Greg Dunlap  0:03  
Our guest today is Margot Bloomstein. Margot is an independent content strategy consultant, as well as the author of Content Strategy At Work and most recently Trustworthy, How The Smartest Brands Beat Cynicism And Bridge The Trust Gap. And I feel like the topic of trust has a lot of parallel to community management. So it seemed natural to have Margot in here to talk about it. So welcome to the show. Margot

Margot Bloomstein  0:36  
Thank you so much. I'm excited to be here with you.

Greg Dunlap  0:39  
So I watched a talk recently, where you mentioned you've been researching this book since like, 2016. So what got you interested in the topic of trust? And what did the path to turning that into a book look like?

Margot Bloomstein  0:52  
So in, in 2016, as you may remember, we were in the throes of a kind of heated political moment that maybe would be determining the future of the country. But we had things well in hand, and we thought surely against the backdrop of so many decades, where we'd seen what happened when politicians were caught in a lie, or when they were caught flip flopping, or playing fast and loose with the truth. Surely, that  all of history would marshal around those problems and kind of right itself and say, "Well, when the American public or when the media catches a politician in the course of a lie, that scuttles their campaign. They're dead on arrival. Then we turn to the other person in the race." And we've seen that time and time again, but it didn't happen that time. And I think that that caught my attention. I was curious through the course of the campaign, we saw, kind of creative revisions of history on both sides of the aisle. And I was curious why the reaction to those, that sort of editorial oversight, I guess, seemed to be changing. Why it seemed that folks were doubling down on the candidates that they supported, even when they would catch them in a lie, even when they would catch them acting in ways that violated their their core principles and the platform on which they were running. People were still basically saying, "Yep, that's the person for me." And it turned out, it was more about the identity of the voters, and how voters thought of themselves, and their own ability to evaluate information, less about the candidates. And my interest in that and what was happening around trust, and how we violate and can lose or maintain trust, that kind of spurred my interest in the topics in the book. Because I think we saw those problems start in the space of politics, and the media, what happens when you lose trust or what happens when you've got it? And are able to keep it? Why does that work for some politicians and some brands, it started in the realm of politics and media. But I think those problems and challenges that we saw around trust, cynicism, gaslighting, and education, those issues now affect every industry and brands in so many industries in the private sector and the public sector. Issues in cynicism and skepticism and trust undermine public health. Currently, as we're talking about vaccination, public vaccination programs, and certainly the new work happening around the COVID-19 vaccines. They're not just being met with enthusiasm, but also a lot of cynicism, a lot of fear and doubt, that will continue to affect public health. And then we also see how in the private sector, so much marketing has fallen flat over the past year, because more and more people don't believe everything they hear from brands that they thought they knew well. And we don't have the same kind of arbiters of truth. And as a result when marketing is falling flat and sales cycles are taking longer, we need to figure out why don't people trust certain brands anymore. And if you're a brand, if you're a corporation, or if you're a community, I think it makes a lot of sense to look at how you can foster trust. And if that is by doing the same thing that you've been doing all along which, its no spoilers, but it's not. But rather by looking at how we can empower people and educate educate people to kind of pull them back from from the brink and the sort of claws of gaslighting and how we can educate them. So they become smarter, more confident, more active participants, as consumers in civic spaces and in the communities in which they they kind of live and work and learn and play.

Greg Dunlap  5:22  
I have a journalism background, and I was thinking that distrust with the media has been going back for decades now. It's been growing since all the way dating back when I was in college. And distrust in all of our public institutions, be they government or utilities or anything has has been diminishing over and over with time. Did you go back into history and sort of follow the strands to where we got here now?

Margot Bloomstein  5:56  
Somewhat. I think I was looking at I think for many of us that are sort of, of this age, we've grown up in this milleu of hearing people say, well, that's how they get you. Everybody's out to sell something, all politicians lie, you can't trust any of them, whatever the them is, in that case within a particular space. And I think we've seen within the context of journalism, how, in some cases, journalists and broader mass media have acted as those arbiters of truth to kind of take what politicians are saying, and hold their feet to the fire and fact check them. And that was far easier when we had fewer competing news outlets. And when the news media cycle was that much slower. I mean, now we talk about it being a continuous news cycle. I know when I was a kid, there were, in many markets, newspapers that came out twice a day, there was the morning news and the evening news. We've seen how in many markets that's condensed. And certainly those papers themselves have condensed and in time gone away too. How that has all changed. But yeah, as I said, I feel like this is a problem that maybe began in, in politics, and media and journalism and all that now affects so many other industries, too.

