Building and Maintaining Client Trust in an Agency 

It’s difficult to overstate the importance of client trust in digital marketing agencies. Without a level of trust, it’s virtually impossible to run a successful digital marketing campaign. It’s no surprise that many agencies struggle to build and maintain a trust-based relationship with their clients.

We’re extremely proud of our 92.3 Net Promoter Score (NPS) which has come as a result of building deep trust with our clients.

Eyeful CEO Antonella Pisani recently authored a guest post for Search Engine Land. In her post, she describes and explains strategies to build client trust. Here, we’ll hit on the highlights of the article.


The Trust Equation

Three Components of Trust

Whether in business or personal relationships, trust is built on three essential components:

  1. Credibility — Can you do what you say you will do?

  2. Reliability — Will you do what you say you will do?

  3. Intimacy — Do people feel good about entrusting projects to you?

These components collectively define trustworthiness. For a solid relationship, clients need all three to be present. Trust may be hard to regain once any element is broken or tarnished.

Self-Orientation and Trust

Even if you have all three components solidly in place, your self-orientation plays a crucial part. You may have all the experience in the world and consistently deliver what you promise. If clients feel that your actions are entirely self-serving, trust will be broken. 

Clients need to know that you want to help them and that you value your partnership and the work you do. They should never feel like just another paycheck.

The Process of Building Trust

Building trust begins before the first meeting with a new client. Here are a few steps to take as you get started:

  1. Welcome the client to your agency with a short message of appreciation. 

  2. Create a survey asking the client about their business, their team, and their marketing needs. 

  3. Introduce yourself, your agency, and your team.

  4. Offer a list of detailed next steps, with achievable deadlines, then ensure you follow up reliably.

As your relationship progresses, ensure you do everything in your power to maintain trust: 

  • Be consistent and reliable

  • Communicate transparently

  • Keep expectations clear and achievable

  • Own up to any mistakes or challenges you face

  • Offer and request clear, constructive feedback


Surviving Challenges or Breaches in Trust

Nobody is perfect, and no agency is either. This means there will be times when you miss deadlines, fail to deliver, or otherwise struggle to maintain trust. When this happens, it’s essential that you handle it with humility and honesty. 

  1. Communicate the problem to the client as soon as you reasonably can. 

  2. Offer a solution to rectify the problem. 

  3. In extreme cases, you may need to offer credits to the client to recompense them for your error.

Remember how important trust can be in agency-client and internal team dynamics. It’s essential that you invest in building and maintaining trust as a fundamental pillar of agency success.

Looking for a trusted white-label agency to partner with? If so, let’s chat

For further details, be sure to check out the original post: How to build and maintain client trust in your agency. 

Eyeful Media is a client-focused digital agency listed among America’s fastest-growing private companies. We seek to place client/agency relationships at the forefront of everything we do. 

If you’re interested in learning about some of our tips and strategies, check out our recent articles, including:

Antonella P.