While we’d have loved a reason to stay a few extra days in Austin post-FinCon, we took to our laptops for this year’s virtual American Bankers Association Bank Marketing Conference, and it did not disappoint.

One of the highlights of the virtual event was an engaging discussion on influencer marketing in our panel discussion on “Using Performance Marketing and Influencer Partnerships to Acquire Customers Digitally,” hosted by our own Chief Revenue Officer, Alana Levine. Alana was joined by Carie Kelly, VP of Marketing (BankProv) and Lauren Greutman, Publisher/Blogger (LaurenGreutman.com), who shared their advice on how to make performance marketing work for your financial institution.

We know that not everyone was able to attend the virtual event, so we thought we’d share our key takeaways that will have the most impact on your bank marketing strategy going into 2022.

Takeaway One: You don’t need to build branches to build connections

During the session “Building Meaningful Client Relationships Remotely,” we heard from Liz Broekman, (VP, Director of P.O.W.E.R. at Fidelity Bank), Dr. Anissa Evans (DBA, Marketing Manager at Evolve Bank & Trust), Doug Wilber (CEO at Denim Social), and Shelly Loftin (CFMP, SVP, Retail, Payments & Lending at the American Bankers Association) on ways to use digital channels to connect with customers online.

The group mentioned that it is crucial to transfer that in-person brand experience to online. One way to do this is connecting with customers via social media channels like Facebook and Instagram. These platforms are touchpoints where customers are actively engaging with brands by asking questions through direct messaging, commenting on updates, and sharing posts with their networks.

Takeaway Two: Don’t throw away your shot – leverage the power of content

Whether your content orients around increasing SEO performance, boosting engagement, or supporting a recent rebrand, it is the channel that will provide the greatest value to your audience and a way to demonstrate leadership and engagement. She mentions that too often, content gets overlooked or pushed to the side, when really it should be at the forefront of everything that you do.

Helpful Tip: When building your content strategy, think about the areas in which you want your bank to be a thought leader. Structure you plan using content pillars to help organize which type of content you want to produce.

Takeaway Three: What people say matters

Here are some key statistics that he pointed out:

• Consumers read an average of 10 online reviews before feeling able to trust a local business
• 72% of customers won’t take action until they read reviews
• More than half of consumers won’t use a business if it has less than a 4-star rating
• Google accounts for 57.5% of all reviews worldwide
• 91% of millennials trust online reviews as much as friends and family

As we mentioned previously, authenticity plays a role in developing trust between you and your audience. When creating your content strategy, become a resource that is informative and value-add, and more importantly, demonstrates that you care and understand your customers. Who is your audience and what are their needs? Are they a teen looking to set up a checking account for the first time? Are they a loyal customer who may be looking to invest further? Consider how you can become that resource and support them on their customer journey.

Helpful Tip: Ask for feedback from your customers and make changes to areas where there is room for improvement. Use surveys or follow-up communications to stay connected with your customers so that they feel supported and heard.

Takeaway Four: Influencer marketing is the new black

As a parent, if she were to ask her kids to do something, they never seem to want to do it. However, if another parent asks her kids to do the same thing, her kids are ready and willing. Just like Lauren’s kids (and probably most kids out there), people are more inclined to listen to third-parties that seem to have a more objective voice. Instead of listening to their banker, they’re more likely to listen to external parties providing the advice.

So how do you incorporate this channel into your broader marketing mix? Keep these key success factors in mind:

• Set clear goals – Set goals that are realistic, measurable, and attainable. Have open discussions with your influencer partners and have defined metrics of success, such as volume of opened accounts from a campaign.
• Have a clear value proposition– Think about what makes your bank’s products attractive. How do you stand out from the noise?
• Make the journey to becoming a customer easy – Ensure that your account opening process is timely and accessible.
• Be able to measure those goals you set – Make sure you can measure end-to-end from first click to opened account.

During our panel discussion, we were asked if performance marketing works well for brand awareness, or if it is more useful for specific product launches. The answer is – it is a great option for both!

Influencers generate brand awareness as they can help you to reach a larger audience, but they can also be a great tactic to drive lower-funnel conversions when launching a new product.

Helpful Tip: Not sure where to start looking for influencer partnerships? Ask your team which financial influencers they follow and start reaching out from there. Find out what you can manage on your own and if you don’t have the bandwidth, consider using an affiliate technology and marketing partner like Fintel Connect.

Final Thoughts

We are proud to have been a part of this virtual event alongside so many other amazing thought leaders. Thank you to the American Bankers Association for including us in your agenda, and for those who met with us or tuned in to our panel discussion, we hope to be able to connect with you again soon!

And when it comes to influencer marketing, we also heard from some of our attendees that they’re keen to try influencer marketing, but it is hard to get over the line. Here are some tips to help sell the opportunity internally:

• Many experienced financial influencers or “finfluencers” do understand compliance standards and know how to help drive the right messaging. In addition, there are tools out there to help keep track and manage your campaigns. At Fintel, we understand these challenges, which is what drove us to develop our Fintel Check marketing monitoring tool to help our partners scale safely.
• You don’t need a to be a large bank with a big budget to get started with influencer marketing. It is cost-effective and can be incorporated into any budget, big or small. Pilot programs are great ways to try out the channel – feel free to get in touch with our team to help build out a plan that’s right for your bank.
• Influencer and affiliate marketing actually accounts for up to 40% of all customer acquisitions for financial institutions, which means if your bank isn’t looking at this channel as a way to drive new accounts, it’s missing out!

If you are interested in learning more about how to leverage influencer partnerships to generate brand awareness or create buzz around a new product, contact us and we would be happy to help you get started!