Greg Dunlap  7:29  
Yeah, I mean, another thing that struck me when you were first starting, is that there is a relationship between trust and truth. Right? And that when truth breaks down, it seems like trust breaks down as well. Would you say that's true?

Margot Bloomstein  7:44  
Yeah, I think that's a fair statement. I think as we as we wrangle with the concept of truth, we also have to address that ... I keep using this phrase the arbiters of truth, we used to have people that, you know, kind of the Walter Cronkite of the day that could say, right, this is how it is, this is the most important thing on which you need to focus. And this is the singular, accurate perspective on it. And with the rise of social media, where anybody with a camera can think of themselves as a journalist, they're on the scene capturing what's going on capturing the evidence of their own eyes. A number of media outlets have had to wrangle with the fact that they're not sole arbiters of the truth, that now the public with whom they used to converse by presenting the truth, now that public wants an active role in determining the truth and in telling their story to because I think that's the other side of it. The truth used to be a narrow thing where editors said, this is what's important, here's where you should focus, the other stuff, not so much. And that left a lot of stories out of the public record. I think that people in the majority didn't always have have their attention focused on the most important topics. Maybe just what an editor found is the most popular topics and kind of popularity feeds on itself in that way. But now as social media and the technologies behind social media have effectively democratized our access to the truth in the way we tell those stories. That's something that we need to wrangle with too. And so I see more and more in the future of journalism, where historically It was kind of a one to many kind of publication process. And through social media, we have many to many things. The other side of democratizing access to the truth is that smart journalism doesn't just present the facts. or present analysis on the facts. But it also presents the data and information behind the facts to effectively say to the audience, don't trust us trust but verify. Here's where we've been focusing our research. you sift through the data, too. And I think we see that in organizations like BuzzFeed and Vox. I recently spoke with some of the team from The M arkup about this. D ata driven journalism that exposes the data that basically says, "Don't believe us. You do the work too." That builds a lot of confidence, to show your work and, and to know that if your audience wants to dig in, they can.

Greg Dunlap  10:50  
Boy, there's a lot to unpack there. I could easily spend an entire podcast talking about the place of truth in our society and how that relates back to journalism. But we'll save that for another time, I think. Because, boy, do I have some thoughts about that? So  back to the topic of trust in general. In this talk, you talked about a framework with three parts - voice, volume, and vulnerability. So how did you land on these pieces as important and how do they play into how people perceive what they do and don't trust?

Margot Bloomstein  11:36  
Well, I was finding, I was starting to see patterns around organizations that did have trust, and then kind of players that weren't doing so well in various industries. And these were the common themes that I was coming across. And so then, as I continued to do research to say, "Alright, this is my theory, that we can build trust by focusing between these three areas. Does this framework hold up?" Then, as I look for other examples of it, that was kind of my my research process. But I started with seeing those patterns and kind of noticing them and then seeing if it was idiosyncratic, or if there was something there. And so what I mean by that framework. Voice refers to how we communicate consistently over time and across channels. The kind of familiar way that brands communicate visually, as well as verbally, so that their audiences know they're in the right place. Know that this is an organization that feels like what they would expect. And that even as this organization maybe is adding new services over time, tweaking and updating areas of its brand, it's still Jenny from the block. It's still the organization that you know, and there's comfort in that sense. Okay, this is the paper I grew up with, or this is the cereal that I know, or the the makeup company that I trust, or the health service and health insurance company that I know, and that knows me. There's some sense of comfort in that, but also confidence that, yeah, I am in the right place, and I know how to use this company. I know how to get services from them. It's a measure of self-confidence that is mirrored then in confidence in the organization. By volume I mean how organizations determine how much to say. How much information to share to help their their various audiences make decisions and feel good about the decisions they make. And again, this is both visual and verbal. In some organizations, it makes sense to say a lot, to share voluminous detail about maybe how they craft their products. Usage information, the backstory behind recipes and all. And in other cases, it makes sense for an organization to save very little. In Trustworthy I contrast the work of America's Test Kitchen and gov.uk. In both cases, they're trying to empower their respective audiences with information. Turns out for one audience, they need a lot of information to feel good and feel like they know what they're doing. In the other case, British citizens don't want voluminous detail around how to access government services. They want to know kind of just the facts in a stepwise fashion, and know when they reach the end of information so they don't have to go searching myriad other webpages across the the government's web presence. And that plays out visually as well to some organizations. They need to offer detailed diagrams about how to put together their products or a lot of information in the context of imagery. And in other cases, they keep things more pared back. The third area where I feel like organizations can work to foster trust is how they lean into vulnerability, or how they they weigh the risk of prototyping and sharing more about who they are and their own evolution as an organization. Especially right now, so many companies, so many government entities, so many public health organizations, they're figuring it out as they go along. And that can be a shared humanizing way of building community. Of saying, we're all in this together, here's what we're trying to get right. But for some organizations, they keep that all very close to the vest. They want to still maintain the image of maybe being bigger and more confident than they are. And they're finding out that, that doesn't really go over too well. With many audiences, we see how the effects of false bravado and empty promises play out whether it's around updates around a vaccine for COVID-19, or around how organizations are remodeling their businesses. In the face of #metoo, are they actually putting the hard work into examine corporate policies and culture, or are they paying lip service to it through an ad campaign. Vulnerability takes work and exposes the inner workings of an organization. But that's really what we mean when we talk about the value of transparency and authenticity. And you don't achieve those things and you don't earn trust around them without putting yourself out there as an organization. And maybe as individuals in an organization.

