✪ High-Value Content Is Not Enough: What Makes People Actually Trust You - #50
Three elements that transform value into confidence and move you from being visible to being trusted. A personal story of shifting from attention to credibility.
For most of my online publishing career (I started back in the year 2000), I followed pretty much the principle “create value, consistently”, because that’s how - I believed - you gradually build a loyal audience.
And for many years, this proved to be true. People would find my writing, liked my advice, tips and perspective, and would subscribe and come back for more.
But as the time went by, I did not realize that something important - though not immediately apparent - got lost along the way.
I was writing more to show my authority, competence and vision, rather than making an effort to build the confidence needed to become someone my readers could trust and buy from.
The Wake-Up Call
When my book da Brand a Friend came out in 2017, my publisher did almost nothing to promote it. So, I decided to take matters into my own hands to make people take note and become more curious about who I really was.
With the help of my own loyal readers, I launched a series of 50+ user-sponsored events across small and big Italian towns. These weren’t corporate book tours.
They were small, human gatherings, organized entirely by my readers. They covered my travel and found or rented public places where we could run small in person events.
Of all the strategies and tactics I have been using in these 25 years as an online indie entrepreneur, this was by far the most successful and rewarding one, because by meeting me in person, people discovered I was a special person with unorthodox ideas and a contagious positive energy they felt highly in tune with. Many of them instantly started to trust me.
As a consequence, I got many books sold, many more readers, and the opportunity to sell many high-ticket coaching and consulting sessions. To this day, after 5 years from the last physical appearance I made in one of those reader-supported events, I am still reaping the fruits of having gone out to meet my audience in person.
That experience changed everything I knew about credibility.
What I learned from this experience is that credibility and trust are not gained exclusively by how much good content I publish, or from the quality of it. They are built by showing that you are a living proof of what you preach, that you are a genuine person that sounds exactly as when he’s writing online, and that you truly care about helping out without trying to convince or persuade others of your ideas.
What Those Tours Taught Me About Trust
What I felt in their handshakes, hugs and words after each event, told me that I was way more appreciated for who I was as a person than for what I had written.
Being me, sharing my ideas, emotions and dreams, was a hundred times more impactful than reading any one of my best articles. But nothing like my physical presence converted curious, open-minded people to wanting to have me as their trusted communication and marketing guide.
Trust doesn’t come from how much content you publish, or how good it is. It comes from being a living proof of what you preach. From being the same person online and offline. From caring enough to show up as yourself, no polish, no persuasion, just presence.
From Attention to Trust
We work hard to create value, but value alone doesn’t create credibility. What makes people believe you isn’t how much you post, but what your work proves about who you are.
I’ve seen brilliant, generous creators struggle to be trusted. And I’ve seen others, with imperfect and unpolished work, build loyal audiences that believe every word.
The difference? Credibility.
People don’t want more information. They want someone to believe.
They want to feel that what they’re reading comes from lived experience, not from prompts, not from repackaged advice, but from someone who’s actually walked the path.
So, the first consideration is: beware in how you use AI, because people can see in a split second - when you are on camera, in a video interview or as a guest at an event - that you do not look, sound or feel like the beautiful sentences that appear in your feed and articles.
And when that happens, they rapidly lose all trust and confidence they had in you.
In other words:
You can sound smart without being credible.
You can teach without being trusted.
You can create endless content without ever building real trust.
The key point is that there is an ocean of difference between being visible, having followers and likes, and being trusted.
What makes the difference is not determined by who posts more often, or by who writes better headlines. The real differentiator it’s how credible you are.
The New Trust Formula
From that experience, I slowly realized that every expert, journalist or creator people who I have come to trust and buy from online, has three unique characterizing traits:
Proof.
You can actually see how they know what they know.Depth.
Their thinking goes beyond what everyone else is saying.Care.
You can feel they aren’t just writing for their own interest and profit.
These three elements, have a profound impact on how people perceive you and in how much they will convert from readers to customers.
But I bet you have never seen these three elements presented to you as strategically important in building your own business and personal brand online.
So, to make sure I do not overlook or easily forget them, I have built for myself a simple formula that constantly reminds me of their importance:
Trust = (Proof × Depth × Care) ÷ Self-Orientation
This formula says in just five words that trust is built by:
showing proof of what you say and by doing yourself what you recommend others to do
going deeper and beyond common beliefs and narratives about how things work and what it takes to be successful
truly caring for the very people you say you want to help
all the while without putting up an expert “I-know-it-all” mask, by being humble, discrete and authentic, and by closely listening to what your readers say.
