NEW YORK, Oct. 20, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Deloitte
Digital, the experience consultancy, and Twilio Inc. (NYSE: TWLO)
(LTSE: TWLO), the leading cloud communications platform, today
announced the results of a joint study exploring the divergent
perceptions of trust between consumers and business leaders in the
United States.
For many consumers, trust is the deciding factor when it comes
to separating a business from its competition. Not only can trust
help bring customers through the door, but it can also help keep
them there — reducing churn and lowering acquisition costs. While
that seems like a simple concept to employ, this new research
uncovered a significant chasm between the way consumers and B2C
leaders define and establish trust. The findings reveal that many
leaders are overly confident about almost every dimension of
customer trust in their brands, and as a result are leaving sizable
business value on the table. The resulting report takes a closer
look at how these two groups evaluate key trust signals and offers
tangible actions that brands can implement to foster trust with
their customers.
The joint report, "Close the Trust Gap to Unlock Business
Value," begins by defining the four elements of trust — humanity,
transparency, capability and reliability — and then dives into
actionable insights developed by Deloitte Digital and Twilio. In
total, the report produced dozens of insights. A sampling of these
insights includes:
- The impact of trust is quantifiable. Research shows that
among consumers who track their purchases, the majority of
respondents (68%) spent more on a trusted brand compared to a brand
they use but trust less. And on average, consumers spend 25% more
money on trusted brands. Trust also helps brands earn permission to
collect more and more valuable data from customers. In fact,
consumers are comfortable with their favorite brands knowing
significantly more data about them than they think the brands
already know.
- Brands are not as trusted as their leaders think. While
79% of B2C business leaders think their customers have somewhat or
very high trust in their brands, only 52% of consumers report
feeling those levels of trust in the brands they interacted with so
far in 2021.
- Consumers define the building blocks of trust differently
than B2C leaders. Nearly 3 in 4 consumers say quality products
or services (72%) and fair prices (73%) are critical to building
their trust in a brand. Yet only 38% of B2C leaders recognize that
fair prices are central to building trust, and only 57% recognize
the critical importance of quality products or services.
- B2C leaders overestimate performance on all core trust
signals. As defined by Deloitte Digital's "HX TrustID" study,
consumers look to four key signals of a trustworthy brand:
Humanity, Transparency, Capability and Reliability. According to
this new joint report, B2C leaders are three times more likely than
consumers to strongly believe that their company consistently
exhibits Humanity through empathy and kindness toward customers
(40% versus 13%) and twice as likely than consumers to strongly
believe that they always show Reliability by delivering on their
promises (40% versus 19%).
- Most brands know what they need to do to earn trust — but
many are still falling short. For instance, a whopping 98% of
B2C leaders say customers trust their brand more when it's easy to
do business with the brand. Consumers agree on this point, with 96%
saying they trust a brand more when it's easy to do business with
it, yet only 35% of consumers say it is very easy to do business
with the brands they trust most.
- Even the most trusted brands have room for improvement.
Thirty-three customers in 100 believe that their most trusted
brands are Transparent — that is, that those brands openly share
all information, motives and choices in straightforward and plain
language. A net of 48 in 100 say their most trusted brands
consistently deliver on their promises.
- Leaders are misaligned with consumer preferences regarding
how to rebuild trust after it is damaged. Brand leaders rank
"provide outstanding customer service" and "communicate proactively
about the problem and the resolution" as the most important ways to
rebuild trust —missing and significantly underestimating the
importance of the three most-important actions in the eyes of
consumers: providing refunds, offering replacements or exchanges,
and admitting the mistake and apologizing.
- When the right actions are taken, consumers are willing to
forgive mistakes, both simple and significant. This research
shows on average, consumers will accept three mistakes from a brand
before losing trust — provided that mistakes are resolved to their
satisfaction and not repeated.
"There has never been a more important moment for brands to get
it right when it comes to trust," added John Peto, U.S. head of Deloitte Digital and
principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP. "This report makes it clear
that the organizations who rest on their laurels or continue with a
business-as-usual approach will be leaving immense value on the
table, while those that align their approach with the trust signals
of their core audience will likely benefit both now and in the
future."
"The lack of consumer trust is pervasive, yet we find that
business leaders are consistently over-estimating the trust that
customers have in their brands," commented Ashley Reichheld, principal, Deloitte Consulting
LLP and the creator of Deloitte Digital's HX TrustID™ platform.
"Leaders must focus on measuring, predicting and acting to rebuild
consumer trust so that they can foster meaningful differentiation
and resilient customer loyalty. Trust is the key to accelerating
growth and delivering value."
"Businesses have been forced to reevaluate how they build and
maintain relationships with their customers in a digital-first
world," said Glenn Weinstein, chief
customer officer at Twilio. "With so many digital interactions
between businesses and customers, there are more opportunities to
strengthen or damage customer trust at every touchpoint. Our
research with Deloitte Digital shows some tangible ways to deepen
relationships by building trust in the ways that matter most to
customers."
The "Close the Trust Gap to Unlock Business Value" study was
conducted in the summer of 2021, surveying 1,000 consumers and 500
leaders of large, business-to-consumer enterprises in the United States about the business value of
trust and the key factors that contribute to a brand's
trustworthiness. The research was conducted by Lawless Research and
commissioned by Deloitte Digital and Twilio. Deloitte Digital drew
from years of experience helping clients assess, prepare and
implement digital innovations and understandings gained from its
"HX TrustID" study to articulate the dimensions and
mechanics of trust and inform actionable insights. Twilio provided
experience and leading practices to the report development and
findings, as a leading customer engagement platform that brings
together globally trusted digital channels, data-driven
personalization, and leading engagement tools that power over one
trillion interactions annually. For more actionable insights on
consumer perceptions and the business value of trust, access the
full report here.
Deloitte Digital helps companies create new growth by
elevating the human experience — with connected ideas, technology
and talent. Our ambition is to make the best customer-oriented
organizations in the world. Alongside all of Deloitte, we foster
the connections necessary to shape a better future for our clients,
our culture, our society and our planet.
Visit www.deloittedigital.com or follow Deloitte
Digital on LinkedIn or Twitter to learn
more.
About Twilio
Millions of developers around the world
have used Twilio to unlock the magic of communications to improve
any human experience. Twilio has democratized communications
channels like voice, text, chat, video, and email by virtualizing
the world's communications infrastructure through APIs that are
simple enough for any developer to use, yet robust enough to power
the world's most demanding applications. By making communications a
part of every software developer's toolkit, Twilio is enabling
innovators across every industry — from emerging leaders to the
world's largest organizations — to reinvent how companies engage
with their customers.
About Deloitte
Deloitte provides industry-leading audit, consulting, tax and
advisory services to many of the world's most admired brands,
including nearly 90% of the Fortune 500® and more than 7,000
private companies. Our people come together for the greater
good and work across the industry sectors that drive and shape
today's marketplace — delivering measurable and lasting results
that help reinforce public trust in our capital markets, inspire
clients to see challenges as opportunities to transform and thrive,
and help lead the way toward a stronger economy and a healthier
society. Deloitte is proud to be part of the largest global
professional services network serving our clients in the markets
that are most important to them. Now celebrating 175 years of
service, our network of member firms spans more than 150 countries
and territories. Learn how Deloitte's more than 345,000 people
worldwide connect for impact at www.deloitte.com.
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