A recent report by Edelman (featured on AdAge) shows that people don’t trust their peers as much as they used to. In fact it’s down 20% from 2008 (45% to 25%). As a matter of fact if you look at the overall “trust-O-meter”, all forms of media are down when it comes to trust and I would love to believe that they used the same demographic/psychographic group these questions.
As for the drop, this could mean many things and it’s important to remember that 43.853% of all statistics are completely fabricated. Here are the most likely reasons for you not trusting your online friends.
- Social media is maturing and people are starting to become more adept at figuring out who is honest and who is selling something or just plain wrong.
- The economy has been very bad over the last couple of years and this impacts how people talk about businesses.
- Some people don’t like to admit their ignorance so they recommend businesses they believe to be good but they have no direct connection with. You know . . . “that guy”.
- People are finally realizing that a user generated medium may not necessarily be more honest than one created by business. The only difference is that businesses have something to gain.
- You simply need new friends. Not the ones that do everything Facebook throws at them. Surveys, virtual goods (aka virtual junk); hugs, pillow fights, mystery eggs, etc.
The AdAge author makes a good point about people needing to hear things 5 times before they believe it. Fortunately for those types, there are now at least 1308 channels in which you can hear someone’s opinion; business or otherwise. As for me, I recommend:
- Reading this blog more often and recommend it to your friends.
- Reading this blog more often and recommend it to your friends.
- Reading this blog more often and recommend it to your friends.
- Reading this blog more often and recommend it to your friends.
- Reading this blog more often and recommend it to your friends.