When Life Changed
But there was something that would later impact all this. Back in 2015 I had taken a big decision: To separate from my life companion and to leave my sons and friends. I wanted to move away from cities, cars, cement, traffic, people running stressed and having no time to share and enjoy life together.
First, I went to live on a little island (Terceira, PT) in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, still somewhat near my home, but after four years - when Covid came - I moved to Mexico, thousands of miles further away.
As I moved farther and farther from home, I had to say bye-bye to my beloved grassroots tours around Italy, and decided to focus on building trust and confidence with an all-online, international, English-speaking audience.
And that’s when I was reminded again that publishing “great content” wasn’t enough anymore.
What matters is something deeper: my ability to connect, to resonate, to be unmistakably human.
Six Small Signals That Build Trust at a Distance
I started studying again by looking at those - who I believed - where much ahead of me.
As I watched and studied them, I noticed they shared a few consistent signals, little patterns that quietly made them credible.
Resonance.
They speak to a clearly defined person and problem.
It feels like a one-to-one conversation, not a broadcast.Transformation.
They show what changes — in their own life or in others — when their ideas are applied.
It’s not theory; it’s lived proof.Distinct Voice.
They sound unmistakably human. Their tone, rhythm, and quirks make them real.
You could recognize their words even without their name on them.Proof.
They show what they’ve done, not just what they think.
Every belief they hold comes from a discovery, a mistake, or an experiment they share openly.Care.
You can feel their intention. They’re not performing expertise — they’re on a mission to help.
The business follows the purpose, not the other way around.Reliability.
They do what they say. They follow up.
Their tone stays coherent across time, channels, and formats.
How I Try to Practice It
I try to live (and write this newsletter / publication) by these same signals.
I share what I’ve lived — the tests, the detours, the discoveries.
I don’t let AI take over my writing. I ask AI to challenge it, to check and spot errors, to suggest gaps and weak points I could add.
I avoid trying to persuade people that I have the perfect solution to their problem. I prefer to share what I have seen, learned and done myself to overcome that problem or situation.
I prefer to show how I reached a conclusion rather than claim I’m right.
When I promise something, I follow through — even when it’s inconvenient.
And I listen. Really listen. Sometimes the best service I can offer is silence,
letting someone think out loud until the real problem surfaces. I ask more questions, and - when expressly asked - what I’d do if I was in that same situation.
I question myself often: Am I still serving the mission that started all this -
helping passionate people escape the 9-to-5 trap to create something of their own?
And when I fail or take a wrong turn, I share that too. Mistakes are part of the map.
They teach, and they build trust faster than any success story.
I love to highlight those who do good, to contribute and to support their journeys for the satisfaction of contributing to something I value as useful and for the joy of seeing them realize their dreams.
What Really Lasts
In the end, what I have come to believe is that to gain the confidence and trust of others, there’s no amount of smartness or knowledge you can pour on the table. That stuff doesn’t build trust.
Trust grows when people feel you’re not there to show off, but to understand, to support, to walk beside them quietly and sincerely.
It’s not the perfection of your message, but rather the integrity of your presence that counts.
Your journey, your purpose, your curiosity, and your care are what make you credible.
Everything else, the polish, the posture, the production, is decoration.
In a world where AI can generate perfect content, what stands out are the imperfections of someone who’s actually there thinking, experimenting, caring.
So to build deep trust at-a-distance keep showing your process, your results and your humanity.
Because high-value content does get attention, but trust-able content gets you two very special things: to be felt, and to be remembered.
How I Can Help You
a) Practical Ideas To Improve Your Editorial Strategy
Critical analysis (video) of your site/landing page/newsletter/blog (choose one) pointing out limits and weaknesses while suggesting improvements and opportunities to create great content.
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b) Positioning and Personal Branding
I help you question and verify how solid and effective your communication strategy is. How effectively you differentiate yourself from others. Do your readers understand instantly what you are about and why it would be so valuable for them to follow you?
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Interested?
Send me a direct message.
Follow a path with a heart.
From Koh Samui (TH)
Robin Good