Brand trust vs. attention (and how to measure it)
Hey Saturday Squad!
I ran a survey last week to figure out what’s actually useful to you. (Have opinions? It’s still open if you haven’t taken it yet!
You said you wanted:
Hot takes on what’s shifting in brand right now
Quick, usable frameworks you can drop into your work Monday morning
Stories from inside the chaos of building, merging, and measuring brands
So that’s what I’m going to do.
Starting today, The Saturday Paper will follow a new structure: a weekly mix of insight, utility, and honesty. And moving forward, it will evolve based on what YOU want to see. The survey stays open and gets checked weekly.
Now for today’s topic… confusing attention for trust!
Brand Trend: trust is becoming the new metric
You’re going to start hearing a lot more about trust as a KPI. Here’s what’s happening right now:
Boards are paying attention: A recent survey found 22% of brands now treat trust as a board-level KPI, and nearly half say they measure it in some way.
CX leaders are shifting from sentiment to behavior: Instead of asking how people feel, they’re tracking who comes back, who repurchases, and who advocates.
Consultancies are building hybrid models: PwC and others are merging perception data with financial metrics to show how trust drives revenue.
PR and comms are ditching impressions: Big firms are moving from “estimated reach” to real readership and engagement, rejecting vanity metrics.
Consumers are demanding proof: The 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer found people now choose brands that “act in my world,” not just advertise in it.
All signs point in the same direction: trust is the next performance metric. Let’s talk about it!
Understanding trust vs. attention
Getting attention has truly never been easier. You can buy it, bait it, or borrow it. Post something mildly controversial on LinkedIn and watch the views roll in. This is where most people stop because, hey - those notifications hit the dopamine reward system and feel good. But attention is the first step, think of it as a starting line to trust.
Trust is the win, but it’s the thing most marketers aren’t measuring.
As marketers, we’ve spent years optimizing dashboards that celebrate visibility: impressions, mentions, reach, engagement. Those numbers make us feel productive, but they don’t indicate whether people believe you.
Think of it like this: Attention makes people look. Trust makes people act.
This manifests in things like campaigns that drive a ton of buzz but don’t change perception, or founders/leaders who are everywhere but not credible (cough Jake Paul, cough cough Elon). Visibility can make your ego feel all the fuzzies, but it won’t sustain your brand. Trust, on the other hand, compounds quietly. It shows up when people come back on their own, when they repeat your language in meetings, when they defend you in group chats you’ll never see. It’s slower, less visible, but it’s what builds staying power.
If you want be the type of marketer who measures it, start prioritizing return trends over post-level metrics or spikes. Who keeps showing up? Who shares your ideas without being asked? Who recommends you when you’re not in the room? Those are your brand health metrics.
Attention gets you a moment. Trust gets you a movement.
How to measure trust
Start by looking at what’s already in front of you. Go back through the last few months of posts, emails, campaigns, whatever you’re running and notice what got people to come back. Which topics or stories created follow-up comments, replies, or shares? Who keeps showing up in your notifications or inbox? That’s your return trend.
From there, pick one signal you actually want to track for the next 90 days. Maybe it’s repeat engagement, maybe it’s branded search, maybe it’s word-of-mouth mentions. The goal isn’t to add more metrics; it’s to start noticing which ones actually mean something.
Here’s a cheat sheet for a few channels to get you started.
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