How to Build Trust on Your Website & in Social Media

Marketing
How to Build Trust on Your Website & in Social Media

Did you know it takes a prospect only 0.05 seconds to form an opinion about your website? You have less than a second to grab their attention!

Your online presence reflects your home design company’s professionalism and expertise. It tells your unique story, shows off the quality of your work, validates your company, and proves you’re the right choice for the job, 24/7!

Today we’re going to show you how to build a solid online presence using your website and social media to ultimately accelerate your company’s reputation and growth. 

Why is brand positioning essential in building an impressive online presence?

The way you position your company online helps you attract your ideal clients, filter out bad-fit clients, sell more projects, and it can even help you charge more for your services. 

Your online presence (website and social media) is what sets your company apart from competition when people are searching for your services online. 

Your brand positioning is crucial to crafting content and messaging on all platforms that shows your prospects why you’re the right choice for their home design project. 

Your brand positioning includes and influences:

  • How much your audience trusts you
  • What your value is to your audience
  • How you’re communicating your story 

When figuring out your brand positioning, ask yourself these questions:

  • Who are you targeting?
  • What’s so unique about your company and your work?
  • How can you tell your story online and reach the right people?

When you can answer these questions, you’ll be able to show your audience exactly what you have to offer, in a way they understand, and that appeals to their pain points. 

How do you position your brand online to build trust?

There are four online mediums you can use to position your brand and build trust with your audience. They are your logo, website, social media profiles, and Google My Business. 

1. How to build trust with your logo

Did you know your logo is one of the first (if not the first!) brand assets that your potential clients interact with? Upon seeing it, your prospect will make an irreversible snap judgement on your company, your services, and whether or not they’re going to hire you. 

Your logo is the start of their journey with your brand, so it needs to hit all the right notes when it comes to representing your company. 

Ask yourself: Is your logo telling the right story?

From the design and font, to your company name and tagline, your logo represents your company and your unique story.

Your logo should spark the same emotional response from your prospects that your work does.

Here’s how you can create the right logo to represent your brand and your story:

  • Choose five words that describe your business and your brand’s story
  • Work to build a logo that sparks the emotions related to those five words
  • Try to keep your logo looking simple, clean, and, most importantly, professional
  • Use a font that’s readable in all sizes, and that’s clear on mobile devices

Pro Tip: Don’t forget to create different sizes of your logo so you can use it for your website, social and print media. This will help you stay consistent with your branding, which is essential for building trust and familiarity with your audience. 

2. How to build trust with your website 

Your website is your home base online. It’s the foundation of your marketing and the leading player when it comes to helping you build up trust and encourage your prospects to convert. 

But is your website telling the right story?

Like your logo, your website has to elicit the same emotional response that your client feels when they look at your work. 

When they see all the fantastic interior design projects you’ve done, they’ll be blown away at how stunning your work is. But, if your website doesn’t reflect your work standards, visitors won’t even get to the stage where they’re viewing your portfolio. 

There are three parts to your website that are important to build trust with your audience:

The design 

It’s a huge part of your online presence, so make sure you have a clean, professional design that truly represents your company. 

Design Tips:

  • Use colors that complement the type of work you do (i.e. a warm welcoming palette vs. a more modern luxurious palette)
  • Always use fonts that are beautiful, clean and especially easy to read for a user-friendly experience
  • Arrange each section on your page in order of importance so your audience sees the most relevant information first
  • Always use simple, professional photographs to show off your work

The copy

Your copy is an incredibly important part of your website and without it, your audience might not even understand what you’re trying to sell. 

Remember, when writing the content for your home designer website be sure to:

  • Know who you’re talking to so you can clearly communicate your offering
  • Always show your audience how you can solve their problem - make it about them, not you
  • Clearly outline the expert services you’re offering
  • Provide them with proof about how awesome your services are
  • Give them information on you and your company - tell your story
  • Tell them clearly what they should do next

Pro tip: It’s important to tell your audience exactly what they have to do next (call, email, book online etc.). If you don’t instruct them on how to book a call or contact you, then they will not know what to do to get started. Don’t make them guess! 

The usability

Your website should also have a positive user experience. If it is difficult to navigate and lacks clear call to actions (CTAs), you risk losing them to a competitor who has a website that is easy to use. 

The best way to improve the usability of your website is by:

  • Simple navigation 
  • Clear, educational content that’s easy to understand 
  • Clear CTA on every page so visitors know how to get in contact with you
  • Having an online calendar showing your availability 
  • Detailed contact page

3. How to build trust with a strong social media presence

Everyone is on social media these days...3.6 billion people to be exact. They’re scrolling through Facebook, pinning on Pinterest, and liking the latest photos on Instagram. 

54% of social media users do research for their next purchase on their social media platform of choice, and if you can stay visible on these platforms, you’re going to be able to:

  • Grab their attention
  • Build trust
  • Convert prospects into clients
  • Improve client loyalty to your brand

When posting on your social media profiles, try to focus on creating a bond with your audience. You want them to connect with you and your company, show them all about what makes you great, your process, and highlight your latest work. 

You can improve your social media presence by:

  • Using graphics, colors and fonts that complement your work and match your branding
  • Using professional photographs of your work
  • Sharing before and afters to show off the dramatic transformations you create
  • Engaging with your audience and offering them educational content that will help get them to the next step in their project
  • Creating and posting regular content to keep your audience entertained and to encourage them to think of your company next time they need interior design services

4. How to build trust with Google My Business 

Google My Business (GMB) is the go-to place for people to check reviews and star ratings on any business. 

If you don’t have your business listed on GMB, you’re missing out on a huge (and free!) marketing opportunity. (Go to business.google.com to get started)

Often the first place people look for reviews, without a Google My Business listing some prospects might think twice about working with you. 

If you haven’t already, you should:

  • Set up a Google My Business profile
  • Include professional photos of your work
  • Upload images of your offices
  • Write an engaging bio that tells your story
  • Respond to all reviews you get - even the negative ones

Need Help?

If you'd like to improve your online presence, we can help. Our mission is to transform home design businesses and help them get their dream clients, sell projects for more, stay current online, and automate systems to save time.

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