Building Consumer Digital Trust: What Marketers Need to Know
Building Consumer Digital Trust: What Marketers Need to Know
Every day, millions of people scroll through reviews, ratings, and photos before making a purchase. They rely on other consumers to help them decide what’s worth their money and attention. But here’s the challenge: nearly two-thirds of consumers believe they’ve seen fake reviews, and more than half worry that platforms remove real posts. This growing skepticism threatens the effectiveness of one of marketers’ most powerful tools:: user-generated content (UGC).
Recent research led by Rachel Hochstein, Colleen Harmeling, and Taylor Perko identifies what drives (and destroys) consumer trust in online content, and how marketers can protect it.
The study defines consumer digital trust as the confidence people have in online information they can’t easily verify. In a world where we can’t see who’s behind every post, that trust becomes the foundation for every digital interaction. Through a meta-analysis of 128 studies across 19 platforms over 19 years, the researchers found that UGC positively impacts firm performance, but only when certain trust conditions are met. Specifically, consumers need to believe that the digital environment minimizes two things: misrepresented content — fake or exaggerated portrayals of experiences, and missing content — posts that have been deleted, hidden, or filtered out. When either suspicion creeps in, trust erodes. Engagement drops.
Verify What’s Real
Badges, “verified purchase” labels, and helpfulness ratings make a difference. These cues tell audiences that real people stand behind their words. Platforms and brands that emphasize verification features see higher returns on UGC performance.
About the Research
Toward a Theory of Consumer Digital Trust: Meta-analytic Evidence of its Role in the Effectiveness of User-generated Content
Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science (JAMS), 2025
Authors:
Rachel Hochstein
Colleen Harmeling
Taylor Perko
Full Citation:
Hochstein, R.E., Harmeling, C.M. & Perko, T. Toward a theory of consumer digital trust: Meta-analytic evidence of its role in the effectiveness of user-generated content. J. of the Acad. Mark. Sci. 53, 1034–1054 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11747-023-00982-y
Takeaway for marketers: Make verification visible. Use verified tags, authenticity badges, or transparency notes on user content and influencer posts.
Keep It Unfiltered
Photo filters and heavy digital touch-ups might look sleek, but they also make consumers doubt what they see. In the research, content-enhancing features like filters weakened the relationship between UGC and performance.
Takeaway for marketers: Encourage authentic, unedited imagery. Campaigns like CVS’s #BeautyUnaltered succeeded because they embraced imperfection, and consumers rewarded that honesty.
Don’t Delete the Story
When reviews or posts disappear, consumers notice, and they wonder what’s missing. Suspicion of missing content prevents audiences from generalizing what they read into broader brand beliefs.
Takeaway for marketers: Keep content history intact. Avoid quietly removing old posts or negative feedback; instead, respond transparently. Consistency over time builds credibility.
Adjust to the Climate
Media coverage about moderation or censorship can influence how people interpret content. When news headlines raise questions about how platforms control or remove posts, audiences grow cautious. The research shows that in those moments, simple engagement signals, such as polls and votes, carry more weight than long-form reviews. These quick, visible metrics act as trust shortcuts.
Takeaway for marketers: When skepticism runs high, lean into visible engagement like polls and reactions. When trust rebounds, encourage richer storytelling: videos, reviews, testimonials.
Digital trust isn’t just a brand safety issue, it’s a performance issue. Platform features that promote authenticity and transparency significantly strengthen the positive impact of UGC on firm performance. As consumers navigate a world of algorithms, filters, and fake accounts, marketers who commit to authenticity, transparency, and consistency can make UGC work harder and more credibly for their brand.
User-generated content still holds enormous persuasive power, but only when it’s trusted. By building digital environments that feel real, complete, and transparent, marketers can turn skepticism into engagement and trust into conversion.
From the Authors
What marketing challenge(s) does your article address?
