Trust-based marketing

Is the antidote to control-based marketing

Two years ago, I took my first stab at articulating a new approach to marketing that’d been simmering in my consciousness since the early days of the pandemic. I called it non-coercive marketing, and my essay/manifesto about it struck a nerve. It rocketed through creator economy circles, and then startup marketing circles, eCom and even B2B circles somehow. I’m still shocked at how far this piece travelled into the worlds of traditional marketing, given how unflattering it was to said worlds.

Since then, I’ve been working on implementing this philosophy in my own business, and I’ve worked with a handful of startups to apply the principles to their early marketing efforts. It hasn't always been pretty, and I've barely scratched the surface of the implementation details, but I can say that there’s something real and valuable here. And I want to keep exploring.

Another thing I’ve found, again and again, is that the term non-coercive marketing confuses the hell out of people. Which, yeah... totally makes sense. Turns out choosing that name was terrible marketing and branding on my part! And I hope to fix that mistake today.

We’re in the early stages of a sea change in how businesses act in the world. The old, control-based models are losing steam. Mass media is dying, and the internet is fragmenting into infinite dark forests. My belief is the companies who feel most human, trusting, and trustworthy will win decisively in the markets of the future, while companies doubling down on the game of “treat customers like transactional units that we can control at scale” will find themselves going bust at an accelerating clip.

My hope is that non-coercive marketing can play a role in driving this new story of business forward. But it’s unlikely to gain memetic traction if the name itself baffles people.

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So today, I’m rebranding non-coercive marketing as trust-based marketing. And what was referred to as “traditional marketing” in my first essay, I’m now referring to as control-based marketing. Trust vs Control. That’s the new paradigm. Think of it as a spectrum on which we can assess our marketing efforts. With any given strategy, campaign, or tactic, are we acting from a foundation of trust, or a place of trying to control people?

I like this name for a number of reasons. First and foremost, it’s clear. It’s simple. Just from the name alone, I know what this paradigm stands for. Instead of being against “coercion,” it is for trust. As for what we’re trusting in, there are four pillars the philosophy rests on.

First, trust-based marketing is rooted trusting your prospects to be the central authority in their own lives. It’s about respecting the sovereignty and dignity of every human who comes into your world, and trusting them to make the right decisions for themselves, even if that means not purchasing from you. When you try to hijack their emotional lives, or exploit their cognitive biases or whatever, to get them to purchase your thing regardless of whether it suits them, you are not in trust mode. You’re in control mode.

Second, it’s about trusting yourself. It’s about being secure and rooted in who you are, what you offer, and what you’re bringing into the world with your business. When you find yourself exaggerating claims or hiding inconvenient truths about your offers or yourself, that’s a clear sign you’re in control mode instead of trusting. In the trust-based paradigm, we tell the truth, and trust that it’s enough.

Third, it's about trusting in the organic nature of relationships. Control-based marketing tries to funnel everyone through the same linear steps toward a standardized outcome. But relationships don't work that way—they unfold naturally, in their own time. Some people are ready to buy the moment they meet you. Others might marinate in your world for years before the timing is right. Trust-based marketing creates space for relationships to unfold in their own way, and their own time, without forcing specific outcomes.

Lastly, it's about trusting in something larger than ourselves. Any business that grows organically is tapping into forces far beyond its control or comprehension. When someone discovers you at exactly the right moment in their life, when your message spreads through networks of trust, when synchronicities pile up and the right people find you at the right time—that's not something you orchestrated. It's emergence. It's grace. Trust-based marketing acknowledges that we're part of a vast web of connection and interdependence that we can meaningfully contribute to, but never fully control. And it works a lot better when you trust in this mysterious power, and perceive it as beneficial, rather than fighting against it so that you can maintain the illusion of control.

Welcome to the era of trust-based marketing, friends. If you’d like to follow along on the journey of unfurling this, consider joining me in The Forest.