Greg Dunlap  16:58  
It's interesting, because we're both consultants, and I'm sure that we both had clients at one time or another who are more focused on their own internal needs than the needs of their users. And you can definitely feel that in their product some ways, but those ways can be really intangible. And so it's interesting to have a framework around which you can kind of classify or or figure out what's going on behind them.

Margot Bloomstein  17:31  
Right, right. And I think of examples like BuzzFeed. As they've rolled out different features across the site over the past several years, they'll oftentimes prototype in public, whether it's the new format for a map, or a new way that they're approaching gathering data in a story. They'll put it out there with simply a description of here's what we're trying to achieve, what do you think? And then have open comments below it, which is daring and scary and incredibly valuable in many organizations. Similarly, they believe in bringing outside perspectives to the table, so some of their articles end with a little boxed feature called Outside Your Bubble, where they're cultivating and curating perspectives that are coming from the topic on Reddit and what people are saying on Twitter and Facebook. And also to kind of say, we trust our audience enough that we want you to know more about this topic than just what we are saying. So let's bring those other ideas to the table too. And then I think there's also the other angle on vulnerability, when organizations choose to share more about their personal growth or just about what makes them unique and different in an industry. And it serves to help their audience better understand who they are, and also better self identify. Penzey's is a wonderful example of that. They're a spice company based in in Milwaukee, a spice retailer, I should say. And shortly after the 2016 election, they published a long post on Facebook that said, here's what we think about the results of the election. And a candidate that is anti-immigration is opposed to the values by which we run our business. And I'm sure there are a lot of people that gut reaction was to read it first and say you're a spice company, what are you doing talking about your personal politics? Stay in your lane. And then they tried to pre-empt that by saying further down through the post that the the work of being in the spice industry is one that entails sourcing product from lots of other countries. When they're marketing Aleppo pepper, that's from a war torn region. And we should discuss why that is the case. They also comment in that post ... the CEO, Bill Penzey in writing it commented that the way we cook in America is due to the story of immigration, and that so many of our recipes come here on the backs of immigrants and then become a part of our national story. And so he was saying, you know, what, policies that make immigration more difficult. They're not in line with the, the policies and the values of our company. This is how we feel about it. If you feel this way, too, here's how you can support us. And here's how you can support efforts to to be on the right side of history here. And they got a lot of pushback, it was a risky, risky move for them. And I don't know that it was a very calculated move. But they lost customers, they ended up gaining far more customers than they lost though. And it turned out every time they posted similarly on on various social issues that have kind of come to light over the past few years, they saw a huge spike in their traffic and in their sales. A lot of people now shop from Penzey's, that aren't home cooks, they don't know a lot about the products that they're buying until they read about them there. But they think I want to support this. And somebody I know is going to need a birthday or a holiday present soon. So I'm getting it from Penzey's.

