The complexity of these new times requires resilience from organizations and leaders, not only to face the challenges of a scenario of uncertainty, but to be able to keep up with the speed of change and seek business continuity. In this coming year, more than ever, trust is renewed as a growth strategy for companies, as it guarantees an avenue of opportunities, whether in relationships with audiences or in building and maintaining image and reputation.
To shed more light on this path, the Reputation Feed invited five executives responsible for brands and the strategic positioning of the companies or units they represent to answer three questions about what trust means in the business world. The gains from trust are countless, they say, as it contributes to relationships with customers, partners, stakeholders, in general, promotes brand loyalty, encourages employee engagement, generates reputation and profitability, among other effects of the attribute.
Claudia Góes, Communications Director at Microsoft Brazil; Pedro Torres, global director of Communication and Institutional Relations at Gerdau; Naile Rocha, general manager of Shopping Iguatemi Porto Alegre; Cris Duclos, executive director of Marketing and Experience at Sicredi; It is Luciana Iodice, Chief Marketing Office (CMO) of Privalia Brasil, also point out which fronts they consider important to gain the trust of their brands and companies.
Check it out below:
When you think of trust, what three words come to mind?
Claudia Góes, Microsoft Brazil
“Integrity, honesty and consistency.”
Pedro Torres, Gerdau
“Truth, reciprocity, transparency.”
Nailê Rocha, Iguatemi Porto Alegre
“Consistent history, transparency and ethical values.”
Cris Duclos, Sicredi
“Partnership, transparency, ethics.”
Luciana Iodice, Privalia
“Authenticity, transparency and consistency.”
In relation to the gains generated by trust for your company, which would you highlight as the most relevant?
Claudia Góes, Microsoft Brazil
“As relevant gains from trust, I would highlight, first, the relationship with customers and partners, as trust helps to build and maintain solid relationships. Then, the brand’s reputation. A trusted brand can attract more talent, new customers and retain existing ones. And, three, innovation. Trust allows Microsoft to innovate with confidence, and customers who trust the company are more willing to try new products and services and choose us as business partners to support the growth of their organizations and solve issues relevant to their companies. ”
– Solid relationships with customers and partners
– Brand reputation
– Stimulating innovation
– Social license to operate
– Engagement and productivity
– Greater market share
Pedro Torres, Gerdau
“The gains are multiple when a company manages to establish bonds of trust with its audiences. When we talk about society in general, trust gives us social license to operate. In a heavy industry like ours, when you establish trust with stakeholders, it generates a gain. With employees, it generates engagement and productivity. When a person trusts, they have engagement and respect. And, obviously, in a more marketing aspect, when we look at customers, one of the gains is market share.”
Nailê Rocha, Iguatemi Porto Alegre
“Trust brings business profitability and brand loyalty.”
– Profitability
– Loyalty
– Security for the member to invest
– Strong reputation
– Solid and sustained growth
Cris Duclos, Sicredi
“In the financial segment, trust is an essential attribute, as we take care of people’s financial lives. Research shows how much Sicredi establishes a relationship of trust with its members, the result of the proximity and humanized relationship of our cooperatives, the genuine interest in people and the purpose of building an increasingly prosperous society together. This is what makes members consider Sicredi as a great partner, a reference when they need support to deal with financial issues. Trust is the basis of our good reputation and has enabled Sicredi to grow solidly over the years.”
Luciana Iodice, Privalia Brasil
“The trust generated translates both to our end audience and to our brands: 95% of them stay with us for five years or more. On the consumer side, trust generates high engagement. In addition to the high recurrence of the base, thousands of people subscribe to Premium, which gives early access to our campaigns. The purchase frequency of these users is 11 times a year. What we have achieved so far is possible thanks to the trust we have built and achieved with brands and consumers for 15 years in Brazil.”
– High recurrence of the consumer base
– Solid relationships with brands
– Premium consumers
Among everything your company does to gain and maintain trust, what are the three fronts/actions that you consider essential?
Claudia Góes, Microsoft Brazil
Security and privacy: Our work is guided by a core set of principles: fairness, trustworthiness and security, privacy and security, inclusion, transparency and accountability. We take a cross-enterprise approach through cutting-edge research, world-class engineering systems, and policy and governance excellence.
Transparency: the company is transparent in its business practices, policies and operations. This includes being open, for example, about how user data is collected, used and protected.
Impact: Microsoft is a company concerned with the impact of its actions and the technologies it develops on society. The company directs all its efforts to fulfill its corporate mission of empowering every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.
Pedro Torres, Gerdau
Ethic: The central pillar is ethics, the first step to establishing trust with anyone.
Transparency: provide transparency, not only for the good things, but for the challenges and dilemmas that an industry like ours also faces. It has a lot to do with communication and establishes trust and admiration, even when you have problems to solve.
Quality and excellence of products and services: a 122-year-old company, about to turn 123, if it doesn't establish ties with its audiences, it won't reach that age.
Frequency and consistency: trust is a difficult process to gain, but easy to lose; Therefore, these behaviors and characteristics have to be maintained very frequently and consistently, because there is no point in gaining trust and not keeping it. This is the big challenge.
Nailê Rocha, Iguatemi Porto Alegre
Promise and deliver: delivery of promised results to stakeholders.
Alignment in culture: team posture consistent with company values and compliance.
No noise: clear and transparent communication with all stakeholders.
Cris Duclos, Sicredi
Brand experience: trust is a consequence of experiences with the brand over time and at every moment of the journey.
Close and humanized relationship: strengthens the trust relationship.
Digital: Being close to our associates is essential so that they see us as a partner they can count on through the channel they prefer.
Known brand: We are running a nationwide campaign, so that our brand is better known throughout Brazil. After all, people only trust those they know. Trust is one of the priority attributes of our brand, which is achieved through the combination of the solidity of the institution and being ethical and transparent in all interactions. We always want to be the partner that our more than 7 million members can count on and trust.
Luciana Iodice, Privalia
Consistency: The first point is the consistency, transparency and experience that we provide to our consumers throughout the entire process, because it has to be true throughout the year, from all campaigns, from the discovery of our platform to the moment of purchase and possible return.
Partnership with brands: The second pillar is with brands, as we are a partner, not just another channel. We are concerned with representing them in the best way and always carrying out actions with great transparency and side by side with them.
Aligned and engaged leaders: The third point, which makes all of this possible, is the very good alignment between all leaders and with our team, with the same values, with the same transparency, because, otherwise, we cannot deliver from the door to outside too.
- Photo credit: Disclosure
