales and reception. This will impress callers and make them think that your company is bigger than it actually is.
Make your website more appealing
Being stuck with an outdated website design won’t do your business any good. Since your website is a reflection of your business, you have to make sure that it’s impressive.
Work on the following when trying to make your website more appealing:
- Fantastic UI. Customers should be able to navigate your site with ease. If they don’t know where to go after they visit your homepage, you can easily lose them to your competitors.
- Attractive color schemes. Some business owners are prone to using unpopular colors on their website while some are just basing their colors on their personal preferences. It’s good to remember that it’s not always about you but about the audience you’re trying to attract. If you don’t know where to get started, you can get inspiration from tons of online resources.
- Effective and readable content. Readability is important to make sure that visitors are getting the most out of the stuff they read on your site. Put some effort in ensuring that your content is targeted and friendly to the readers.
See Also: 4 Ways to Make Your Website an Effective Business Tool
Improve your customer interactions
Remember that you have control over how you deal with your patrons. Make sure to turn every interaction into a positive and memorable one for them.
Here are a few strategies you can use:
- Cover all of your bases. Customers will be getting in touch using all forms of communication imaginable. They will email you, call you, record voicemails, send faxes or fill up a form on your website. Make sure that you track all of those forms and see to it that you respond to them in a timely manner. If you can afford it, find a good CRM platform that will allow you to centralize and simplify all types of customer engagement.
- Try to see things from the customer’s perspective. Treat your patrons the way you want to be treated.
- Be transparent with handling feedback. Be appreciative of the feedback that you get whether they’re positive or negative. By doing this, you’ll be able to find the things that you’re doing right and discover the things you still need to work on. Large companies aren’t fazed by negative feedback; they quickly work on making improvements.
Engage in corporate social responsibility
Businesses shouldn’t always be entirely about what the customers buy. Several studies have already proven that modern consumers are more likely to patronize companies committed to advocacies or those that support causes.
Well-known brands such as TOMS and Warby Parker have understood this perfectly. While they don’t exactly have the best products on the market, they sell items like pancakes because of their business model.
“Traditional marketing, where savings is the main message, is no longer as appealing as it was before,” says this social responsibility article on the RingCentral Small Business blog.
Because of this, you need to keep up not just because it’s trendy but because it pays to have a purpose. Also, you have to make sure that the cause you’re supporting is relevant to your business.
Become a leader in your niche
It would be best to score speaking engagements at industry forums. This way, you’ll get to share your knowledge, generate awareness about your brand, and become a leader in your space. You also get the chance to learn from others when you do this.
Spend time building relationships with your audience and with like-minded individuals in your niche. Participate in meet-ups if you can and be active when attending such events.
Be part of associations or organizations that are niche-specific. These will add to your “seal of approval”. They will help you gain the credibility and trust of the people around you.
The bottom line is that you should get your name and your brand out there. You want to be seen and be heard at this point.
These are just some of the things you can do establish business credibility. If you’ve already tried out some of these tactics, let us know how they’re working out for you.