Gen Z shoppers are less trusting of brands compared to Boomers, according to Morning Consult’s report, “Most Trusted Brands—The State of Consumer Trust.”
Ongoing data and privacy breaches in the last few years have cost brands big—that’s in terms of dollars and a loss of consumer trust. Yet the findings indicate consumers tend to have more trust for larger brands. According to Morning Consult, three-quarters of Americans trust the average major company to consistently fulfill its promises.
While most brands remain largely well trusted by consumers, there’s still a generational gap between those trusted by young consumers versus older generations. Morning Consult found that USPS, Amazon, and Google are the most trusted brands across generations. Gen Z and millennials have the most faith in Google, which earned the top spot, followed by Netflix, Amazon, YouTube, and PlayStation. Gen X and Boomers, on the other hand, trust USPS the most, followed by Google, Amazon, The Hershey Company and PayPal.
On why consumers trust USPS and Paypal, reasons include they’re reliable, they deliver the mail no matter the weather, they have security measures and you’re guaranteed to get what you order.
Younger consumers are more likely than older adults to prioritize ethical matters when considering which brands to trust. A majority of Gen Z and millennials are less likely to buy from brands that are not ethically or responsibly run.
Reliability and data protection remain necessary blocks to retain consumer confidence, as 73 percent of participants said protecting personal data is very important when considering whether to trust a company. This is followed by 71 percent who said making products that work as advertised is important. Of the most trusted brands, only two—YouTube and Android—were founded after 2000.
The three areas of distrust that brands need to address to gain more consumer trust are protecting data privacy, making what’s in fine print clear and easy to understand and treating employees better than required by law.
Morning Consult’s findings are based on 16,700 interviews per brand for 2,000 brands conducted from October 2-December 2, 2019 as well as interviews with 2,200 US adults from December 3-5. The surveys asked participants: “How much of you trust each brand to do what is right?” with the options of answering “a lot,” “some,” “not much” or “not at all.”
This article first appeared on a.list