Financial Services Marketing and Advertising Strategies

Financial services marketing, as the name implies, is the marketing effort made by the company or marketer in the financial services sector. The purpose of financial services marketing is the same as that of any other marketing – to attract new customers to the financial organization and to retain the existing ones. Even though the purpose of financial services marketing is (broadly speaking) the same as that of every other marketing, the challenges involved in it and its execution are quite unique.

The financial services marketing sector has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years and has become somewhat of a well-established niche. Naturally, as the niche market becomes more and more popular, you are left with tight competition, and standing out from the crowd becomes even more difficult. Financial services marketing is typically viewed as one of the tough marketing sectors because the products/services they provide are value-driven, and it is hard to convey this value to the target audience.

So what makes financial services advertising so much harder and more complex than regular advertising? For starters, what the financial service provider sells is not easy to sell because when it comes to the financing sector, even the simplest things can be confusing to the general public. Furthermore, the financing sector deals with investments that are usually not returned with physical products, which only makes it even harder to convert the target audience into customers.

The biggest challenge involved in financing business is earning the trust of your customers, and once you’ve done that, the rest of the job becomes relatively easy. This article takes you through some of the best financial services marketing and advertising strategies that you can use to boost conversions for your financial institution. We even take you through some of the instances where leading brands around the globe have used these marketing strategies to get the desired results for their business.

No one wants to do business with a company that they do not trust, and although this is universal for all businesses out there, it’s especially important for financial institutions—establishing trust among your prospective clients should be your first priority when it comes to financial services marketing. To establish this trust, you must convey an exceptional company culture, build engaging digital experiences, and even consider celebrity endorsements.

Keep in mind that as a financial institution, you are asking people for their hard-earned money, which they may even not trust their friends and family with. Building trust is without question the first and the most challenging roadblock you will face with a financial service business. It doesn’t matter how big your company is if your company fails to earn the trust of its potential customers. However, there are a number of ways you can encourage your customers/potential customers to trust your business.

When it comes to financial services marketing and advertisements, branding the single most important aspect that can help you earn the trust of your potential customers. Work on better defining and sharpening your company’s core values by working closely with your executive team. The customers want to see your company upholding the values you preach in action and not merely in words. Every marketer must make it a point to promote the company values by showing the customers how you live up to your values.

Branded Social Content by Transamerica

Branded social content is a great way to start if you want to establish trust among your target audience. Firstly because most of the interactions with your customers and potential customers are now through the digital medium, and as far as digital mediums go, social media is the most reliable of them all. Transamerica is one of the few companies that have successfully used its social media content to establish itself as a trusted brand successfully.

Transamerica brilliantly used its Facebook page to promote its service with a consumer-focused approach. What Transamerica did was to share content that majorly focused on health and wellness and charitable programs of the company. As a result, the target audience was given a glimpse of the values of the company and how committed they are to living up to those values. Although the success of such strategies is relatively slow, it will benefit your business in the long run.

Relatable content is the key to running a successful marketing campaign, and it is no different for financial service marketing and advertising. Engage your audience, keeping three things in mind that financial sector customers value the most: remarkable digital experiences, rewards, and convenience. The more relatable your content, the easier it is for the target audience to see why they need your product/service. This further makes it easier to convert your target audience into customers as well.

It is important that you clearly identify your target audience for each campaign and effectively use this information when coming up with content that can entice them. The content you create can be anything from a simple image posted on your social media to a well-produced video advertisement. So long as you choose the right media channels and outlets that your target audience is likely using to ensure the maximum reach and best result for your campaign.

Creative Videos by MasterCard

The creative videos from MasterCard are a perfect example of utilizing relevant content for a successful financial services marketing and advertising campaign. MasterCard has always been a leader when it came to financial service marketing and their brilliance shows in the creative videos they use. Their videos cover a wide range of subjects but what is noteworthy is their customer-centric videos.

The videos they create are fun to watch, but more importantly, they are made for brand awareness than for generating sales. Furthermore, MasterCard utilizes a focused documentary approach and covers specific locations, industries, or personal hobbies to make it relatable to the target audience.

Social media influencers are all the hype today. The best thing about utilizing influencers for your marketing campaigns is that they already have a well-established fan following which guarantees a minimum reach for the campaigns. What’s more interesting is that you get the freedom to choose the right influencer for each unique campaign. Selecting the right influencer is perhaps the most important part of using influencer campaigns and can potentially decide the fate of your marketing effort.

Furthermore, you need not necessarily get the most popular influencers for the campaigns, as micro-influencers are also capable of getting the message across the target audience. Additionally, you can use the influencers to spread the message you want without using the regular banking terms and explain what you are offering in simple language to the target audience. This is crucial because more than half the population has no idea of even the basic financial concepts.

World of Hyatt Credit Card Launch by Hyatt and Chase

Hyatt and Chase partnered up with celebrity mom Molly Sims to launch their world of Hyatt credit cards through the platform. Even in this, you can find that the influencer’s interest aligns perfectly with the travel card she helped launch. The travel card features health and wellness perks, and you can notice the same interests if you check out the Instagram account of Molly Sims. In this case, the influencers profile gives predominance to travel while keeping up a strict beauty and fitness regime, making her an ideal choice for appealing to people who also share similar interests.

Content marketing is a marketing technique that employs useful content for educational purposes to appeal to the customers on things they want to know about. This includes everything from educational Alexa skills to actionable blog posts. The trick is simply to use content to attract and retain customers. Nowadays, it is easy to get access to all sorts of information, and a serious customer is bound to do his/her research before investing their money into a product or service.

Therefore, a potential customer often is more than likely to be online, where he/she will consume content to educate themselves before making an investment in a product or service they want. Content can not only generate organic traffic to your website but also help to create brand awareness and even lead to conversions. By educating the reader or those who consume the content, they are also encouraged to establish a relationship with your business. The content your prospective customers consume can also include videos, podcasts, and much more.

Journalistic Style Videos by Jyske Bank

One of the best financial services marketing that utilizes content for educational purposes can be seen in the journalistic style videos produced by Jyske Bank. These videos were highly successful in capturing market attention, and this not only raised awareness of the brand but also established them as industry experts, which in turn helped to boost trust in the brand. The insightful videos from Jyske Bank did not only educate the masses on banking-related topics but also offered them viable solutions which ultimately helped their own business.

Direct mails marketing has always been an integral part of financial services marketing and advertising right from the beginning. Direct mail remains one of the most utilized modes of communication for financial institutions and for a good reason. Direct mails are a sure-shot way of reaching the target audience as long as you have the accurate address of the recipients. However, the deliverability of the direct mails can be easily ensured by using an advanced address verification tool such as PostGrid.

Furthermore, direct mail marketing has evolved over the years to accommodate digital channels into its operations. The innovative, multi-channel direct mail marketing includes trackable mails which use QR codes or personalized URLs. This way, not only can you ensure that the direct mail reaches the target audience but also make it easily trackable while enhancing the convenience of the user. This means that your direct mail efforts can now be connected to your social media and other digital channels.

Direct Mail and Social Media Combination by Barclays

Barclays, a popular financial service provider, is known for its unconventional approach to financial services marketing. Barclays was among the first to successfully combine direct mail marketing with their social media to create a successful financial services direct marketing campaign. The new campaign focused on encouraging user-generated content to raise awareness of their services.

The company delivered direct mail to its customers, which weirdly enough contained a bottle of coke and a packet of mentos. The package was symbolic of the explosive growth they can deliver if the customer joined hands with them. Similar innovative approaches not only help you stay relevant in the crowd but also successfully entice the users into making the desired action.