As top CMOs and marketing agencies know, brand trust is key to driving growth. It is a foundational element to building long-term brand equity and has the power to influence consumer purchases. The Asia Pacific consumer landscape is largely loyal to homegrown brands, posing challenges to international brands to compete for business. Now, savy brands are using digital solutions to get a competitive advantage to generate long-term brand trust.
The importance of brand trust
Brand trust is an intangible yet invaluable asset to your business.
According to Kantar TNS, brands with higher-than-average trust levels among consumers have increased the value of their brand by an average of 170%. Meanwhile, brands with below average trust have experienced a 13% decrease in brand value in the same period.
Brand trust is also a core component of converting consumers to purchase.
In another study by Edelman Trust, they found that brand trust is the deciding factor for 81% of consumers when they consider a purchase. This was closely followed by the product’s quality (85%) and value (84%) and was significantly ahead of customer experience (55%).
In Asia Pacific, consumers are increasingly loyal to home brands. Only 41% of consumers in Asia Pacific trust global brands, while 59% trust local brands. In Japan, 89% of consumers trust in local brands, and in China where consumers tend to be weary of local brands has seen the proportion of consumers who trust in local brands grow almost 200% from 2015 to 58%.
This poses a challenge for international brands seeking to build customer loyalty among consumers in Asia Pacific.
To gain consumer trust, international brands should make sure they deliver on their brand promise, whether that promise is responsive customer service, value for money, or guaranteed data privacy.
Brands should act as data custodians, not data vultures
In Asia Pacific, brands should convince consumers that they are data custodians, and not data vultures.
Customer should be used to build meaningful relationships with consumers. This is achieved by building products and experiences based on a deep understanding of their needs and wants.
As companies are challenged to provide increasingly personalised consumers experiences, the also face larger risks of violating data privacy laws and weakening consumer trust.
The rise of data protection movements reveals a shift towards a privacy framework that aligns with the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation. For example, China’s Personal Information Security Specification came into effect in May 2018. While the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation is non-binding, the standard is still referenced by law enforcement agencies and requires a more sophisticated approach to data consent.
In Japan, while 38% of consumers state that they are not opposed to brands using their data for personalisation, over 70% of consumers indicated that they would no longer purchase from a brand that sends them unpleasant personalised content. As a result, brands use a sensitive strategy for handling data privacy.
Nowadays, marketers are leveraging technologies such as AI-powered personalisation and data mining, which calls for a solid data protection framework to guarantee data privacy to customers.
If brands use service providers to manage their customer data, they need to take measures to ensure that the service provider follows the applicable data protection laws. A good-quality service provider would already take precautionary measures to guarantee that its systems and workflows employ the best practices for data privacy and would be able to advise you on measures required to respect the applicable privacy frameworks.
Brands should amplify marketing messages that resonate with consumers in Asia Pacific
Data is an enabler. This means that owing to CRM systems and marketing automation, data can allow brands to reach their target consumers on their preferred channels at scale. Brands can leverage data to provide engaging and relevant content that feels personalised to each consumer. Technology enables brands to focus and amplify their marketing messages to consumers across multiple owned channels.
To develop brand trust, brands should make repeated contact at key touchpoints: one study from Edelman found that 87% of respondents had strong trust in a brand after seeing it across six different touchpoints, while 13% had strong trust in a brand after seeing it only one time. Data-driven marketing that is effective identifies the touchpoints with the biggest impact on different consumer groups and will personalise these interactions at scale. This means that brands need a quality data analytics team equipped with the right skills in areas such as data wrangling to accelerate consumer trust.
In Asia Pacific where 47% of consumers are willing to switch brands, brand trust plays a crucial rule. Ultimately, brands that gain consumer trust also benefit from higher loyalty: their consumers are two times more likely to stay loyal compared with brands with an average level of trust.
Brands therefore should leverage both consumer data and social intelligence to find the values or needs that matter most to consumers in their marketing efforts.
