The Trust Ladder: What Makes People Buy From an Unknown Builder

I had just finished creating my new product, and I decided to post about it on Reddit and let the marketing process begin. Just as I opened Reddit to start writing, I read a post where someone else was talking about the exact same kind of product. Honestly, it discouraged me quite a bit. I closed Reddit immediately.

It wasn't the first time something like this had happened. And I ask the same question every time it happens - what am I going to do differently that not anyone else can do. Why will my product make it and not someone else's. I actually can't find an answer to this. Not at that moment.

Weeks later, when I'd buried this question somewhere in me, I was talking to a more seasoned builder about what inspired them to make something, and are they not worried that someone else can make it pretty much the same, if not better. Unless you're doing something that needs an exclusive partnership or you're doing an engineering discovery, any product can be built by another person. On top of that, if you do decide to build - do the hard yards to enhance it basis feedback and add critical features, and then a new player sees what you've built - and gives those features from start - at a lower price. This is not hypothetical. This is a real possibility we all face each day.

In my discussion with the seasoned builder, we arrived at an important realization. To save yourself from competition, you need a factor that compounds - you come in late, you lose ground. And it can't be features, since that works in the opposite way. And that factor is Trust.

What trust actually means here

I recently planned a marketing redesign for my Agency OS Notion workspace. I kept thinking about how I can build trust in the user evaluating this product. For me, trust in a digital product is not a psychological, vague term. It has to be a series of things I can do to demonstrate trustworthiness. I tried to go a bit deeper and research a more practical way to build trust in a more tangible way. This article lays out a set of filters people apply to figure out whether they can trust your products or not. If your marketing efforts - landing page, marketing script, social media posts - pass all filters, your product is in for the long haul.

The filter ladder

The next three filters work in a sequence. In the user's mind: Will it give me the results I want (filter #2) → I like what it's saying, but how do I believe it'll actually do what it's saying (filters #3 & #4) → okay, but is that outcome worth the cost it brings?

The bare minimum trust test

The first aspect of trust building is quite direct. Very subtle to users, but it matters.

When an indie hacker or any builder launches a product - it's very rare that they don't face competition. And when they do - the typical reaction is either to continue shipping a headless product or leave it thinking the market is not suitable. I felt the same when I shipped my Shopify app. Shopify is a massively crowded market and every idea there has 10, if not 20, existing products with great reviews and marketing budgets.

The question of continuing building or leaving used to come in very late for a founder - until the AI coding era. Before AI coding became a norm, products used to take a lot more to get built. You needed at least one developer and one designer to ship a decent MVP in about 3-4 months. But now it's completely different. People are shipping decent working products in about a week.

This means that escalation to commitment is low. Escalation to commitment is a psychological phenomenon which makes us go - 'I've spent so much effort already, I can't leave now' - and we continue to stay invested in something despite it not leading to results. Low effort of building leads to low escalation to commitment, and hence faster decisions to quit and move on. There are far more products being shipped into the world than ever before, and at the same time far more products being dropped in a month's time.

What this means for trust building? People take time to adapt, no matter how good the product is. So they know they'll have to spend time learning the product - which always stays at the back of their head. As a result, there's less and less acceptance of a vibe coded experimental tool since it may completely vanish in a month.

If a product has spent some time in the market, then it would have gone through some testing, some iteration - and despite that the builder has committed to stay - then this must be worth trying.

Filter #1: Whether this is an experiment that will stop working before I get anything out of it - or has it spent its time in the market?

For my Agency OS Notion product - I redesigned the product a bit basis feedback and I'm calling out its lifecycle in the product banner itself to tackle this filter head on: Launched in Nov 2025, has served 60+ agencies, improving each day!

Staying in the game is the bare minimum needed to start the trust cycle. Then comes the big question - is this worth looking into?

Trust that it will give me what I want

This is the first layer for the user. They'd stay for the rest only if they're interested in this part. It's a cliche that people need to know the impact not the list of features - and by extension of it, people want to know the pain it resolves.

Filter #2: Does the builder know what my biggest pain point is?

If you can name the pain points clearly, you're in. People will read the rest. A personal realization here is that people know way better than to fall for the high energy salesy pitch about digital products. What you say about their pain has to be a calm and living experience - not a forced understanding of it. This is specially true since most marketing content is AI generated and AI usually starts with a high energy sales pitch. You need to tune it down.

