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“Social media isn’t about creating a great brand. It’s about acting as though you already have one” @sxsw
Today, the price of success is digital leadership. That holds true whether you are a brand or an individual. In fact we could argue that if you don’t have a strong online brand, you’re risking extinction.
How then do financial services brands and executives make the most of their online presence and manage the potential risks?
This week, I spoke at an event hosted by Women in Super about why corporate and personal brands are underrepresented online, and how financial services brands and executives can make the transition from having a great brand to having a great online brand.
The “digital disruption bomb”, so well outlined in Deloitte’s digital reports, has well and truly gone off in financial services. It’s predicted we will be one of the industries most affected by digital disruption in the next few years.
This presents huge risk – a concern that financial services organisations (particularly in wealth management and superannuation) have focused on – but it also presents huge opportunities.
With sensible risk management frameworks, financial services brands can protect their reputation while still building a powerhouse online brand if they act on the opportunities that digital disruption presents.
Why you need to own online ink – search rules
Google and Corporate Executive Board research demonstrated last year that on average, buyers are 70% of the way through their information search before they contact a brand (source: forbes.com). What this means for wealth management and financial services – and other industries – is that we need to be highly visible in organic search (essentially Google). If we can reach people while they are in this information search phase with the material they are looking for, we gain pole position when it comes to later stage decision making, searches and purchases.
Combine high search visibility with analytics and we can reach, and re-target, both prospects and current clients.
Direct isn’t dead either
We now have a far greater ability to target information to people by using a combination of analytics and direct contact, based on the data we have about them. But what’s really interesting, and hits home in many wealth management businesses, is the ability to follow-up, or re-target (based on unique identifiers such as email addresses) through social media or other online channels.
The ultimate outcome is that we really can now tailor our marketing to the market of one. In some cases there are already spectacular results – increases, for example, in superannuation fund member engagement (Deloitte cites a 1500% increase in the case of AustralianSuper), or a leads pipeline that nearly tripled.
If the words ‘social media’ still send a chill up your spine, remember this: the reputation risk of social media and content marketing is manageable. The risk of missing the boat isn’t.
The worst consequences of digital engagement can be foreseen, planned for, and avoided. The price of being left behind isn’t brand damage – it’s brand obliteration in a competitive online marketplace where both businesses and consumers use online tools to make the most of their purchase decision.
The opportunities outweigh the risk.
