Michael Porter, a leading authority on strategy identified two types of corporate strategic advantages: low-cost and differentiation. With all due respect to Mr. Porter, we at Social Strategy1 think that there is a third – Trust.

Trust is one of the most desirable qualities within any partnership. It cannot be bought, imitated or stolen. It’s also been proven that trust can be profitable: boosting customer trust by 5% can increase profits by 25% to 95%. At Social Strategy1, we believe companies that get closer to consumers and earn their loyalty, emerge as winners in an increasingly competitive business environment.

However, projecting a corporate image that inspires loyalty today is not easy. With the emergence of internet-based social media, consumers are now empowered to make informed decisions about where to buy and who to buy from. They are cynical about corporate information as only 6% trust advertisements and 77% ignore corporate altogether and are more likely to buy based on trusted opinions.

The new paradigm in shopping is first to review and research products online before buying and with the amount of user-generated content available, it’s really not that hard. There are over 200 million blogs online and 27.3 million tweets per day , more than half of which are dedicated to product, shopping and corporate reviews and social shopping is becoming the biggest trend. However, businesses that filter and respond to this vast amount of data, can often discover that this is an overwhelming and uncontrollable process, and consider outsourcing social media efforts.

Do you know what buyers are saying about your company? Do you like what they are saying? You don’t have a choice, because the amount of user-generated content is growing every day.

At Social Strategy1, we think that participation in the world of information-hungry consumers is a great opportunity to establish brand awareness, increase sales and reinforce your customer’s commitment. After all, the biggest strategic advantage in business is trust. And it has been proven that trust established through social media is not only credible, but also profitable. View case studies on social media.

Talk to our analysts to see how your business can enhance its trustworthiness.