Social Media In Financial Services Nicola Webber The Gate

How to build your financial services brand in the social media space

1. Branding

2. Projecting

3. Conversing

In many ways, choosing an adviser is a leap of faith

It all comes down to this

Which company will help me feel confident about my financial future and that of those who rely on me?

Will you deliver the cheque and will it meet my expectations?

“I don’t know who you areI don’t know your company.I don’t know your company’s product.I don’t know what your company stands for.I don’t know your company’s customers.I don’t know your company’s record.I don’t know your company’s reputation.Now - what was it you wanted to sell me? ”

Moral – Sales start before your salesman calls

(Source: Advertisement for McGraw Hill Magazines.)

Branding is something you do already

Or is it?

Branding your business – 3 steps

Consider what you’d like people to remember about you1

Think about what makes you different and try to bring that out in everything you do (Remember to be customer focused).2

Branding your business

Be single minded.

It is an old marketing maxim.

If you throw one ball to someone, they will catch it. If you throw several, they are unlikely to catch even one.

“A man may be so much of everything, that he is nothing of anything.” Samuel Johnson

The best communications focus on one message.

3

Your two most valuable commodities

Trust Reputation

Clarity and consistency build trust and reputation

Clarity

Clear about who they are, what they stand for and what they

offer their customers.

Consistency

Consistent in their presentation, in their character and in their

messages.

Each of these builds trust and reputation

Your social media presence is the clothes you wear on the internet

Your social media presence is the clothes

you wear on the internet:

Speak with one voice consistently

across all channels

Keep your ‘brand’ in mind in every

interaction

Make sure everyone is on board

Good English is important – check your

spelling and grammar

Branding Summary

1. Why brand? To communicate what you offer, your unique

qualities and experience

2. Branding your business To build trust and reputation and instil confidence

in your customers

3. Communicating consistently To be consistently recognisable through clarity in

identity

2. Projecting

The extended visibility of your brand: So from stationary, to website, to all the available channels

Why bother?

Real time search

The extended visibility of your brand: So from stationary, to website, to all the available channels

Why bother?

“Everything you now do with social media will have an impact on search”

Cedric Chambaz, Microsoft

Need image for telling stories

Summary

Popular content:

•Lists

•How-tos

•Stories

•Videos

Structuring your content

Sharing and following content

Sharing content:

•add this

•tweetmeme

•slideshare

•YouTube

Tools to maximise reach

Projecting Summary

1.Why bother?• To build trust in your clients and with a wider audience

2.Effective content and propagation• Make your content easy to digest, and easy to share

3.Tools to maximise reach• To maximise your return on your time investment

3. Conversing

Advanced ‘listening’ tools

Don’t allow voids to develop around your brand

Brand advocates

Conversation Summary

1. Listen first Monitoring social media offers great insight into the hopes and

fears of your audience.

2. Join in the conversation Establish where conversations are happening and take the

opportunity to engage

3. Actively manage both positive and negative How you manage your brand in social media will leave a

permanent legacy, make sure it’s the right one

1. Branding

2. Projecting

3. Conversing

And finally…

Thank you

www.thegateworldwide.com

twitter.com/TheGateLondon

http://uk.linkedin.com/in/nicolawebber

‘nicolawebber’

Nicola Webber

All images from flikr > Commercial