Do you want to help your business stand out from your competitors? In that case, you must develop and implement strategies to boost brand perception. And not just because a positive brand reputation makes it easier to impress your audience. Much more importantly, how your target audience perceives your brand directly impacts their willingness to engage with and buy from your company.
According to research from Edelman, employing marketing tactics to position your business as trustworthy and competent is worth the effort. For one, 81% of consumers will only consider buying from a business if they trust the brand. Secondly, brand credibility does a great job of convincing customers to invest in new products. Finally, remember that positioning your business as trustworthy could also be the key to maximising customer loyalty (which is good for business in the long run).
It doesn't matter if brand credibility was high on your list of branding priorities or if you're just now seeing the benefits of positioning your business as a trustworthy authority. Here are some simple digital marketing tactics that can help boost brand perception.
Associate Your Brand with Credible Industry Voices
Incorporating social proof in your digital marketing strategies is arguably the best way to convince your target audience to trust your business.
But here's the deal: while encouraging your clients to leave positive reviews about your business can be a great way to establish your business as a trustworthy industry leader, you have other marketing strategies at your disposal. As a matter of fact, you can effectively emphasise your brand's reliability and benevolence by expanding your digital marketing arsenal.
For example, something as simple as associating your brand with credible industry voices can be a great way to encourage customer trust. Especially seeing that the latest research on customer trust reveals that 74% of people trust scientists just as much as they do peers.
With this in mind, you could elevate brand credibility by doing something similar to Digestive Warrior. This business uses a prominent space on its homepage to feature an interview with a certified doctor, discussing the benefits of using the brand's Para Kit solution.
Alternatively, you can build brand credibility via association by using your site or social media channels to announce and feature professional partnerships with trustworthy brands.
For example, check out SurveyMonkey's Instagram feed. The SaaS company regularly uses the platform to announce new integrations and partnerships, knowing that this is the type of news its followers will appreciate and that will remind users of SurveyMonkey's commitment to prioritising its customers' needs.
Finally, as you work to encourage your target audience to perceive your business as an industry authority, don't forget to share any certifications or industry awards. After all, these aren't just testimonials to your organisation's hard work. They also prove your brand's commitment to providing effective, high-quality solutions. Moreover, they could be an essential differentiation factor for convincing customers to choose your brand over a competitor.
Check out how seamlessly ThousandEyes does it on its homepage, where it has an entire page section dedicated to showing off brand ratings and relevant industry awards.
Have Meaningful Interactions with Your Social Media Followers
One of the biggest mistakes business owners and marketers make is thinking they can boost brand perception by simply serving potential customers with content. However, the fact is that establishing trust and encouraging people to engage with a brand relies just as much on meaningful interactions and showing an avid interest in solving consumer pain points.
If you look at some of the research regarding what buyers want from brands, you'll find that understanding and connection rank high on their lists of priorities.
According to SproutSocial, 64% of consumers want brands to make an effort to connect with them. Adobe discovered that 88% of U.S. consumers want to engage with brands that excel at meeting their expectations. A survey from the M&C Saatchi Group revealed that 61% of people expect brand conversations to be supportive, knowledgeable, and inclusive, demonstrating how much people want businesses to show they care.
With this in mind, one of the most impactful ways to boost brand perception is to use any opportunity to engage in meaningful conversations with your existing and potential customers.
One excellent tactic to create these conversational opportunities is to utilise your brand's social media and content pages to the maximum of their potential. After all, if you're already investing time and resources into producing high-quality content, why not use the opportunity to build relationships with your followers?
For example, if you check out the Moto Machines YouTube channel, you'll find it is filled with helpful video reviews introducing prospects to new products. However, what stands out about this brand's approach to content marketing is that it uses the video comments section to interact with viewers and answer their highly specific questions. The answers are direct, casual, and sometimes even humorous.
This helps position Moto Machines as an absolute authority on everything motorcycle-related. The replies also demonstrate the brand's commitment to empowering its audience and helping them make educated purchase decisions.
Use Your Blog to Compare Your Product with Your Competitors
To position your brand as the go-to industry authority, you must visibly outperform your competition. And the only way to do that is not to fear comparisons.
Ultimately, pitting your solutions against their alternatives can seem intimidating. But the simple truth is, your customers aren't just going to take your word at face value when evaluating products to buy. They'll go through several stages during their buyer's journey (including an in-depth research phase), where they will compare and contrast multiple options that fit their needs.
Now, data shows that, in 2024, people take a real deep dive into product research. For example, PWC discovered that almost one-third of global consumers use price comparison websites to evaluate potential solutions before buying. This tendency proves the importance of investing in product research and development. Moreover, it demonstrates the power of copywriting and digital marketing in ensuring your solutions stand out in your prospects' minds.
For instance, something as simple as creating a product comparison guide on-site can be a tremendous opportunity to position your brand in a way that allows you to emphasise your unique value propositions and show customers why they want to invest in your solution.
Check out how Aura does it in its Best Amazon Repricer Tool guide. By comparing its software solution to two alternatives, Aura unlocks the opportunity to mention its innovative features and dedication to customer support, allowing it to stand out as the better alternative to most established repricing tools available on the market.
