Banks are transforming to adapt to the digital age. Content marketing helps achieve this goal, as it allows you to reach all audiences, educate consumers and personalize their experiences.
Technology is drastically changing financial services and has been doing so for years. Back in 2015, a Deloitte report assured that the banking experience of the future would be completely virtual, customer-oriented, frictionless, and personalized. Today, it is already like that, or at least it is how customers expect it to be.
Consumers have gradually understood the potential of digital communications and solutions. Currently, 66% of customers execute half of their banking transactions online, a number that is forecast to continue to grow, according to research from Accenture Strategy. Therefore, creating a seamless digital experience in online channels is one of the priorities of banks. Doing so can be the key to a financial institution's success.
One of the best ways to achieve this is to adopt a content marketing strategy. This type of marketing consists of creating, publishing, and distributing relevant content for an audience with the aim of obtaining prospects, positioning themselves in the customer's mind, strengthening trust in the institution and building customer loyalty. If a bank wants to convince its customers that it is their best option, it can demonstrate it through a strategy based on valuable content.
In a market such as banking, in which there is little differentiation between products, brand affinity and the trust that a bank builds among customers is key to remaining relevant. Content marketing helps to achieve these goals and also allows to reach others that are essential for today's banking.
One of the banks' goals is to reach younger audiences. Millennials are at the center of their strategy, as in 2016 they surpassed baby boomers as the largest generation. However, it is not easy for banks to reach this audience: it is a reticent group towards banks.
Millennials also tend not to trust disruptive advertising very much. According to the report New money: how top finance brands use content marketing to win in a customer-centric world, published by The Content Strategist, millennials skip YouTube ads as quickly as possible and two-thirds use ad blocking programs
Content is a friendlier option for this audience. 47% of millennials say they would be more likely to trust a financial services company if it created useful content, according to survey data from The Content Strategist. For this reason, companies like BBVA and SoFi have invested in content marketing to help connect with their customers.
Customers trust commercial messages less and less. When they see an ad, they know that the brand has paid for it, which is why they don't pay much attention to what it says. Content marketing doesn't pressure visitors to do something, but instead helps build trust by offering non-promotional information that educates them and helps them solve their problems.
Banks use content marketing to add value to their products. Some of the products or services offered by financial institutions may be difficult for the target audience to understand. Well-explained content tailored to the bank's audience can educate them on a topic for better understanding.
One of the problems facing banking today is the lack of trust in digital media. This occurs mainly among older consumers, as young people tend to trust more. Creating content that can teach the audience about the use of digital tools for banking, for example, can reduce this mistrust gap.
Personalization makes it possible to meet the needs of each customer, depending on the stage of the customer journey in which they are, by connecting them with the information they are looking for and need.
With content marketing, a bank can create attractive and useful content for each of its audience groups. The content that interests a retired person is not the same that attracts a young person. If a bank uses content as a method of personalization, they can create blog posts focused on retirement to appeal to the baby boomer generation, and others on financial advice for millennials.
Another advantage of having a personalized strategy is profitability. Increasing personalization across more channels can increase overall consumer spend by up to 500%, according to the study “Engage consumers & increase buyer readiness through customer-centric marketing”.
Banks like BBVA or Bancolombia, or investment banking groups like Goldman Sachs, use content marketing to reach younger audiences, connect with them, increase brand awareness and build customer loyalty.
However, it is not just about creating lots of content. For this strategy to be successful, it is essential to have the right processes and tools to connect the content with the audience. The key is in the data: with its analysis you can know what interests the target audience and thus produce content aligned with those interests.
If you would like to learn more about how we can help you create a successful content strategy for the financial sector, please contact us: sales@castleberrymedia.co.
