Stories
Why Only 5% of Consumers Trust Ads and What Brands Should Do Instead
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Storyboard•20-10-2026, 08:16
Why Only 5% of Consumers Trust Ads and What Brands Should Do Instead
- •Data from NP Digital reveals that advertising ranks at the bottom of consumer trust at 5 percent, while friends, family, and customer reviews lead with 84 percent and 69 percent trust respectively.
- •Industry experts note that people have never truly trusted ads; instead, advertising builds the familiarity and safety net that makes consumers receptive to recommendations from trusted sources.
- •Relying solely on last-click attribution or return on ad spend creates an incomplete picture, missing how early brand awareness and offline retail interactions drive actual sales.
- •Marketers are urged to use a combination of multi-touch attribution, brand-lift studies, and incrementality tests to measure what builds long-term demand rather than just capturing final clicks.
Key Questions Answered
According to data from NP Digital’s Consumer Discovery Insights report, only 5% of consumers say they trust advertising when evaluating a brand, placing it at the bottom of the consumer trust list.
Friends and family command the highest trust at 84%, followed by customer reviews at 69%, independent experts at 67%, and Google search results at 57%.
Around 69% of consumers have already abandoned brands they perceive as unreliable or dishonest, according to a global study by McCann covering over 20,000 respondents.