Greg Dunlap  21:36  
Yeah, it's interesting how all of those elements really tie in together and how much you talked a little bit earlier about consistency, right? And how about how consistency versus inconsistency really tie into that as well. Because, you know, I'm thinking about .. like you were talking about public prototyping and people don't like being surprised. But if you frame it properly, then they don't mind it. But you know, as opposed to like, you know, everybody's complaining whenever Facebook or Twitter's UI changes, and they're very surprised by it. And they have no idea why it happened and no background on it and stuff like that. And those things create problems with trust as well.

Margot Bloomstein  22:17  
Right? Yeah. Because as you said, nobody likes those surprises. And our initial reaction is, you know, how dare you change this thing. That is MY thing, where I've built MY network and this is where I see MY friends, and now you're changing it on me. And I just think if Facebook, if Twitter, if any organization that is anticipating change can share the process getting there with their audience, that would be so much better for everyone involved. For the designers and the developers, as well as for the users. And again, that takes a an investment in vulnerability. But that's how we draw our communities close by exposing the product roadmap. By saying, here's where we think we're succeeding now. But these are changes that we want to make. Here's what's coming down the pike. What do you think? Here's how we're getting to that final end product, where we're moving toward right now, by gathering feedback along the way, and bringing your users into the process of creation, whether it's by offering feedback, or simply informing them, hosting open houses, and listening sessions, all of that. It all works together to help build more confidence in your audience. It's certainly a show of respect that you want to expose this process to them. But it also it helps them feel more confident that they know where things are going, that there aren't going to be changes that take them by surprise. And it also helps to build loyalty. And I think I've seen that, certainly, in my own work as a content strategist. When I mean, maybe like 10 years ago, if I was working with a client to roll out new editorial style guidelines, I used to say that it would feel kind of like we would write them and then Heisman them over and drop them into the company and then I'm sure they got used a ton. Right. I don't do that anymore. And I think most content strategists don't take that approach anymore. Instead, what I found works better is to bring close the people that will be using those style guidelines, convene listening sessions, and I'll facilitate workshops to make sure that I'm hearing from people what might be the challenge or issue with updating things to be in sentence case when previously we've used title case everywhere. Or the challenges that we might see in adopting a certain punctuation style or new phrasing around things. I want people to be able to share their concerns so that as we arrive at consensus for those changes, they feel like they can champion those changes as well. That they've been a part of the process, not simply recipients of the change. And I think for organizations, when at a corporate level, they can take that same approach of saying, here's where we're going and create brand champions along the way that can help to evangelize the change. That works really, really well for corporations, as well as for government initiatives, too. I hope to see more of that moving forward, more transparency around the missteps, maybe in vaccine production, and more transparency and openness about the challenges because false bravado gets us nowhere. And I think we all have more confidence when we can see how people respond to challenges and then rise above them through the work.

Greg Dunlap  26:03  
One of the things you've talked about, and you mentioned it a little bit earlier, is America's Test Kitchen. In this talk I was listening to earlier you talk about how they have fostered trust, versus how maybe other recipe recipe or cooking centric sites have or haven't fostered trust. Can you talk a little bit through about what you found there?

