13 minutes
There are two sides to every coin. What makes credit unions great—a focus on member service that leads to very low attrition rates—can also make some CUs a little lackadaisical on the marketing front. Many credit unions stick with outdoor, broadcast, and other traditional marketing avenues that have worked well for them in the past. But the marketing environment has changed drastically, thanks to technological and cultural shifts.
Right now, there are three extremely compelling reasons for credit unions to pay attention to digital marketing, and mobile-device marketing in particular.
First, mobile devices are permanently glued to people’s hands.
“There are over 150 million smartphones activated every day,” says Louise Nestor, director of marketing at $450 million/45,000-member Connex Credit Union, North Haven, Conn. “People are on their phones all the time, especially the millennials, who are more attached to their mobile devices than anybody else. People use them because they need to get information quickly and immediately. They want convenience, and things that are simple and easy to use.”
Second, mobile marketing is incredibly trackable. Broadcast and many other marketing methods can be difficult to track, but when messages are shared via mobile devices, you can trace the entire process: number of impressions, number of clicks, number of applications filled out, number of loans originated.
“You’re able to show a really direct ROI, and that’s why we’ve been doing more and more and more in that space,” says CUES member Cathy Graham, VP/marketing at $3.9 billion/313,000-member Desert Schools Federal Credit Union, Phoenix. “It’s kind of a marketer’s dream.”
Third, and perhaps most importantly, members are asking for it. Graham says her CU conducts regular surveys, and it found that members wanted to hear from Desert Schools FCU more digitally. It’s not often a financial institution gets an invitation like that—so clearly it should be a priority.
Being Optimized
When it comes to putting mobile marketing into practice, the first thing to realize is that, increasingly, online means mobile by default.
“A lot of folks were saying they wanted to get information from Desert Schools through email,” says Graham. “You think email, oh, that’s my desktop. Not necessarily. I know I check my email probably fifty-fifty phone vs. desktop, just depending on where I am. We found out that when we were sending emails to our members—and this was several years ago—something like 35 percent of those were being opened on a mobile device. So whether we thought we were doing it or not, we were doing mobile marketing.”
Early on, the CU’s website and emails weren’t responsive, so they didn’t look particularly good on smartphones and tablets. But when the CU’s marketers understood their missives were being read on these devices, they prioritized mobile-friendly Web design.
There’s more a credit union can do to improve mobile interactions, says Mike Lawson, principal of DML Communications, San Diego.
Number one, he says, is to make apps as quick and easy to use as possible. The less swiping and navigating members have to do, the better.
“Design your apps with as much automation as possible,” he suggests. “I know there are some things you just can’t get around, but make them as streamlined as possible. Use digital signatures and try to do away with as much thumb-typing as you can.”
Seek and Find
Many mobile marketing methods are extensions of online marketing in general—for example, paid search and organic search optimization. They’re all the more important in the mobile realm, says Sam Kilmer, senior director of CUES Supplier member and strategic partner Cornerstone Advisors Inc., Scottsdale, Ariz., because when members are out and about transacting business, they have their phones handy. Credit unions understand that power.
“Even if [credit unions] have not invested a lot in dedicated apps, what you’ll find is that they have invested in organic, perhaps in paid search, with Google,” he says.
Paid search has been extremely successful for Desert Schools FCU, which has increased its digital budget 1050 percent since 2010.
“We started with our consumer lending products, [such as] if you wanted to refinance an auto loan, if you wanted to buy a new car and get an auto loan, or if you wanted a home equity loan,” says Graham. “We created some display and paid search campaigns, and then we built out the landing pages on our website and put the appropriate tracking on them.”
Graham says the CU measured those campaigns and optimized them over time: Could it spend a little more money and get more results? Could it spend the same money, but tweak the wording to convert at a higher rate? It’s been an excellent learning experience for the marketing campaign, and a great success for the institution. The home equity search campaign alone is delivering, in Graham’s words, “1,000 percent ROI, something crazy like that.” So the CU is now expanding its search campaigns to include consumer lending, first mortgages, and its financial services CUSO.
