The Advertiser, March 2003

THE REBIRTH OF ADVERTISING TO BUILD TRUST

by Robert Duboff

A historically implicit attribute must now become an explicit goal of advertising.  In the past, an advertised brand was trusted.  In fact, branding itself has always had the goal of pridefully asserting ownership or authorship.  The very act of advertising a brand was viewed by consumers as a mark of quality, since they assumed that a business would only spend money on expensive marketing if they had self-confidence in their brand.

This assumption no longer obtains.  First, marketers grew lazy.  We forgot that brands needed to continually earn whatever respect may have been conveyed by advertising.  Secondly, there have been many instances of false or misleading claims made through advertising (as well as other forms of marketing).  The traditional view of the consumer (“why would they spend money advertising if it weren’t a good product”) has, over time, been supplanted by a perspective that advertising is often used to hype a product that has no competitive advantage or one that addresses no pre-existing need.

To some degree, this shift in sentiment has been hastened, if not caused, by the decline in respect for (big) business, a shift that pre-dated the scandals of 2002.  Now, only 17% of the public (as measured by Gallup in November, 2002) rate the honesty and ethics of business executives as “high” or “very high.”  (Only 2% chose the “very high” response.)  Accountants, despite Andersen’s contribution to the scandals, are rated positively by 35% while nurses are at 79% and military officers at 65%.  (See Sidebar 1.)

It is worth noting that advertising practitioners were rated “high” or “very high” by only 9%, lagging behind Congressmen (17%) and union leaders (14%), though slightly ahead of car salesmen (6%).  This creates a real obstacle to effective advertising.  The vast majority of the broad target distrusts both the marketers and the clients.

Aristotle described the three essentials for persuasion.  The key is that communication be credible and then that it appeal to both logical/rational and emotional values of the target.  Without credibility of the message, no matter how well crafted the ad, the impact will be undermined.  Even more insidious, without credibility of the source (the underlying brand and/or business), the impact will be undermined.

Years ago, a brand started with trust, so the only issue was credibility of the message and the initial hurdle was awareness.  Now, a business starts without trust, so it must earn trust while it builds awareness.  Clearly, advertising is only a part of marketing, but it cannot ignore the need to establish and maintain trust.  The erosion in trust (and concomitant declines in loyalty) may be due to heightened competition, to increasing price sensitivity and/or to worsening service quality.  But, it could also be attributed to a lack of focus on the need to earn trust.
From this perspective, the most important consideration for marketers as they look to the future is how to earn, re-earn or keep trust from its targets sufficient to motivate people to receive marketing communications.  (There are many other challenges, most of which were detailed in these pages by Jim Speros of Ernst & Young in the October 2002 issue:  My focus here is on trust as a necessary enabler for marketing to overcome the various other hurdles.)

While there are several ways to accomplish this necessary goal, these are essential:

  • Marketers need to measure and monitor trust levels and the credibility of their communications
    • Research must be sensitive to messages, media, brands and the business itself

  • Marketers must communicate candidly.  While puffery is legal and probably ethical, it is not wise.  The key to trust and credibility is not to mislead those to whom you communicate.

It is worth noting that “everything counts.”  In our connected world, businesses can not say one thing in their advertising and another on their web site or in other communications.  When Nike was accused of taking advantage of its workers in Asia, its brand image and economic performance suffered.  Conversely, companies recognized for being great employers perform better than their peers.

Interestingly, in this environment, what was a disadvantage of advertising turns into a great advantage.  Only advertising gives the marketer control over both the direct marketing for which you can control the message to earn trust over time.  Because just asserting that you deserve to be trusted rarely works, the process takes time.  In addition, you can utilize other devices such as a service or product guarantee, 24 hour access by email or voice, warrantees and the like to demonstrate your sincerity.