Margot Bloomstein  26:26  
Sure. Well, one of the things that really struck me when I sat down with with Jack Bishop, the Chief Creative Officer of America's Test Kitchen, we were sitting at their offices. This was a couple years ago now in his office, kind of off of a larger room before we walked through the kitchens themselves. And one of the points that he made was that they're in the business of fostering success. Because success breeds confidence. And they wanted to help people feel confident. Whether they were very skilled home chefs, whether they were were people that were just picking up a recipe for a new dish for the first time, and they didn't really know their way around the kitchen yet. If they were a little bit uncertain about getting the ingredients. They didn't want to be coming at them with a bunch of technical jargon, or confusing and varied layouts of information, or lists of ingredients that would be really difficult to get regardless of where you live. So they keep that all in mind when when they're thinking about how to formulate a recipe, how they're testing it, or recommending different ingredients or tools or specialized equipment that you might need. And they go through that process of testing all the different variables. You know, the stereotype is that there is 43 different ways to make toast, we went through all of them just to be able to recommend the best one for you. And they go through that process of making the mistakes, having different people try out different techniques, so that they know that whether you're very very tall or very, very short, you're going to have success using this particular piece of kitchen equipment. Or as they're putting together a recipe, they might find the perfect ingredient, but realize that it's very difficult to source. So they'll recommend the next best alternative, because they know that will suit the needs of the majority of their audience. And they've built trust through that by exposing their process. Explaining how they reach their conclusions, so that a reader knows that if they want to replicate the same process, they can. But usually they have enough confidence in the brand, in being able to see that they do have this process, that they don't need to replicate it themselves at home. It's kind of just nice knowing that the research is there. And other publishers in in the cooking space might focus more on elevating the perspectives of one particular ego. This is not that kind of brand. At America's Test Kitchen, the ego that they look to elevate is that of the home cook. That's the sort of hero that they're trying to create. And by offering content that is the right level of detail to meet the needs of different users, the right volume of information depending on the device that you're using to access the recipe, the device or or content forum I guess to access the recipe, and then being so vulnerable to share the mistakes and missteps and what they learned along the way. They're not presenting kind of polished final nothing-bubbles over here. Instead they're saying, warts and all, here's what's happening. Here's how we got to good results. And here's how you can do.

Greg Dunlap  30:10  
So America's Test Kitchen is interesting, because it's very focused on users, on normal everyday people. And that's very much what the focus of the podcast has been in when we talk about communities as well. I know that a lot of places in the book, you talk about trust as it applies to content strategy and working with brands, but how do you see these principles or this framework applying more generally, towards the ways that people gather and interact with each other every day?

Margot Bloomstein  30:51  
Well, I think it's funny how you say gather and interact with each other, because now the way we gather, hopefully, if you're doing it right, is, is online, and maybe with with more of a view into your co workers life than you've ever had before. Quite literally, maybe into their living room or into their dining room, and kind of gathering a sense of who they are that way. And, of course, so much vulnerability comes with that. And I think the way that we can support each other, if it's co workers, or fellow community members, and the way that businesses support us is by right now investing in the things that still enable confidence, empowerment, and good decision making. So brands shouldn't be rolling out big monumental Earth-shaking changes right now in the voice that they use. In the in the look and feel of their platform. Now is the time to reassure people with familiarity. And I think also with the way that we engage with each other, now is the time to offer more information. To over-explain things. Whether you're giving a status report to a colleague, or trying to explain something to a friend, now is when more information that is well-triaged can be helpful, so that people can kind of look through the details and know that they're on the right path. I think that a challenge that I've seen, certainly through communication on Zoom, and moving back and forth between like Zoom and Slack, for example, is that we can best support each other when we communicate multiple ways. Because oftentimes, we're communicating now with lower fidelity means than if we were gathering with friends face to face and we had body language and emphasis and various other ways of kind of adding color to our language. So if that's the case, it's a good thing now to be able to explain something maybe in an email or over Slack, and then follow up on Zoom. So that you can offer a color commentary that way too, because some people are visual learners, some people prefer to get information verbally, and most of us are a mix of that. So I think there are different ways that we can support each other by by offering more detail and accommodating more learning styles. And then keeping things familiar. Maintaining the language that that people have come to know and trust.

Greg Dunlap  33:36  
Yeah, I mean, in a lot of ways, I think I think about, you know, you talk about consistency, vulnerability, all of those things seem to apply just as well to interpersonal relationships as they do to corporate brands. One of the things we've talked about a lot in the podcast, for instance, is expectations management, or like, people in their communities don't want to be surprised when things happen. A decision gets made because somebody gets kicked out of the community, or because somebody said something that wasn't responded to or whatever. People want to understand the rules in the groups that they gather in. And it seems like a lot of that kind of thing feeds back to the kind of themes that you have in the book as well.

