I had the pleasure of listening to Mr. Christo Van Wyk, Regional Director, Meltwater, India & Middle East, at the 8th Edition of PRAXIS on topic – ‘build brand trust’ held in Goa. Christo, a South African, living in Dubai for almost 10 years likes to introduce himself as — Christo Van Wyk, father of two children and husband of one wife. He has 10+ years of experience in emerging markets and went to business school at Oxford.

He started his key note about how to build brand trust by showing an image of MS Dhoni as a prime example of trust, and then further going on to explain how important it was for consumers to trust a brand and the fact that the brand will deliver on it’s promise at every interaction because if they don’t consumers are going to find someone who does. Corporate crisis is on the rise and consumers crave for trustworthy relations now, more than ever.

According to Christo there are four main ways on how you can build brand trust:

a) It’s not about you t, it’s about them — How one positions and markets their brand

b) Be radically empathetic — He shows Dove’s beauty campaign as an example of empathy

c) A commitment to improving lives — Consumers now look for brands that drive social changes

d) Be real — Connecting with clients will help speaking with the audience better.

He goes on to say that a brand should define what a brand’s trust means and to reach for smarter goals, get the right kind of technology and to measure brand trust. He also showed us the Nordnet Transparent banking campaign and the Sodexo campaign. Concluding his keynote with a quote “A brand is simply trust” by Steve Jobs.

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– Lakhshita Singh

Lakhshita Singh is an alumna of Class of 2020 of PG Programme in PR and Corporate Communications at SCoRe, Mumbai. She interned with Avian WE and was recruited by the firm for their Mumbai office. She is from the city of joy Kolkata. A little background, her mother’s from Rajasthan, a Jain Marwari, her father’s from Punjab a Sikh Punjabi and because both her parents work her brother and she spent a lot of time with her maternal grandmother who’s a UPite, so would like to say that she has quite a diverse background and she loves to explore new cultures. Currently she in Mumbai for her PGD in Public relations, she is an enthusiastic traveler and a music buff and even though she don’t look like one, she calls herself a foodie.

This blog post originally appeared on Lakhshita’s Blog Page: