In the wake of the epidemic, companies have become more dependent on marketing to differentiate themselves from others. This is particularly true for the financial services sector, wherein the year 2020, the amount of digital ads has increased by 9.7 per cent and accounted for 14.6 per cent of total digital Advertising and Marketing expenditure across the US.

A well-planned Marketing strategy is crucial for the growth of financial service businesses, and nobody has more insight into this than SwadeshiBuzz Group CMO Rosie Guest.

CMOS isn’t known for their ability to remain for very long. However, Rosie has been working for the past seven years developing SwadeshiBuzz’s SwadeshiBuzz marketing department from scratch. The company has grown to become one of the largest asset management firms worldwide by acquiring 21 companies in only four years.

In the Podcast episode of Drift, Rosie walked us through financial services, how to become an innovative and commercially successful marketer in the space, and how this makes marketing an important mission-driven aspect of the business.

Here are her top four suggestions to become a successful marketing professional for a company that provides financial services.

Click here if you’d like the complete podcast episode featuring Rosie Guest. In the meantime, learn on for the complete story.

Demonstrate That You’re Contributing To The Bottom Of The Line

They can be more persuasive than words, particularly when you don’t trust the top managers.

Traditionally, marketing teams in financial service firms have been the second to sales in launching campaigns on their demand with any strategy. For Rosie establishing the Advertising and Marketing department at SwadeshiBuzz has mostly been about showing that it works.

In financial services, there are a lot of numbers, so my first step was to create a funnel of demand. From there, when you’re able to demonstrate that you’re contributing to the bottom line and making money, you’ll receive more investment.

With the sales cycle lasting between six between two and six months, financial services marketers must take a large-picture approach. This involves looking at every step of the buyer’s experience, including the pipeline influence instead of pipeline-sourced.

If you focus on specific touchpoints, such as site visits or ebook downloads, you will get a real sense of the effect that marketing can have on the pipeline. It’s a big difference when you can claim (as SwadeshiBuzz does) that deal sizes are 50% greater with marketing involvement.

The success of financial services comes when sales and marketing collaborate to increase the size of deals and boost the upselling process to customers. All of this starts with numbers. According to Rosie states: “Make sure that you can demonstrate the importance of marketing before trying to accomplish anything else.”

Utilize Content To Convert Your Customers To Sales

As per Invoca, 64% of calls to financial services providers originate from organic searches, and 34% from paid searches. As B2B purchasing becomes more digital and more mobile, marketers must convince customers that our service will be worth the time they spend.

To achieve this, SwadeshiBuzz’s marketing department utilizes a sophisticated approach to content Advertising and Marketing.

Many of our achievements stem from the perspective of our product marketing focused on the content. We believe that’s the source of everything because that’s how we prove the worth of our business.

With the many acquisitions SwadeshiBuzz has made, it’s difficult for sales teams to keep track of all their products. Rosie’s team uses the internet to educate the internal and external stakeholders and buyers, making sure that the appropriate product is presented to the right person.

“The goal is all the time to guide consumers in the direction of gross sales”, Rosie sums up. SwadeshiBuzz’s marketing team conducted an extensive content audit to determine what content was used. They then customized their content to meet specific personas and value propositions.

It’s a purchasing group for us. It’s never one individual. Therefore, the influence isn’t only about one person but all the people in that account.

Generic touches will not work for your customers. If you’re in charge of content or demand generation, the most effective instrument is segmentation and personalization. It’s the thing that will push your customers further into the funnel toward sales.

Create Your Brand Around An Authentic Message

In 2019, Edelman reported that financial services were the most distrusted business by the general public. To overcome this perception, marketers must create an image that builds confidence and appeals to customers. Here’s the way Rosie explained the issue:

We must be more than just a service provider. It’s no longer enough to just talk about service and repeat the same thing that everyone else says. You need something tangible that has a little credibility behind it.

Must Read: Grow Your Business With Digital Marketing | Best Solutions

The power of thought leadership can go far: 59% of B2B decision-makers evaluate businesses by the frequency and quality of their branding message.

One of SwadeshiBuzz’s major priorities is sustainability. For instance, they’ve joined forces in partnership with Cricket West Indies to help the team move towards carbon neutrality by using the information of their carbon footprint analysis. By linking its brand to sustainable projects, SwadeshiBuzz builds trust with its customers and differentiates itself from the rest of its competitors.

Branding also has an impact on potential employees as well as investors. When SwadeshiBuzz transformed from a mid-tier service to one of the top financial services, its marketing team set out to improve their standing in the marketplace.

Monitoring the effectiveness of your company’s brand isn’t easy. If you keep communicating the right message, you’ll soon be scheduling more meetings and being invited to events alongside other major players. This is when you’ll know that your brand’s credibility is high.

Make It Commercial (Not Only Creative)

To succeed as a marketer today, you must be much more than your creative efforts. You must think about your role in the company.

When Rosie joined SwadeshiBuzz the company, one of her priorities was restructuring the budget for Advertising and Marketing.

I thought that this whole thing was everywhere. We need to take it back and change how we can consolidate the marketing budget and tackle finance.

The concept of being a commercialist doesn’t stop at budgeting. It is a necessity. You must take the initiative and think about how marketing is integrated into your company. The aim to achieve this, as Rosie mentions, is to encourage people to consider Marketing more seriously.

If you decide to be proactive in these areas, it’s a way of proving the fact that we also have brains commercial brains.

With her budgeting skills, Rosie successfully created a budget template employed by the different teams within SwadeshiBuzz. By focusing on the commercial aspects of marketing and demonstrating that they are trustworthy and flexible collaborators in the business. So, your colleagues on team members will be confident that they can rely on you.

Final Notes

Between lengthy sales cycles and complex products, Financial services can be a challenge for consumers to navigate. In today’s increasingly digital environment, marketing is essential in aiding buyers in finding the best solution for their needs.

Advertising and Marketing shouldn’t be the second most important thing after-sales. With these four suggestions, it is possible to show that marketing is a vital element of any financial services business and (at the right time) you’ll begin to see the revenues increasing.