Lee Groeger - 05/15/2026
With trust in traditional mass media recently hitting a record low, the media landscape is deep in the throes of a "trust recession." Read on to find out where consumers are placing their trust and how brands can leverage this trend and inject more authenticity and transparency into their PR strategy.
Spoiler alert: It’s people. The answer is people.
With trust in traditional mass media recently hitting a record low, the media landscape is deep in the throes of a “trust recession.” As a result, consumers are increasingly shifting their trust away from corporate media and brands, and toward individuals — namely, creators, experts, or people inside an organization — who are perceived as more authentic and relatable.
Aligning with people to be the face of your organization or brand isn’t a new concept; many companies have been doing it for years. But if this is uncharted territory for you, here are a few best practices to keep in mind.
Find the right fit
We’ve all had the experience of watching a celebrity or influencer promote a company, product, or service that it’s very clear they have never, and maybe will never engage with. Not only does it fail to earn your business, but it can completely push you away, right?
Authenticity is invaluable. People are generally pretty intuitive about whether something — or someone — is genuine, so identifying an individual whose personality, lifestyle, and overall vibe aligns with your brand’s is more important than almost any other decision. At the end of the day, when it comes to finding a person to represent your brand, you should be looking at someone who represents your target audience.
Look within
Don’t overlook your internal assets! It’s often argued that employees – from the bottom to the top – are your most valuable assets, and that 100% applies to brand representation. Foretell and Echelon Insights conducted a survey in 2025 about media trust in America and found that, in a crisis, people trust a company’s CEO (22%), senior management (20%), or employees (18%) more than they trust the company brand as a whole.
This is referred to as “The Boss” Effect.”
Credibility already exists inside your organization; you just have to activate it by empowering leaders and employees to communicate with clarity, context, and consistency, rather than relying solely on universal brand statements. By putting your people are the forefront, you’re essentially creating a network of credibility when trust is hardest to earn.
Keep it personal, not perfect
Consumers are weary and wary of polished corporate marketing. As shown by the 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer, individuals care more about personal connection and shared values. What’s resonating now are voices that feel human, and that’s not a knock to AI; it simply means that people relate to leaders who speak in plain terms, employees who share anecdotal experiences, and ambassadors who feel relatable.
I ghostwrite a monthly byline on behalf of one client for a major business publication. In evaluating the article analytics, we noticed that the column’s performance had been pretty stagnant in recent months. So, we did a little research and found that one of the themes of the best-performing articles site-wide was personalization. With that insight, we started incorporating a more personal perspective, including interpersonal experiences and stories “from the trenches,” and immediately saw an improvement in performance.
Beware ‘Cancel Culture’
We love people. People are great. But people make mistakes, and the reality for people in the public eye today is that those mistakes are likely to be scrutinized, weaponized, and amplified. As a brand, partnering with a public figure means being prepared for this reality.
Unfortunately (for everyone), you can’t “de-risk” a human being. What you can do, though, is structure the partnership so one person’s mistake or bad decision doesn’t become your brand’s crisis. Think of is it less as a marketing decision and more as a risk-managed investment.
Now, there are plenty of ways you can leverage people as part of a PR strategy to help build trust for your brand. The most effective tactics build familiarity, demonstrate transparency, and offer proof. Here are a few that consistently yield positive results.
Executive thought leadership
Teach, don’t sell. Position C-suite leaders as experts in their field with insights – not spokespeople with talking points – who can help customers, stakeholders, peers, or whoever your intended audience may be. Once you’ve secured an earned media opportunity, such as a contributed byline, speaking engagement or interview, focus on messaging that tells the audience how something was accomplished, not just why you’re great. Get into the nitty gritty!
Why it builds trust: Specificity signals authenticity. Audiences trust leaders who explain their thinking, not just outcomes.
Culture communication
Empowering employees to publicly share insight into how your organization operates serves as evidence of company culture. And not just executives, but everyone from engineers and operators to employees with customer-facing roles. One way we accomplish this is by uncovering real stories from employees – such as problem-solving moments, frontline innovation, and community involvement – and pitching them to media.
Encouraging employees at all levels to share work experiences on platforms like LinkedIn (without over-scripting them) is another way to amplify first-hand visibility into your organization.
Why it builds trust: Trust often transfers more effectively person-to-person than brand-to-person, but only if their voice feels authentic.
Expert alignment
It is generally more impactful to your audience when others speak about you than it is when you speak about yourself, or, in this case, your brand. This reality is one of the bedrocks of public relations, which has led to the common practice of partnering with credible third-party experts to earn validation via multimedia efforts such as media appearances, op eds, event panels, speaking engagements, and social media collaboration. The type of partner you should choose, whether an academic, industry analyst or subject matter expert, depends on various factors, but the baseline criteria should be an alignment of core values.
Why it builds trust: Borrowed credibility is powerful, especially when the third party ostensibly has something to lose by associating with your brand.
Final thoughts
Brands that create space for personal perspectives, who prepare their people, and then trust those individuals to represent them thoughtfully, are more likely to earn credibility than those relying on tightly scripted messaging.
Getting it right requires strategic planning, research, open and frequent communication, trust, and apropos of the topic at hand: TRUST. To be honest, it’s why a lot of brands rely on companies like 3E PR to help them get, and stay, on the right path…and that’s just fine with us!
Want to talk about how we’ve done this for other organizations, or what this might look like for yours? Email me at lgroeger@3epr.com.