The Financial Services Marketing Handbook

Tactics and Techniques That Produce Results

Evelyn Ehrlich, Duke Fanelli

• Publisher: Bloomberg Press
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781118065716
• eBook ISBN: 9781118236369
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

The roadmap to success for financial professionals using real-world examples, practical how-to's, and a structured approach to marketing strategy and tactics that covers the basics for beginners and inspires new ideas for marketing pros

The Financial Marketing Services Handbook, Second Edition gives sales and marketing practitioners the practical tools and best practices they need both to improve their job performance and their retail and institutional marketing strategies. The FSM Handbook guides marketing and sales professionals working in an industry characterized by cut-throat competition, client mistrust, transformative technologies, and ever-changing regulation, to understand the practical steps they must take to turn these threats into opportunities.

Providing invaluable information on how to target, win, and retain profitable customers, the book presents an overview of the basic marketing functions—segmentation, positioning, brand building, situational analyses, and tactical planning—as they relate specifically to the financial services industry. With up-to-date case studies, showing what has worked and, more tellingly, what hasn't, the book demonstrates how to effectively utilize the marketer's toolbox—from advertising and public relations to social media and mobile marketing.

• Discusses how social media (Twitter, Facebook, blogs, review sites) impact branding and sales
• Packed with new information on landing pages, email success factors, and smartphone apps
• Demonstrates how behavioral economics affect marketing strategy
• Case studies and charts are fully revised and updated

The financial industry is under intense pressure to improve profits, retain high-value clients, and maintain brand equity without straining budgets. The first edition has become an industry-standard reference book and The Financial Services Marketing Handbook, Second Edition gives sales and marketing professionals even more of the information they need to stretch value from each marketing dollar.

SECTION TWO

Marketing Tactics

CHAPTER 4

Advertising

To most people, advertising is marketing. It is often the first tactic to come to mind when a sales or product manager is seeking to build sales. But media advertising (as opposed to direct marketing, online or digital marketing, and tactics discussed in other chapters) is just one element in the marketing mix. There are many reasons to use media advertising—whether print, broadcast, online, outdoor, or mobile.

These are among media advertising’s most important functions:

• Brand building. This is the main reason most companies use brand or “image” advertising (that is, advertising not specifically designed to sell a particular product). Keep in mind that most financial services are bought irregularly. Buyers pay little attention to advertising for products or services that they are not looking to buy. Therefore, the task of financial advertising is to generate a sufficient level of awareness over time to be “top of mind” when the buyer is ready, say, to take out a mortgage, finance a new business, establish an IRA, or engage a new investment banker.
• Familiarity. Advertising gives potential buyers the comfort that they are making the right decision. It is easier for someone to buy from a company that is well known than to take a chance on an unknown quantity. This familiarity also “softens the beaches” for the sales force.
• Customer retention. Advertising reinforces satisfaction among those who have already purchased from a company. In a proprietary study conducted by a leading brokerage firm, advertising was found to have little measurable impact on acquisition of new customers but had a significant effect on client retention.
• Reaching third-party influencers. Institutional advertising is often aimed at senior management rather than at those who actually buy a particular product, with the aim of getting a “trickle-down” referral from the top. Similarly, financial advisers are more comfortable recommending products they feel are well-known to the public.
• Maintaining market share. Companies may be forced into “defensive advertising” in order to keep up with their competitors’ ad expenditures and avoid losing market share.
• Improving employee morale. Advertising can have a positive effect on staff motivation and make recruitment easier.

Media Selection

Which advertising media should carry one’s advertising message? All of them. Assuming you’ve got the money, each channel reinforces the others and reaches target segments in different ways. A successful campaign may use print and broadcast coupled with online channels, to create the strongest possible impact.

Ally Bank needed to establish a brand virtually overnight. The bank grew out of GMAC (General Motors’ financing arm), but was launched as a separate brand in 2009. By mid-2010, Ally had spent $121 million on broadcast, print, and online advertising. As a result, 97 percent of those polled had awareness of the brand.1

The value of message integration across channels is particularly important considering that even television is viewed on more than just television sets. Consumers are watching via the Internet and on mobile devices, in-home and out-of-home, live and time-shifted, free and paid, rebroadcast and original programs. Advertising has followed viewers to online videos, online TV shows, TV show sponsorship, branded entertainment, online streaming, video on mobile phones, and more.

According to eMarketer.com, ad formats such as banner ads, sponsorships, and video ads are all growing even faster than paid search. In 2011, video ad spending grew by more than 50 percent, sponsorship by 25 percent, banner ads by 22 percent, and search by 20 percent. By 2015 online display-ad spending is predicted to surpass paid search.

