Tips For Building Brand Trust With UX Design

What exactly is trust? It is defined as a firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability or strength of someone or something. From a business perspective, brand trust is exactly what you would then expect; the belief people have in your brand’s reliability, truth and ability. As this is something that should be very important to every business out there, we would like to share our tips for building Brand Trust with UX Design.

Of course you might be thinking, “What the heck does UX design have to do with trust and our brand?” The answer is – a lot more than you are probably aware of.

The Relationship of Design to Trust

Why are chain restaurants so popular even when we know from experience that with a little work and investigation you could find a better meal even in a strange town? The simple answer is trust. Many businesses have built up a level of trust over time and have developed a reputation that is known.

Of course that can be good or bad.

For example, if you are on a long trip and it’s early in the morning seeing a sign for Dunkin Donuts or Starbucks for some is like a beautiful beacon. Even if you don’t regularly frequent either establishment, you know they both have a good reputation for providing coffee and snacks.

The design, layout, logo, color schemes, menu, etc are often very consistent even from state to state and their overall product design and consistency lends to the level of trust they inherently have with consumers. This shows the direct relationship design can have with trust.

This same concept translates to every business on multiple levels, from business cards to a brick-and-mortar location to the website that consumers visit you on. By looking to build consistency, reliability and truth with the aspects of your design you will consciously and subconsciously build trust with an audience.

Of course there is the other side of the coin to consider as well; a business that uses misrepresentative photos, misleading CTAs, or things like that annoy and frustrate consumers erodes trust.

Tips for Building Brand Trust with UX Design

The idea behind UX design is to enhance the usability, accessibility and pleasure between the user and in this case, the website. Of course our examples can sometimes relate to APPs as well, but the primary focus here is a website.

• Provide Real Information about the Business – This can simply not be stressed enough. Always use images, stories and other information aspects that actually represent your business and its’ employees. Truth is a key aspect of trust and if you misinform people, such as by using images of a big conference room surrounded by people in professional dress attire when you have two employees and a single room office, people will then question everything else about you when meeting in person. Word quickly spreads when things are not as they seem which will erode trust with potential customers as well.
• Avoid the use of Dark Patterns – A Dark Pattern is the name for a user interface that has been created to subtly trick users into doing something without them knowing it. An example would be having a check box already clicked for “yes” when you are making a purchase and that “yes” box is an agreement to purchase a protection plan. Any time you trick someone that will immediately cause distrust on any future interactions, if the customer is even willing to have a future with you.
• Meets User’s Needs – Why is someone at your website? Whether it is to buy a product or obtain information, most likely they are there looking to fill a need; your job is to quickly and easily provide them with what they need. Why make someone click through 4 pages to get to something when it could be done in 1 click? Sometimes people do this in an attempt to up-sell or earn additional ad revenue, but this type of action is annoying and not very trustworthy.
• Avoid Distractions – Pop-up ads, broken links, poor UX design and interface, and other things that cause irritation and annoyance completely takes the focus off what your business can do for someone and instead calls into question your reliability, which is a cornerstone of trust.
• Provide Good Content – Trust is always built when you provide useful, good information that helps your costumers. Showcasing your knowledge and positioning yourself as an authority is an important aspect of building trust. After all, you wouldn’t stop at Dunkin Donuts if they weren’t known for making a good cup of coffee.

The bottom line is that trust is absolutely paramount to success in today’s business world; your website is an important part of showcasing your reliability, truth and abilities. Hopefully these tips for building brand trust with UX design will demonstrate how a good design goes a long way to building a strong connection with customer that lasts for years.