What would Graham like other credit union managers to know about mobile marketing with search engines? You don’t have to be a big guy to do it, she says.
“You can control your spending,” she says. “You can set daily limits. You can have a very controlled, manageable budget, even a couple thousand dollars a month, and yet still be out there when people are searching in your marketplace. You can be driving qualified leads to your website or to your branches or to your call centers. So I think it’s one of the most cost-effective ways that you can be doing marketing, especially for a credit union.”
Making Processes Easier
What does mobile marketing feel like from the member’s point of view? If it’s done correctly, it’s so relevant and so helpful that it feels less intrusive than traditional marketing. You’re communicating with members the way they want to be communicated with.
“The idea of relevance is really huge right now,” says Graham. “We’re not filling their mailbox, but when they’re on their phone and they’re doing a search, if somebody is in our marketplace and they search ‘best auto loan rates,’ they see Desert Schools FCU pop up. When we do send correspondence, they’re getting an email on their phones that is responsive. They can read it, but they can also click on it and take action that’s appropriate to them. That click might result in a phone call to a live person, or it might go to an application.”
“The key is making mobile messages personal by taking advantage of data,” says Brian Day, director of digital strategy at CUES Supplier member TMG, Des Moines. “The more data you have, the easier it is to ensure you are sending relevant offers and information. By looking at purchase activity and other information, you can paint a clearer picture of consumer wants and needs. Not using data to target consumers will lead to irrelevant or not timely information, which is not useful to the consumer.”
Nestor says her credit union currently has a number of services and advocacy points available for members who log into online banking. But it is currently evaluating technology that may make those processes more streamlined in the near future. If members see that Connex CU is offering a great rate on a car loan and they happen to be at a dealership, the new tech will allow them to apply from their phone and potentially get on-the-spot approval.
It’s all about doing business the way members want to, says Graham. “They all know they can come into a branch. We have 47 branches, so we try to make it easy for them to do that. But we also make it easy for them to do business with us if they choose to do it on a mobile device, whether it’s a smartphone or a tablet.”
Social Media and Messaging
Social media is another area of the online experience that is increasingly accessed via mobile devices. No mobile campaign is complete without a social component.
“Most social networks are now mobile-first experiences,” explains Virginia Scott, senior product manager at CUES Supplier member Fiserv, Brookfield, Wis. “Newer platforms like Snapchat and Instagram are exclusively mobile, while the majority of Facebook and Twitter traffic now originates from mobile devices.
“Social networks are also evolving into effective and mature mobile advertising platforms for content that is relevant, engaging and shareable. Facebook and Twitter are essential platforms for search marketing, customer service and relationship building, and credit unions can use these platforms’ ad targeting features to promote their brand or pitch offers.”
Scott says Fiserv is seeing social marketing used for educational purposes, too, touching on basic financial literacy or explaining how a CU’s products and services work.
Businesses that use social media successfully tend to use it more as an informational channel than a sales channel, says Day. “It can be a great way to tell stories and connect to consumers in a relevant way,” he says. “Videos present a nice opportunity for telling a story, but they have to grab the consumer’s attention right away and they can’t be very long.
“Facebook, for example, allows videos to auto-play in the news feed. It’s a good idea to use big, animated text on screen so even if consumers don’t open the video, they will see some of the message.”
“We are all over social media,” says Nestor. “A lot of our concentration has been focused on Facebook and Twitter, because right now that’s where we’re finding that our members—and nonmembers—spend a lot of time. We do a lot of community outreach, and we share that with the community through those channels. We do financial literacy. We educate people on different common financial terms. We do probably about 20 percent product, and the other 80 percent is community, budget tips, fun trivia, fun quizzes.”
Messaging is important, but social media campaigns are at their best when they have the potential to lead directly to actions. Again, it’s about making the transition as seamless as possible.
“The cool thing about social media is that you can drill down so far, you can just almost customize [your message to the member],” says Lawson. “Especially on Facebook, gosh, the customization that you can drill down is phenomenal.”
