Privacy: Reduce your Customers? Concerns by Building Trust First ECommerce Articles | December 6 Terry Porter Jersey , 2004 Before making a purchase from you, buyers need to trust your company and think that your products and services will do what they are supposed to. Do your ... and online ... help ...
Before making a purchase from you, buyers need to trust your company and think that your products and services will do what they are supposed to. Do your marketing and online practices help establish the trust necessary to convince prospects to buy from you? What is the connection between privacy and trust? Evidence shows that the two are closely correlated.
Since the beginning of interpersonal communication, trust has been perhaps the most important influence on information disclosure. Then, when commerce started Jusuf Nurkic Blazers Jersey , people would trade with those individuals whom they trusted and would avoid those who were perceived as non-trust-worthy. Intrinsically subjective and hard to define, trust is a function of the amount and type of control one has in a relationship. Social exchange theory advocates that individuals weigh both the costs and rewards in deciding whether to engage in social transactions. Aided by a little common sense we can conclude that if the rewards outweigh the costs, then the individual is likely to enter into an exchange relationship whereas if the cost outweighs the rewards there will be no exchange. This trade-off occurring inside people?s minds should not be overlooked since it ultimately determines whether they will buy from you or not.
The same process takes place in cyberspace. That is, the risks of disclosing personal information are weighed against the benefits when deciding to provide information to a website. Hence, trust is critical to disclosure in both interpersonal and online relationships. This is where privacy concerns come in.
In a previous article; ?How to write a privacy policy? C.J. McCollum Blazers Jersey , we said that privacy involves protecting our integrity as individuals and our right to disclose or not to disclose our personal information to third parties. Since technology has become such a powerful enabler of data collection and utilization, one of the biggest IT responsibilities is making sure that the personal information their systems collect is protected from misuse and abuse. Who draws the line that separates them both? This seems to be quite an intricate issue.
As a consequence of the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001, increased security is a reality in today's world. As the US government collects more personal information about its citizens, are Americans really confident that their personal information is being safeguarded without their privacy being compromised? A survey conducted by the Ponemon Institute, a leading privacy think tank Damian Lillard Blazers Jersey , in September 2003 uncovers some interesting findings. The more than 6,000 Americans who participated in this first annual Privacy Trust Survey were asked to indicate their confidence, as it relates to protecting privacy, regarding 60 different government agencies. The overall results indicated that the majority of Americans surveyed (83%) consider privacy a matter that is important or very important to them. Nonetheless, many respondents indicated they have a high level of uncertainty about the government agencies that collect and use that information Jusuf Nurkic Kids Jersey , thus creating a negative impression of those organizations. The survey also showed that protecting personal information is important to people of all ages, education and income levels. Among the organizations scoring the highest were hospitals, doctors, banks and the U.S. Postal Service. Those ranking lowest included retailers, grocery stores C.J. McCollum Kids Jersey , telephone companies and the newly created Department of Homeland Security. Although at a first glance it might seem somewhat strange that two federal government agencies could score so differently on the survey, a closer look would explain the apparent discrepancy. When you compare the two, it is easy to see why consumers trust the mailman more than the people fighting terrorism. The Postal Service has more than a century of proof it can be trusted, while the Department of Homeland Security does not yet have such proof.
A number of studies of interpersonal exchange situations have confirmed that trust reduces the perceived risks or cost involved in revealing private information. As a case in point, Jarvenpaa and Tractinsky in their ?Internet Consumer Trust Model? (1999) found that trust increases confidence in a company Damian Lillard Kids Jersey , which lowers the perceived risk of electronic exchange with that company and, therefore, increases the likelihood of consumers engaging in electronic transactions. Similarly, Swaminathan et al. in the ?Exchange Model? (1999) established that consumers prefer to do business with web sites that they perceive to be reliable, honest Jusuf Nurkic Youth Jersey , consistent, competent, fair, responsible, helpful C.J. McCollum Youth Jersey , and altruistic, all of which are main components of trust.
All of the above indicates that the role of trust in facilitating disclosure is especially critical in online exchanges, where computer-mediated communication replaces physical contact. Other potential issues on the Internet include; technical difficulties for people who are new to the online world, lack of ability for consumers to physically inspect goods prior to purchase, and new companies that have not been in the market long enough to establish good reputations. Trust is important because it contributes to building a good or bad image of the company before the customers? eyes. Negative images are very hard to change. This is why this is such a delicate and critical issue.