Investing in comparison content boosts conversions by convincing your target audience of your brand's or products' superiority. It can also be an exceptional way to manage customer expectations and to ensure that you only convert users whose needs align with what you can do for them.
Ultimately, nothing positions your business as a credible entity as effectively as demonstrating your capability to deliver a positive CX. Yet, if you consider that a single negative experience causes 80% of people to switch brands, you'll realise that ensuring you match customer expectations becomes more essential than ever.
If you check out the comparison between Asana and Monday on the Monday website, you'll notice that the brand directly compares its solution's features against those offered by its main competitor. However, the concluding part of the article reveals why. If you look closely, you'll see that Monday admits that its competition offers a solid product for beginner users. However, it points out that its software delivers a much more advanced experience for professionals, and it does so at a better price.
Create Custom Landing Pages for Each Audience Segment
One of the main obstacles brands encounter when attempting to engage web visitors is that they may be targeting a diverse set of buyer personas. And, knowing that 71% of today's consumers expect personalised brand interactions, as well as that 76% of people become frustrated with non-relevant brand messaging, it becomes evident that one of the more effective ways to boost your business' authority is to show that you do precisely what your audience expects from you — regardless of their specific needs or position in the buyer's journey.
The good news is that you can solve this conversion obstacle relatively easily. All you have to do is segment your audience and create custom landing pages for each buyer persona.
If this doesn't align with your budget, you can get away with creating page segments that differentiate between different subscription tiers. This is what SaaS brands like Notion often do, presenting consumers with a broad list of user benefits and letting them choose a plan based on their priorities.
However, there's a much more streamlined way to show you understand your audience's needs. Instead of trying to fit every single benefit of your product onto your homepage, consider creating landing pages that speak to specific segments of your prospects.
For instance, if you check out the Dial My Calls website, you'll notice that it includes several audience-specific landing pages, like the School Emergency Notification page below. Each of these assets addresses a unique set of consumer pain points. The highly focused approach to addressing these user needs allows Dial My Calls to position itself as experienced, trustworthy, and credible.
Sometimes, the best way to increase brand credibility isn't to highlight the praise your business received or invest in content that answers your audience's technical questions. Instead, it's to give your prospects real-life insights into your work process and support your promises with evidence of your organisation's capability/solution's effectiveness.
One relatively easy way to accomplish this goal is to produce and publish detailed customer stories and case studies.
What makes these resources so effective at boosting brand credibility isn't just the fact that they rely on social proof to demonstrate your business' expertise. But much more importantly, these pieces of content provide concrete evidence of your team's competence and showcase your process to help prospects form realistic expectations regarding your products' capabilities.
For example, check out the Fractl website, which has an elaborate Work section showing the brand's dedication to using social proof to establish authority. A closer look at the content — like the Fanatics 6-Month Engagement Case Study — reveals that the brand takes real pride in its work process. These articles support the business' claims by allowing readers to see the results of Fractl's work. More importantly, the case studies go into the work process, allowing all prospective customers to form a more accurate idea of what the brand does and predict what it could do to solve their specific pain points.
Harness the Power of SEO to Rise to the Top of SERPs
As you explore simple digital marketing tactics that can help you boost brand perception, don't forget to invest in SEO.
Online consumer behaviour data reveals that most people begin their product research journeys on search engines. Nonetheless, they only look at the first few results. A study from Backlinko shows that the #1 result on Google receives ten times more clicks than the page in the #10 spot, proving just how important it is for your business to rank high on SERPs. But, even if you don't win position zero on Google, you still want to invest in SEO. Why? Because 82% of people look for familiar brands when browsing search results.
So, if you want to maximise your brand's credibility and benefit from your positive reputation, do your best to make your business easy to find. Identify and target relevant keywords. Invest in content marketing to build topical authority and build a strong backlink profile. And, of course, don't forget to invest in technical SEO, as these easy hacks often hugely contribute to your target audience's experience while interacting with your business.
Showcase Your Brand's Investment in Social or Environmental Causes
Finally, don't forget that today's consumers don't just want effective, convenient, and affordable solutions. Research suggests that they also judge brands based on their values.
If you look at the PWC Consumer Insights Survey from June 2022, you'll discover that a company's commitment to ESG values directly impacts credibility. So, if you want to maximise your brand's trustworthy reputation, it's a good idea to showcase your brand's investment in social or environmental causes your audience cares about.
You don't have to go over the top. But, something as simple as pointing out what your business stands for — as done on the ORLY homepage — can be an excellent strategy to connect with your audience and convince them to support your organisation due to shared values.
Maximising brand credibility through digital marketing can be simple. With the strategies discussed above, you can easily position your business as a trustworthy, capable, and customer-oriented entity your target audience can rely on.
No matter how much you work to position your business in a positive light, don't forget that actions speak louder than words. And the only way to maintain a good reputation is to deliver on your promises. So remember to invest in CX, put your customers first, and do your best to stay true to your brand's values, even when it may seem like an inconvenient thing to do.
Karl Kangur is a serial entrepreneur who founded his first online business as a teenager. He’s a digital marketing expert and loves talking about trends and best practice in this space. When he’s not doing any of these things, he’s probably at the gym preparing for his next competitive bodybuilding event.