For my Agency OS Notion product - this meant showing people that I understand the pain of an agency owner. Only then will they trust the product to deliver on it. I rebranded the OS's landing page to share what problem it'll solve: one line, not a list of things. It works both ways - people who're looking for that outcome stay interested, and people who're not go away - which is what you'd want. The last thing you want are people who expected something else, and leave with a bad review.

Trust that it delivers the promise

This is the filter that makes all the difference. There are 2 things the user looks for at this stage:

Filter #3: Is the person behind it trustworthy?

Filter #4: Has it worked for others?

Is the person behind it trustworthy?

The biggest asset in social media today is not your writing style, or your knowledge. It's you being your human self.And it reflects everywhere. When I started writing on X, I had an animated image for my profile picture and an alias name. It was doing its work, until I changed it to my real name. Suddenly my comments got better viewership and response. I'm still a rookie at X and I don't spend much time - but I could see this one thing made a difference.

The same goes for your products. It's the single biggest factor that makes people buy - it's who you are, what you're capable of, and most importantly, do you do what you say.

• Who you are and your journey - if you're selling something big ticket then this matters a lot. If you're looking to get them to enroll for a community then this matters most. A brief note about yourself goes a long way, but what's best is a small note - followed by a link to a full article where they can read about your journey.

• What are you capable of - it's your credentials, experience and, if relevant, ideology. This is almost essential, no matter what the product is. People need to know who's selling, why they sell, and what made them an expert at this. For my Agency OS product, I shared that I'm Notion certified, have been building enterprise products for 10 years, have worked with agency clients to know what they exactly want, and that I am building this since I realized a recurring problem across my clients.

• Do you do what you say - this comes from your presence. Probably the reason why it's important to be active on at least one social media platform - so people can see you and validate the impression they formed of you. I say on my website that I believe in a clutter free, calm and focus oriented way of working. But if I posted on X videos of hustling day and night without rest, the user would be in conflict. You need presence, and you need consistency of actions.

The direct way of seeing this: share your experience in the domain, show your face and real name, and give them a link to your socials where they can see you're active. This is such an underrated thing - but one that completely makes your products stand apart. A direct differentiator from the competition, if you've actually done the work and can claim it.

Has it worked for others?

Another massive filter is social validation. If people see others using the product and giving positive reviews, it not only gives them confidence that this works - it makes them fear a real FOMO. Knowing that they're already behind all these other people who are using this product and moving ahead makes them take action in the moment. If you can share brand names - even if they're not well known - it adds a layer of professionalism that no new product can match. This is another aspect that grows and compounds over time. The more time you've spent, the more people can talk about your product - and grow you beyond any new competitor. People love certainty, and they love it even more when others give it to them.

To pass this filter, you need to show things like number of downloads or users, ratings and testimonials. When launching a new product, you may not have these - so sharing reviews from your beta phase will work. I have even seen people share testimonials of their other products initially, just to bring human validation to their capability. This goes well with filter #3 as well.

Trust that they're not being robbed

The final filter matters deeply for high cost products. People love a bargain. But they equally hate overpaying. Product price has to be a no-brainer deal. I love how Alex Hormozi frames it in his book 100 Million Offers - he suggests that you make the pricing look so small against the value it brings that people feel they're getting away with it. A way of looking at this filter is: how will the product pay multifold of its cost in one month? If you can show the ROI immediately - great. If not, value stack to make it look like they're winning the deal, not you.

Filter #5: How will the product pay multifold of its cost in one month?

This is another factor which has compounding, but it needs to be done smartly. When a product is new, it's typically offered at a lower price than competition. So products that stay over time will go through a cycle of gradual price increase and an additional value every time the price increases. And this value has to be something that people can't copy. Things like community access of other buyers, your additional products at discount, and even a one-time consultation call - things that bring value beyond a feature is the best thing you can add to your products. So the more time your product stays, the more cycles of differentiated value your product will have - a new entrant can't copy that.

The filter ladder

#1: Whether this is an experiment product that will stop working before I get anything out of it - or has it spent its time in the market?

#2: Does the builder know what my biggest pain point is?

#3: Is the person behind it trustworthy?

#4: Has it worked for others?

#5: How will the product pay multifold of its cost in one month?

This filter ladder is something I'm putting to test across my products. I'm also doing A/B testing to see which variant or combination best delivers the intended message.

In my experience, Filter #3 is the one most builders skip. They'll spend weeks on the landing page and nothing on showing who they are. If you're building right now - which of these five filters do you think your product fails at?

Follow along as I build and experiment in public - @lifedesignshare on X.