Margot Bloomstein  34:21  
Yeah, and I think making those rules, clear, consistent and accessible. Those go so far, to then maintaining constructive and positive personal relationships. And I think you're really onto something there because I think that it's something that applies whether we're talking about very structured, formal relationships that might be governed by a contract, like a contract that an agency might have with its client. And certainly, and this is something that Mike Monteiro speaks about a lot, when we have more detail in our contracts to spell out what happens if things go south. What happens when timing is off, or people don't pay when they're supposed to and all, or if we go too many rounds of review or anything like that. When we spell out those expected norms in advance, it means that we've discussed them in advance, and people know what to expect, and can then act in a way that is most beneficial for for everyone and for the project itself. And I think that applies in those very structured corporate contexts. It certainly applies in communities online and off. When we know the rules that are in play, and maybe when we can have the discussion around those rules and contribute to those rules, it allows us to behave in accordance with those rules. And I think right now, I certainly see it play out with how people interact in in small towns. I know around here,  there were a lot of questions around what to expect with the election process. And when Town Hall would be open, how voting would go, would there be additional hours and then in the midst of a pandemic? What should we expect as far as access to polling places? And it seemed like the towns where residents were on top of saying, we need to know this in advance, and then where town government was involved in communicating those things ahead of time, and with clarity and consistency, things like the election went much more smoothly. And I think that that's something then that that we can emulate across other styles of community, too. Whether it's a Slack group, or a Facebook group, or even the the conventions in a conference that is now going online, we need to know what are the right behaviors if we want people to model those behaviors.

Greg Dunlap  37:02  
Right, because the last thing you want is for an already tense situation to be further exacerbated by confusion or a lack of predictability.

Margot Bloomstein  37:17  
Right. Right. And I think I'm like one of the one of the things that I always think about in the context of online communities, if we go back to the simple model of what happens at a party. Well, when we used to be able to do those types of things. We still can there but it might be like a spreadsheet party. I know that's a thing now. Or a Zoom happy hour even. But still within those those contexts. Maybe you get an invitation ahead of time, the nomenclature and the invitation, the look and feel of it. Are you getting it over the phone? Or is it an email? Or is it something that comes to you on paper in the US Postal Service? That starts to set the tone so you know, all right, what to expect? Who else will be there? The general vibe, how you should dress for it? Is it a potluck? Should you be bringing a dish? If so, how fancy should it be? Is this going to be a picnic or a cocktail party? We set the stage in all of that kind of ancillary messaging that goes on around an event. And of course, that can also be in the kind of messaging that people receive in the confirmation email when they're signing up for a community or a newsletter or something for the first time. In any error messages, opt out language, etc. And then when someone gets to the party, there's oftentimes a host that is maybe walking around introducing people, starting conversations, making sure your drink is filled, you know where the food is, etc. That has to happen in our online spaces too. And we do that to a degree with the kind of nomenclature and messaging and prefilled fields that might occur or that someone might see when they're setting up their profile for the first time. But having that be a designed experience with the right content to set the stage, that helps to make sure the rest of the party continues to go well, and that as more guests arrive, the people that are already there, again, at the party or in the Slack group, can continue to model the right behavior so that folks know when I get here, should I introduce myself in the general channel? How long should I work before I post? What's appropriate here? Because I think as much as parents might have told us when we were little not to follow the crowd and to be individuals, we still do all grow up and certainly as adults want to to fit into a degree so that we do the right things that we can maintain the appropriate behavior. Not to just be one of the crowd, but ultimately so that we can be good participants in community. That's not a politically correct perspective or not. I think it's simply a matter of how do you avoid offending other people. That's the purpose of manners. And that could be also the purpose of content and design as we're building these experiences.

Greg Dunlap  40:24  
Well, I love this topic. And I love the idea of the way that trust isn't permeating the world around us today. And I'm really, really looking forward to your book, and I really appreciate you coming on today. How can people find you on social media and tell us what's going on as far as being able to find your book when it's released?

Margot Bloomstein  40:50  
Great, well, you can find me everywhere on social media, especially on twitter at mbloomstein. And you can learn more about the book by go to my site, http://appropriateinc.com/trustworthy, and you'll see a little bit about it there, drop your email there, so that you get my newsletter that is very infrequent, but will tell you about the preorder, give you excerpts, upcoming readings and appearances and whatnot. Probably on Zoom. And go with it from there. So, soft launch, quiet about this, but do want to share with folks that Trustworthy is now available for preorder, at least in the hardcover, and the ebook will be coming shortly as well on Amazon or visit bookshop.org to support your favorite indie bookstore.

Greg Dunlap  41:46  
That sounds great. I'm really looking forward to it. And thanks a lot for coming on today. Margo.

Margot Bloomstein  41:50  
Thank you. I really enjoyed this.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai