55% of Online Consumers Distrust Brands with Their Personal Information

By
Staff Writer
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77 per cent of consumers said that they would unsubscribe from brands because they feel their information is being misused. These are among the key findings in a new Optimove 2023 Consumer Trust of Retailers Survey of 406 U.S. consumers. Optimove is a Customer-Led Marketing Platform.

 More than half (55 per cent) of consumers surveyed do not trust brands with their personal information, and 77 per cent unsubscribe from brands because they feel their information is being misused. These are among the key findings in a new Optimove 2023 Consumer Trust of Retailers Survey of 406 U.S. consumers. Optimove is a Customer-Led Marketing Platform.

Respondents said that their top fear is that their “financial information will be stolen,” cited by 49 per cent, followed by their “identity will be stolen,” chosen by 33 per cent of the consumers. Results revealed that respondents think trust between brands and consumers is eroding overall with the following results: getting worse (41 per cent), staying the same (35 per cent), and improving (24 per cent).   

At the same time, a total of 64 per cent are loyal to and shop at brands they do not trust comprised of the following: 32% shop at an online brand they do not trust “daily,” and another 32 per cent said they shop at brands they do not trust but “try to avoid them.”

When asked what the “most important action” is in consumers trusting a brand, 56 per cent responded, “having a policy that the marketer will not share personal information.” The second most important action was the brand “asks my permission to offer suggestions,” chosen by 31 per cent of consumers.

And 82 per cent of respondents said it is “extremely or very important” that they are “in control of the personal information they share with online brands.”

Pini Yakuel, CEO & Founder at Optimove, said, “Trust and loyalty are inextricably linked. For consumers, if trust is broken by misuse of personal information, marketers rarely get a second chance. While consumers often choose an online retailer based on price, they will leave because of a marketer’s service miscues. It means that once a customer engages with a brand, the marketer must make the customer experience stellar by listening to and responding to customer needs and desires.”

Yakuel added that consumers are human and can be illogical. “More than six in ten consumers shop at brands they don’t trust. It shows that price and convenience may be worth the ‘risk’ for a shopper. They will not necessarily switch when the brand has delivered on time with the right products – especially for commodities.”

Other key results are as follows:

  • Top action brands can take to build trust: a policy that personal information will not be shared, selected by 56per cent of respondents. 
  • Email is the preferred channel by consumers for sharing personal information, selected by 67 per cent of consumers surveyed.
  • Personal information consumers feel safest about sharing: email (53 per cent), gender (52 per cent), age (49 per cent)
  • Marketers who send excessive or irrelevant offers to consumers are trusted less: 46 per cent said they trust a marketer less; just 19 per cent trust a marketer more