7 Reasons You Need a More Robust Content Marketing Strategy
Given today’s intense competitive landscape within the banking industry, both banks and credit unions are constantly looking to bring new customers or members into the fold and to expand relationships with their current constituents. That’s why it’s critically important to make your brand stand out.
Content marketing is one of the most cost-effective ways to build brand awareness and establish yourself as a trusted expert. It can build consumers’ trust in your financial institution while giving them the information they need to make an educated decision – resulting in more conversions for you. Here are seven advantages to expanding your brand’s online presence:
1. Building A Friendly, Caring Brand
Content marketing is the perfect way to exhibit your brand’s unique personality. From inspiring customer testimonials to conversations with financial experts, showcasing your expertise, empathy, and dedication to customer or member satisfaction will help set your credit union or bank marketing campaigns apart from your competitors and create affinity for your brand.
2. Capturing A New Audience
More and more, consumers are looking to the internet for financial information and advice. If their Google searches are leading them to your competitors, you are losing a valuable opportunity for conversions. Whether you’re trying to promote your new mortgage product, increase savings deposits, or attract new members, content marketing can help you get your message in front of more people – and do it in a way that gets them listening.
3. Creating Engagement
The more your content speaks directly to current and prospective customers’ or members’ needs, the more likely they are to engage with it. And the more they engage, the more likely they are to be loyal to your brand. The key to this is knowing your audience and segmenting it so you can deliver the right content to the right people at the right time.
4. Repurposing Content
One of the biggest advantages of content marketing is that you can often repackage content for use on multiple platforms. Blog posts can be promoted on social media platforms, in emails, and even in newsletters or advertorials. Videos can be shared on multiple platforms and transcribed to create Q&As. These kinds of strategies help you reach more people and get more bang for your buck from the content you produce.
5. Managing Your Online Reputation
Whether you like it or not, when people post about their experience with your bank or credit union, it won’t always be in the most positive light. And the less content that is available about your bank or credit union online, the more prominent those negative stories will be. While it’s important to learn from these experiences and in some cases respond to dissatisfied patients in a positive and helpful manner, one of the best ways to limit the impact of negative mentions is to create more content so any negative stories get pushed further down in search engine results.
6. Focusing On Your Community
Chances are, giving back is important to your financial institution. It’s important to a lot of your current and potential customers and members, too. So if members of your leadership team sit on nonprofit boards, you encourage employees to volunteer for causes they care about, you sponsor scholarships for local college students, you provide financial wellness resources to members, and you donate money to make your community a better place, make sure you’re telling people about it! This kind of feel-good content marketing can go a long way toward improving current customers’ perception of your brand and convincing prospective customers to take a look at what you can offer them.
7. Getting Customers to Promote Your Brand
There’s nothing more valuable in bank or credit union marketing than word of mouth. In the digital era, that can happen when customers share positive stories about their experience with your institution, or when they share content you’ve created. Whether it’s sound financial advice or a member testimonial, the more engaging the content you create, the more likely it will generate free, high-value marketing that will help grow your constituent base.
Developing the Right Content Marketing Strategy
Whether you’re a large national bank, a small local credit union, or something in between, the content marketing experts at LIGHTSTREAM can help you come up with a strategy that’s right for your organization. From developing content that resonates with your target audience to packaging that content in innovative ways designed to maximize its impact, we’re a content marketing agency that can help you accomplish more with your marketing budget. Think of it as an investment in growing your business. Contact us to learn more.