As with any marketing decision, your choice of where to advertise is a function of target segments, objectives, and budget. It might appear obvious to use online and mobile media if your target market is young. But these are also important tactics if you are aiming at institutional buyers, such as financial advisors or pension consultants. If your objective is to deliver sales leads, then print and online may be your most effective choices. Television is fine if you have a big budget or if you have a regional market that can be reached efficiently through local broadcasters or cable stations.

Multiple Advertising Media Drive Online Response

While paid search is an important element in overall advertising effectiveness, the most successful campaigns employ multiple media. American Family Insurance created a multi-media approach to build their “Trusted Advice” campaign, including radio, an online branded entertainment series (In Gayle We Trust), and a micro-site, “Building a Better Future,” for the educational portion of the campaign.

Traffic from all three channels pointed back to American Family Insurance’s web site. As a result of the campaign, American Family Insurance saw:

1. A double-digit increase in web visitors.

2. A triple-digit increase in web traffic.

3. A triple-digit increase in online quote activity.

4. A double-digit increase in time spent on the site.

Source: “American Family Insurance: A Case for Multi-Screen Marketing.” ANA 2011 TV & Everything Video Forum, 02/10/11; Digital, Social, and Mobile Members Only Conference, 03/02/11.

Print Advertising

The complexity of financial products lends itself to the written word. Whereas video is particularly adept at conveying emotions, words are better able to communicate facts and figures.

Print advertising includes newspapers, consumer magazines, specialized trade magazines, and directories (everything from the Yellow Pages to specialized industry directories). Most print publications now have online versions.

When deciding on advertising in print publications and related web sites, consider which publications your target markets read. Media selection is somewhat simpler on the institutional side, as there are standard trade journals that everyone in a given industry reads (for example, in investment management and retirement planning, such publications as Institutional Investor and Pensions & Investments). On the consumer side, media placement is more complex and a highly specialized subject. Ad agencies, digital agencies, and specialized media firms perform sophisticated analyses to determine which of thousands of media opportunities best match target market segments.

How much can you afford to spend? Print ads, depending on their size and the circulation of the publication, can range from several hundred dollars—for a local daily or weekly publication with a circulation of several thousand—to upward of $200,000 for a full-page ad in the Wall Street Journal.

It is important to keep in mind that advertising page rates will vary greatly depending on whether the ad is black-and-white or color, the overall bargaining power of the advertiser, the number of pages and repeats being contracted for, and whether the ad will appear in regional or national editions. Bargains can sometimes be found by waiting until the last minute for left-over space in a publication.

Another consideration is where your competitors are advertising. During the market boom of the 1990s, ads from mutual fund companies fattened consumer financial titles like Money, Smart Money, and Kiplinger’s. But with so many companies advertising the same type of product, the message got lost in the clutter. Smart advertisers began looking for alternatives, like shelter magazines and other publications aimed at wealthy consumers.

The Role of Your Ad Agency

Any company with enough money to buy advertising should use an agency to create and place the ads. Some companies will also ask their agencies to handle strategic assignments, such as identifying target markets and the appropriate media for reaching them.

The agency will help you determine, given your budget, where you can expect the greatest return for your investment in ad dollars. Selecting an advertising agency is often a complicated job that may require hiring a consultant to prepare the request for proposal (RFP) and help in the evaluation and selection process. The steps that follow have been adapted from the publication Selecting an Advertising Agency, published by the Association of National Advertisers.

Don’t Overlook Radio

Too many advertisers forget about radio, but in many markets, radio reaches more people than many other media. Depending on the time slot, radio has these additional advantages:

It’s inexpensive. Radio spots often cost less than print or online for equivalent cost-per-thousand (CPM) prospects. What’s more, radio ads are not expensive to produce—if you want, you can just provide a script, and the radio announcer will read it.

It’s clutter-free. People don’t zap radio ads the way they do television. Listening to the radio may be the only thing that people in a car are doing other than driving, so you have a very large share of their attention.

It’s targetable. In many markets, some radio stations may be reaching small ethnic and other communities that may otherwise be difficult to access. A financial adviser of West Indian background had considerable success using a radio station directed at Caribbean audiences for advertising and related publicity.

Develop an agency “job description.”

• Identify the functions the agency will perform, such as account service, research, and media buying and the specific types of assignments, such as new product introductions, positioning or repositioning, brand building.
• Determine whether the assignment will be local, regional, national, or global.
• Will the agency be joining a roster of other agencies, or will there be an exclusive arrangement?
• With which departments and outside ve...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• Title
• Copyright
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: The Unique Challenges of Marketing Financial Services
• Section One: Strategic Market Planning
• Section Two: Marketing Tactics
• Conclusion
• Appendix: Applying Marketing Principles to Sales Practice
• About the Authors
• Index