Every day, millions of consumers seek out online user-generated content about brands (e.g., brand comments, reviews, likes) to help them make purchase decisions because they think brand-related content created by other consumers is more believable than marketing communications. Yet 62% of consumers believe they have encountered fake user-generated content, and 54% of Americans report concerns that platforms may have removed legitimate user-generated content. We respond to these concerns to identify what features of online platforms, which we call digital trust cues, lead consumers to trust online user-generated content.
What companies/organizations/industries will benefit from your findings?
Any company or industry relying on online user-generated content (customer reviews, photos, comments, likes etc.) to generate awareness and interest in their offerings benefits from the findings of this research. This includes diverse industries like hospitality and travel, beauty, and home goods industries among many others. Companies that run engagement marketing campaigns, where they entice customers to create user-generated content through giveaways, contests, or other appeals, can use this research to develop their engagement marketing campaign strategies. Finally, social media influencers who depend on building trust with consumer audiences can benefit from the findings as well.
Using one of the entities listed above, illustrate precisely how and to what extent it may benefit.
Digital Trust Cue #1: Verified brand advocate identities and expertise.
A hotel chain, like Marriott or Hilton, could increase the value of their engagement marketing campaigns by choosing to prioritize online review platforms with badging reward systems, helpfulness ratings, and identity verifications. On their own website and apps, they should use these systems to decrease threats of misrepresented user-generated content. Nike, for example, gives runners badges on the Nike Run Club app for hitting milestones like running 100 miles. These badges can be shared on social media, providing evidence of brand advocates’ expertise in the sport when making recommendations about shoes, clothes, and other gear.
Digital Trust Cue #2: Unfiltered visual content.
The hotels should also encourage customers to post unfiltered, but still exciting, photos of their vacation so that consumers can develop positive, but realistic expectations of what their own vacation will be like. For example, Aerie, a woman’s clothing company, did this with their #AerieReal campaign. In this campaign Aerie encouraged brand advocates to post unedited photos of themselves in Aerie swimsuits by pledging to donate $1 to the National Eating Disorders Association for each uploaded photo. The resulting content from brand advocates showed the products on realistic body types and in realistic settings that helped other customers imagine what Aerie swimsuits look like on real women. In a world of airbrushed, glossy images, raw honesty can be a competitive advantage and help you stand out from the crowd.
Digital Trust Cue #3: Complete personal narratives.
When hotel chains are choosing brand advocates to partner with, they should choose to highlight brand advocates that are known to present their complete personal narrative, warts and all, regardless of the cultural temptation to alter the past based on what will serve them in the moment. Also be sure to include terms about the length of time brand post must remain visible to the public when working with brand advocates. Though the ability to delete content is common across platforms and gives users the ability to transform themselves online, it can come with costs to the effectiveness of your brand advocates. For example, the singer Selena Gomez made headlines when she deleted a photo of herself wearing a Balenciaga sweatshirt after the brand was criticized by fans. Though the majority of engagement with a post occurs within the first month of posting, the ability of a post to cultivate trust may go far beyond the first month.
Digital Trust Cue #4: Adjust strategies depending on platform reputation.
Finally, social media managers for hotel chains should keep an eye on the news to consider if online platforms are being called into question as moderators and curators of online content. This news coverage can shape the calls-to-action in engagement marketing campaigns. When concerns about online platform moderation and curation are high, they should focus on encouraging engagement in guided ways with set response options such as through polls, asking for likes, or asking customers to share branded posts. When there are less concerns about online platform moderation and curation they should encourage open-ended and creative user-generated content like written reviews, personal photos, and crafted videos.
How can the recommendations from your findings specifically be implemented?
Using the six factors above, suppliers can be strategic both in how they target discounts (based on market and targeted buyer factors) and how they design discounts (in terms of which products are discounted). In general, spillover will be minimized if the supplier targets buyers that are larger, that offer services, that have many competitors, and that have minimal online price transparency in their markets. Spillover can also be reduced by being judicious when discounting seldom-discounted products, and avoiding broad discounts across the portfolio of products being purchased.
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