Can customers trust you and your company to deliver quality goods and do it within the terms posted on your website? If not, you could easily be losing much of your Online Business Credibility.
Remember that when you do a good job, people are not as inclined to share the experience as they are when they receive bad customer service or a poorly made product.
Don’t risk your business by ruining your credibility due to these common internet business mistakes.
What Can You Say About the Products or Services You Sell
If you can’t answer that question other than to quote the brochure provided by the distributor, then you could be shooting yourself in the foot. Honestly, if you can’t take the time and effort to try the product yourself, how can you expect anyone else to buy it in good faith?
Transparency is an important part of building credibility, plus it makes the job of selling online easier. We live in the age of ethics! When you can state that you personally use a product, this goes a long way toward convincing others of its value. It also allows you to recommend uses and applications for the item – an essential part of delivering great customer service.
The bottom line? Don’t sell anything you yourself would not use.
Is Your Sales Copy Over the Top
How many times have you seen sales copy with such tag lines as “Rated number one worldwide”, “Make millions overnight”, “Lose weight without diet or exercise”? Obviously none of these claims could possibly be true.
Don’t fall into the trap of over-hyping your products. This can only lead to disaster when you are unable to back up outrageous claims. It causes customer dissatisfaction and gives your online business a bad reputation. Plus, it makes your website look spammy and shady and people won’t likely link to it.
This being said, there is a way around focusing on a product’s defects. If you sell a power tool that isn’t the most powerful, talk about its good points and use appropriate application examples. Don’t advertise it as being great for commercial construction but do mention that its lower price makes it a great tool for doing small repairs around the house.
Do You Make Promises You Cannot Keep
If so, then don’t make any promises at all. It is far better to under-promise and over-deliver than the opposite. Think about this in terms of everything included in your terms of sale; i.e. shipping, return policy, guarantee, warranty, availability, pricing, etc.
If your website page states that you will beat the lowest price anywhere on the internet, then you need to be prepared to honour this promise without making it nearly impossible for a customer to take advantage of the offer. What about shipping guarantees? Remember that you are at the mercy of the company you use to send the order out to your customer. If they can’t guarantee a delivery date, then ethically you can’t either.
Losing your Online Business Credibility merely to gain traffic and customers is never worthwhile in the long run. It simply costs too much in the way of future online sales and most importantly… your online reputation.
See you at the top of Google!
Sean Rasmussen
SEO Australia Pacific
AussieSEO.com © 2007 - 2010
Hi Sean,
Thanks for the gentle reminder on how to build your online business credibility. It is really just common sense and if we stick to products that we genuinely love and use ourselves; we should be okay.
That way we’ll be able to talk about them honestly and authentically and it should be easy to convince our customers that we know what we’re talking about. Also, I agree wholeheartedly with not making promises that you can’t keep. It’s better to disappoint someone straight up over a delivery time than promise a delivery by a certain time and fail to keep that promise.
.-= Jazz Salinger´s last blog ..Learn and Earn – It’s a Marathon Not a Sprint =-.
Hi Sean
Reading this article brings back memories of having dealt with unethical companies in the past.
I am dealing with one at the moment who I was an affiliate with and it makes me cringe to think how people can be so ruthless and dishonest and think nothing of it. Snake oil salesmen (or women) I think they are called.
There are so many products out there and like Jazz says, you are better to promote products you love. That way your passion will shine through, you stay in your integrity and I am sure people will be sold on your enthusiasm.
Thanks for the great article.
Blessings
Elly
.-= Elly´s last blog .. =-.
Making promises that you can’t keep! Oh how so many on the net do that as they happily flog you there products and services. Or they hook you in with a free or inexpensive offer – promising success and then you find that you need to ‘upgrade’ at a significant monthly fee to really access the goodies.
At least going through with Sean, that sort of opaque BS is eliminated and we get what we see.
It sets a standard to be emulated
Under-promise and over-deliver is so right! And so few actually do this. They do over-deliver on useless or out of date stuff though.
Really following that principle is a great way to build trust and credibility.
I suppose the best way to keep your credibility is to know the product you are selling and use it yourself so you can give an honest endorsement. With my ebay store I tell them I will post their bought item with 2 days after they purchase which is fine unless Australia Post loses the item and my credibility goes down the drain which has happened. So you are right about making promises, you really need to guarantee that you can keep those promises.
.-= Jackie Stenhouse´s last blog ..Anxiety Separation in Children =-.