For existing brands and businesses, your current trust level (as disclosed by objective research) dictates the strategy.  If you are fortunate enough to be trusted, learn what earned you that status and continue that behavior and/or communications.  If you do not have the trust (or loyalty) you need, work to diagnose the causes and make the remedy the number one (if not only) priority.  The devises listed above may need to come into play.

No matter what your current status, most companies and brands can do more to create a positive reservoir of trust (or “Trust Equity”).  This is the modern version of (positive) corporate image which is akin to (positive) brand equity.  There is evidence (for example in Sandra Waddock’s The Responsible Manager and from Boston College’s excellent Carroll School of Business’ Center for Corporate Citizenship) that being a good corporate citizen brings positive economic return.  If so, that may be because such behavior – if structured well – can enhance the credibility of the brand or company which enables marketing (and sales) to operate more effectively and more efficiently.  Good citizen behavior also appeals to emotional, if not rational, values.

The need for trust equity provides another new way to think about advertising’s benefits.  The demise of Andersen shows that even business-to-business brands should work to become known (positively) by the general public.

What word comes to mind now when you think of Andersen?  Probably “shredding.”  With little to no knowledge of that firm before its massive publicity in association with shredding Enron documents, the public figuratively convicted Andersen in parallel with the actual Houston jury, which did not find Andersen’s shredding to be illegal at all when it found the firm guilty for another reason.  Awhile ago, the natural trust for a fine firm could have protected Andersen from the public verdict (and maybe the jury outcome as well).  And, without the weight of negative public opinion about Andersen, politicians and regulators, if not prosecutors, might have been less anxious to attack the firm in the first place.  The need for having a positive reputation with the public has never been stronger than amid the cynicism (and litigation) of today.

Of course, this is all easier written than done.  As cited earlier, measurement and monitoring are necessary since trust only exists in the hearts and minds of the targets.  It is also vital to consider employees since they are the ones who can make performance equal marketing’s promises (or not) and their loyalty and trust is critical to success in other ways as well.  However, without the intent to earn and keep trust, credibility will not develop in this environment.  And, while, as described above, this environment does create renewed rationales for advertising, without the credibility trust engenders, the advertising cannot work.  If advertising (and other communications) are not interesting and informative to its targets, it will not work.  But, if they do not have underlying integrity in its widest meanings if they do not speak with respect and candor, the impact of even the most creative ads with the best media plans will be minimal.  Advertising can accomplish incredible goals, but only if it is credible.


Sidebar 1: Public Perceptions

Please tell me how you would rate the honestly and ethics of people in these activities/fields – “very high, high, average, low or very low.”

Nov. 22 - 24, 2002
N = 1017

 

Very High (%)

High (%)

Nurses

22

57

Military officers

18

47

Clergy

14

38

Accountants

4

31

Congressmen

3

14

Business executives

2

15

Lawyers

2

16

Stockbrokers

2

10

Advertising practitioners

1

8

Car salesmen

1

5

Source:  Effect of Year’s Scandals Evident in Honesty and Ethics Ratings by Jeffrey M. Jones, Gallup News Service (www.gallup.com/poll/releases) 12/4/02.

 

Sidebar 2: Critical Practices to Ensure that Advertising Works to Build and Maintain Trust

  1. Be candid; even sins of omission can be deadly.  In all assessments and monitoring, you must measure whether the messages are credible.

  2. Remember that your ads will be eventually seen by all your constituencies (e.g., customers, employees, shareholders).
    • If they are not embraced by your employees, they will not be counterproductive.

  3. Thus, it is vital to develop an overall measure of how each constituency rates the business’s or brand’s trustworthiness.  This Trust Equity score should become a key performance metric and should be owned by external communications (as well as internal communications).

  4. Work through likely scenarios that could befall your business (e.g., accidents, law suits, etc.) and develop strategies to handle each without ever resorting to “No comment,” which has come to communicate a degree of culpability akin to taking the Fifth Amendment.

 


This article was originally published in The Advertiser, March 2003.

 

 

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