The latest PwC Trust survey shows that it can get worse...

How much do consumers care about ESG and rising prices?

Photo: @lattefarsan via Flickr.

Building trust with consumers and employees is good business. Last year, PwC showed that 33% of consumers are willing to pay a premium for products from companies that they trust. 19% of employees surveyed chose an employer they highly trusted.

However, the downside of distrust is stronger. 44% of consumers surveyed claimed to have stopped buying from a company due to a lack of trust. 22% of employees have left a company because of trust issues. Perhaps, some of the employees who shifted during the great resignation left because they simply did not trust their employer rather than primarily for a better salary or position.

The disconnect between business leaders and society

With all of the focus on purpose and ESG initiatives, the trust gap between business leaders and their employees and consumers continues to grow. In fact, the latest PwC Trust Survey shows that, yes, it can get worse.

87% of business leaders think customers highly trust their companies when only about 30% of consumers do. That’s a 57-point gap!

Business leaders still do not understand that grandstanding on ESG without follow-through or substance is worse than sitting on the sidelines. Almost half of the business leaders surveyed implemented transparent ESG reporting. While investors loved the new reporting, consumers mostly yawned and ignored these efforts.

After all, if a consumer does not trust a company, would they trust that company’s self-reported ESG and diversity efforts?

How is trust built?

With so much focus on trust, does leadership understand how to build trust with consumers and employees? 47% of executives say that trust is built from customers, employees, and other stakeholders rather than senior leadership.

Consumers and employees disagree. They look to the C-suite to take the lead in trust-building.

Question: How much do you agree that trust is more bottom-up than top-down.

Source: PwC's Trust: The new currency for business.

Consumer trust and price

One new layer to the trust survey is the increasing importance of price in building trust as inflation increasingly affects consumers. The affordability of products and services is becoming more important to consumers.

PwC recommends that companies focus on transparency around maintaining quality to ensure that consumers understand the value that they are providing their customers.

However, there is a deeper way to build long-term trust through action. Consumers want the companies that they support to act in solidarity with them. With claims around inflated corporate profits, consumers are looking to companies who can tighten their belts as much as consumers.

Trust is not built on a winner-takes-all system. It is an ecosystem of giving and taking. Being transparent about the cost inflation and potential hits on profitability will build trust.

A business that can authentically show that it understands how consumers are hurting and lend a hand to help will win the day — capturing market share and deeply loyal customers.

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