Marketing is crucial to lead generation — the two go together like salt and pepper. If you’re not targeting the right people with the right message by the right means at the right time, then you’re not doing it right.
Financial services may find it tough to develop and execute a high quality marketing strategy that yields results. Luckily, we’ve come up with ten go-to marketing tips in the world of financial services!
1. Building Customer Personas is a Must
One of the very first steps, when it comes to creating an outstanding marketing strategy, is to develop multiple customer personas. Research your consumer’s financial backgrounds, current job status, spending patterns, interests and hobbies — what is their living situation? Do they have children? Are they still in education? Do they work in a high-salaried job? Are they working to improve their credit rating? This means you can segment the customers into different profiles and target the services that make sense for their personal circumstances.
2. Create a User Experience for All Parts of the Customer Journey
The marketing funnel is all-inclusive of customer needs — from the awareness stage right down to the crucial decision stage. One of the very best ways to utilise the marketing funnel is to create content tailored to each customer persona and each part of the customer’s journey.
For example:
Awareness stage: Blogs, information booklets, ebooks, quick checklists, how-to videos
Consideration stage: In-depth white papers, reports, product details (specs), webinars
Decision stage: Pricing, offers, demos, free trials, service/product comparisons
3. Collaborate With Influencers
If your brand was a person — who would it be? Is it a down-to-earth YouTuber like JaackMate, a national treasure like Stephen Fry or even a beloved cartoon character? Influencer marketing is still very much a done thing — especially for financial services looking to make their products seem more personable and relatable. People want to see your service in action, in an everyday life setting. This is where YouTubers and Instagrammers can work wonders — they already have a dedicated following and they can seamlessly integrate their promotion of your service within their videos. The same goes for Instagram stars — they create content their followers love…so the message will always be on-point and targeted to your desired customer persona!
4. Don’t Neglect the SEO Competitor Work
Keep on top of competitors by regularly checking up on their SEO efforts. Start by creating a content inventory listing all the pages your website has, along with all the pages your competitors have on their websites. You’ll start to notice a pattern where there are gaps in your content, and gaps in your competitors’ too! Don’t forget to keep running regular analysis on each of your individual web pages and what it’s ranking for. Check out your competitor’s backlinks too — and see if you can ask the same websites if they will backlink to your site.
5. Work With Charities and Give Back to the Community
Working with charities is a win-win situation for everyone involved. Not only does your brand get more exposure, but you’re also making connections in the local community, finding out what your potential customers really want out of a product. After all, Millennials are the biggest advocates of this, with 48% preferring to know the faces behind a brand. What better way to show your literal faces than by raising money for charity or partnering with a charity and contributing a certain percentage of your profits from a specific product. It’s even better if your charity efforts are connected to your products/services in some way — as you can offer advice and guidance, everybody wins! Encourage your colleagues to come up with charity events such as a bake sale, fancy dress in the office, marathons, the Three Peaks Challenge and so on. You can both raise money for a good cause, and create your own press releases, sending them off to all the local media outlets.
6. Make Sure You’re Mobile-Friendly
Not only is having a mobile-friendly website essential for good SEO practice and page load speeds, it’s catering to over half the global population! That’s right, over half of website traffic comes from mobile devices. Elements of a mobile-friendly website include big call-to-action buttons, short registration forms, automatic scaling, clear images, clear text and so on.
7. It’s All About Micro-Moments
Micro-moments have been around for some time — they’re nothing new. But astonishingly, most financial services firms don’t take advantage of them! Long gone are the days where people consumed media at specific times of the day, such as between 7pm and 10pm after work or at the weekend — the average person’s life is full of quick bursts of digital media. Micro moments are everywhere — we indulge in them on our commute to work, waiting in shop queues, at work…even before we get out of bed each day.
A micro-moment is where a customer is consciously trying to find an answer to one of the following questions: making a snap decision:
- I need to go to…
- I want to learn…
- I want to buy…
- I want to know
Make sure your marketing strategy, whether it’s a PPC campaign or social ad, is geared towards these micro-moments.
8. Work on Your Email Strategy
When it comes to creating an email strategy, getting the balance between friendly and annoying can be a challenge. There are thousands of financial firms out there and people can find it a little overwhelming to be bombarded with similar products and services. The number one rule with email marketing strategies for financial firms is to be human. This is in terms of the language you use and how you angle your marketing message. Of course, don’t go too overboard on using slang and matey words, just be straightforward and friendly — as if you’re talking to a work colleague. Ask yourself how customers can integrate your products and services into their daily lives. Not only does this make financial products look significantly more interesting, it means your customers will actually form a decent relationship with your brand, bringing them back time and time again!
9. Build Trust Through Reviews
The majority of Brits do not trust banks. In fact, an Edelman report has shown that only 57 percent of the general population trust financial services. Forming trusting relationship with customers can be a challenge, but the tried and tested strategy of sharing positive reviews will reinforce confidence in your brand. Don’t neglect collecting, displaying, and sharing great reviews on a regular basis. You should also prioritise handling reviews that are unsatisfied with your product or service; respond quickly and always offer support. Despite having a negative review, potential customers will never be put off your brand if they see that you are keen to improve your product or service.
10. Above All, Believe in Your Own Product
One of the most important marketing tips, and one of the easiest to forget, is to love your own product or service. There’s no point trying to sell people something if you don’t believe in your own goods!
Are you an affiliate, broker or lender looking to expand your lead generation efforts? Have a chat with us today about your needs!