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What Makes a Company Trust Worthy? February 23, 2010

Posted by Blake Sunshine in blogging, public relations.
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The only thing a company needs from its consumers is trust. If your consumers don’t trust you, they won’t buy your products or use your services, and they will tell their friends not to either. But what makes one company more trust worthy over another?

Millward Brown just came out with a study on the most trust worthy companies in America.

The study found that the top 10 most trust worthy companies were as follows:

1. Amazon

2. FedEx

3. Downy

4. Huggies

5. Tide

6. Tylenol

7. Toyota (The study was clearly done pre-Toyota recalls)

8. WebMD

9. Pampers

10. UPS

They picked these companies based off millions of consumer interviews where they asked, “how trust worthy is this brand,” and “would you recommend this brand?”

I think there are a few characteristics that make these brands trust worthy:

1. An Exceptional Customer Experience- Customers love Amazon. They provide their users with great customer service and an easy to use site. People know that when they use Amazon they are going to get what the ordered, when they ordered it. Consumers trust an exceptional customer experience, and Amazon does a great job of providing one.

2. A History of Trust- The Tylenol recall is one of the most ancient PR success stories in the book. Tylenol recalled all of their medicine until it was safe for their consumers. But that was years ago, so why are they still one of the most trusted brands? Because they’ve already proved that they can be trusted! A history of trust goes a long way in keeping customer’s trust.

3. An Indispensable Product- Two diaper companies and two delivery companies made the list of the most trust worthy brands. People with babies need diapers and pretty much everyone needs a packaged delivered at some point, and when consumers need these things they need them immediately. And if you can provide these products/services to consumers consistently, they are going to trust you every time. Better yet, if you have an indispensable product, consumers are going to recommend you every time.

Your company can have all of the characteristics that make a company trust worthy. But is your company trust worthy?

It’s never too late to evolve your organization February 11, 2010

Posted by Blake Sunshine in corporate, social media.
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When I was the social media intern at National Instruments, my manager Deirdre Walsh taught me most everything I know about social media and community building. Now that I’m a PR professional, I am part of the “virtual social media team” at work. It’s an awesome team to be a part of, and it’s even more awesome that Deirdre was interviewed for this great article in Target Marketing Magazine called “Four best practices to leverage niche social networks for conversions.”

In the article, Deirdre explains how our virtual social media team works, and how your organization can reach out to your community using social media. ”We have built this virtual social media team, where we have representatives from the more traditional marketing functions like direct mail, events, public relations,” Walsh says. “And their role is really twofold: It’s to … work on the … social media projects … [and] to evolve the more traditional marketing functions.”

“For instance, for a conference, members of the NI team will create direct mail pieces that provide information about how to follow updates on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the NI community.”

Do you see? It’s never too late for your organization to evolve! My role in traditional media relations and writing as a part of the PR team is changing so rapidly it’s almost hard to keep up. But by being a member of the virtual social media team I get to work on cool social media projects (like monitoring, metrics, Facebook, blogs, etc.), while also thinking of new ways that PR and social media can work together to reach our community.

If you find yourself stuck in a traditional marketing role, doing things the same way things have always been done, decide within yourself that it is time for your organization to evolve. It’s never too late!

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