In my two previous posts, which you can read here and here, I communicated some of the insights and tidbits of important information I picked up at Forrester Research's Financial Services Forum. Here are the rest of my notes.- Social networks can work for Financial Services companies if the marketer has specific objectives clearly established beforehand.
- Remember that unlike an online or offline ad campaign, it’s very difficult to just discontinue a social media effort like a community or blog without offending some customers. Social media efforts require a commitment.
- In a heavily regulated industry it’s imperative that legal and regulatory staff is involved in social network planning early in the process.
- Know your audience! Don’t expect active participation in social networks and communities out of just anybody. It’s not a build it and they will participate proposition.
Action Item: Josh has built a tool to help you profile your audience. Go to http://www.forrester.com/Groundswell/profile_tool.html and check it out.
James McGuire, VP Online Strategy, RBC Financial Group and Joey Wilson, Director of Marketing Strategy, Sapient in the Sapient Guest Executive Forum address “Demystifying 360: Gaining a Complete Customer View to Change the Way You Market Online”:
- A legacy of sound database marketing practices and recent, significant investments have enabled RBC to maintain a complete customer view and integrated online marketing practice. “This enables us to market to a person, not a persona” Mr. McGuire states.
- RBC maintains a fairly complex series of business rules, where certain customer behavior triggers notifications and up-sell/cross-sell promotions.
- On average only 2% of the participants in any community are creating content.
- This means that people are out there creating content, but not necessarily in your community or network. Don’t assume they will.
RBC’s series of business rules are layered over a foundation of strict contact guidelines so no customer is touched too often no matter what their behavior may dictate. The guidelines prevail. In fact, notifications and marketing based on behavioral triggers has allowed RBC to all but do away with scheduled online campaigns.
Factoid – 22% of online adults are classified as “content creators.” Interesting, but, this can be misleading, because:
Feel free and post any comments or questions.
This is the third and final post from Bryce Marshall highlighting the key insights from Forrester Research's Financial Services Forum Jun 23-24, 2008.
