Graham Jones, the Internet Psychologist just posted an interesting article on his blog (errr, website?). It's about a research that shows that bloggers are the ones that have the least trust of all people when it comes to recommendations of a product. Now, why would that be? Isn't that in contrast with what we social media marketers like to think and preach?
I think the key here is building a relationship. I don't trust A blogger I come a cross, no more than a person on the street that I have never met before. It could be anyone. But there are certain bloggers that I read regularly, have commented on and who have commented on my blog, whose recommendations I would take just as seriously as if they were from a close friend.
I have the feeling that the question was too limited to give a correct picture. First of all, we might have to limit the question only to those who read blogs in the first place. If I have never read a blog, I'm certainly not going to trust a blogger. We might even have to stop thinking about them as bloggers, like Graham suggests that we stop thinking about our blogs as blogs. It's a conversation where we build relationships with our customers (and even competitors) and through constant ongoing interaction with our readers, they get to know us and trust us. So asking if you trust a blogger is pretty much like asking if you trust a person. What person? What blogger? Someone I know or a complete stranger?
If we look at the other end of the scale, we see that people trust "people like ourselves" the most. That's what makes blogging so good for businesses. Because you can change from being the voice of a CEO (or even worse, just a blogger) to being the voice of a "person like myself". That gets you (and your blog) to the top of the scale.
So I guess we just have to stop being bloggers and start being "people like ourselves", building relationships.
Hjörtur
Great post....made me think!
Posted by: Saul Colt | April 08, 2008 at 11:35 PM
Found you via Graham. This article and the one about Facebook are good reads.
Need a Presenter?
Posted by: Jeremy Jacobs | April 09, 2008 at 12:28 PM
Found you via Graham. This article and the one about Facebook are good reads.
Need a Presenter?
Posted by: Jeremy Jacobs | April 09, 2008 at 12:29 PM
Thanks for the offer, Jeremy. Just sent you an email and a LinkedIn invitation.
Cheers
Hjörtur
Posted by: Hjörtur Smárason | April 09, 2008 at 02:10 PM
Hi Hjörtur,
We have met in a couple online environments.
I'm glad to see that yet another blogger is interested in the 'friend', 'trust' realtime concerns of the blogosphere.
It is my guess that this topic is of interest, but is not as widely promoted and / or passed around as it could be, but is nevertheless internalized (maybe even by those we may not think hold this concern)
I never claim to 'trust' in people too often I'm afraid...online or off. It may be a downfall of mine, to be continued. But I DO try to be trustworthy. In the end, that's all we really have.
Posted by: spostareduro | April 15, 2008 at 12:46 PM
Hi Hjörtur,
We have met in a couple online environments.
I'm glad to see that yet another blogger is interested in the 'friend', 'trust' realtime concerns of the blogosphere.
It is my guess that this topic is of interest, but is not as widely promoted and / or passed around as it could be, but is nevertheless internalized (maybe even by those we may not think hold this concern)
I never claim to 'trust' in people too often I'm afraid...online or off. It may be a downfall of mine, to be continued. But I DO try to be trustworthy. In the end, that's all we really have.
Posted by: spostareduro | April 15, 2008 at 12:47 PM
I think the key here is building a relationship.
..................
Dineshani
Comment edited: Ad removed.
Posted by: Dinu2008D | April 27, 2008 at 06:55 AM