For example, on Facebook a CU can target ads to a specific set of people with whom they have already established a relationship on or off Facebook. Audiences can be defined by email address, Facebook user IDs, phone numbers, names, date of birth, gender, locations, app user IDs and more.
“But then you need to seamlessly transfer stuff to the app so the member can get access super quick,” says Lawson. “They can get right to the service that they want to use—an actual loan application for an auto or mortgage.”
Customized messages can be delivered to the member on social media sites, or they can be sent via email or text. But as always, it’s the fine points that determine whether this type of marketing is deft or ham-fisted.
“Utilizing a mix of channels to reach consumers is important,” says Day. “These can include in-app notifications, text messages, emails, social media, etc. You need to be cognizant of how the message is packaged for each channel. With a text message, you’ve got about one sentence. Email messages can be longer. When consumers log into the mobile app, it’s the perfect opportunity to include a message or an offer to get the consumer’s attention. But with notifications, you also need to be sensitive to the fact consumers don’t want their phones beeping and buzzing all the time. You are competing with other apps on the consumer’s phone, which also may be pushing notifications. This can create clutter for the consumer.”
Early in the Sales Cycle
Tim Daley, senior consultant at Cornerstone Advisors, says one of the keys to successful mobile marketing is entering the consumer’s buying cycle or influence cycle at the earliest possible point.
“What I mean is, people are normally not looking for a car loan, they’re looking for a car,” he says. “They’re not looking for a mortgage, they’re looking for a house. The role of the marketer is, how do I enter the conversation with brand and lead generation at the earliest possible point of influence?”
With mobile marketing, that’s easier than it used to be.
“One innovation in mobile marketing is the ability for financial institutions and merchants to use location information to give consumers contextually relevant offers or information,” says Day. “For example, as a consumer is walking down the street and passes a coffee shop, the coffee shop could push the consumer a coupon or offer [through the coffee shop’s app]. As a financial institution, if I see a consumer is spending time on car lots, I might push them information on auto loan rates.”
But the true power of location-based marketing may lie not in transactional interactions such as coupons and offers, but in pre-transactional ones, where the credit union is able to relationship-build and teach members to expect the CU to be there when they need them.
“As far as mobile is concerned, because it’s a device that is always with me, it’s a way for the credit union to continue a conversation that may or may not even have started,” Daley says. “If you’re not coming into the branch as much as you used to, this is a way to engage on a device that’s always in your pocket or purse. Now they can, for example, put a geofence around an event the credit union is sponsoring and thank you for coming. It’s a nice way to continue a conversation with your membership even though they are not with you.”
Geofencing is a virtual geographical barrier using GPS or radio frequency identification. Programs, such as a mobile app, can use the geofence to trigger a text message, mobile notification or email when a device enters or exits the boundaries of the geofence.
The crucial step is to then translate that relationship into something actionable, Daley says.
“If I get my members used to talking to me or getting notices from me in that fashion, the next time they go to a car dealership and I greet them with an offer, they’re less likely to feel that that’s creepy,” he says. “We want to make sure we don’t look like or feel like Big Brother, but we can still continue a conversation with our membership when we don’t typically get a chance to see them.”
Desert Schools FCU’s Graham sees that type of interaction in her CU’s near future.
“Right now with the app that we have for our mobile banking, believe it or not, that platform doesn’t allow us to push out messages to our members,” she says. “When someone’s on their phone and they’ve logged into Desert Schools FCU online banking, with all the information that we know about them, we would love to be able to say, ‘I can see from Cathy’s debit card activity she has been going to Home Depot a lot. Maybe she’s ready to do some home improvement, and we should market a home equity message to her.’ Or ‘She goes to Babies ‘R’ Us a lot, so let’s talk about college planning.’ I think that’s going to be huge for us, because we’ll know who those people are, and I think we can make those messages even more relevant.”
Jamie Swedberg is a freelance writer based in Athens, Ga.
