Brand Affinity 5 - Transparency

Are you comfortable with the unknown? Neither are they.

If there are unknowns about your company, it may prevent consumers from fully trusting you, even if you’re the real deal. And if they don’t fully trust you, it’s hard for them to establish a positive emotional connection with you.

This explains why more and more brands are starting to embrace transparency by showing consumers what goes on behind the scenes. It helps to disarm consumers.

We often see this in industries where brands are known to cut corners, such as food, health supplements, banking and fashion to name a few. Because of bad press in industries like these (tainted food & supplements, fraud, sweatshops, etc), consumers have grown more suspicious and far less trusting. Becoming the brand that tells all can make you stand out and break down consumers’ barriers.

Brands can also leverage transparency to build not only trust, but admiration too. If your product is made of the highest quality materials, or if it’s crafted with extreme skill, precision, passion or hard work, then giving consumers a glimpse into this reality can help foster feelings of admiration and appreciation… not only for your product, but also for its journey and the people involved. Can you see the similarities between such transparency, and having a good story? (Read the post about storytelling.)

We now live in a world with a massive magnifying glass and speaker phone attached to all businesses. It’s called the internet. Chances are, if your business is up to no good, at some point people will find out, and then tell all the other people. It’s best to do good, and to give people a glimpse of your do-goodery 🙂

That goes a long way in building your brand affinity.

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