HE BLOGOSPHERE - It is widely recognized that traditional methods of marketing–direct mail, print, TV, radio–are losing ground with consumers. Emerging marketing channels such as blogs, buzz, viral and e-mail are gaining purchase as the new electronic word-of-mouth.
The CUNA Marketing and Business Development Council, for instance, examines just that issue in a new white paper, “Emerging Marketing Channels.”
Blogs are relatively new to the financial services industry. In 2004, the $348-million Verity Credit Union in Seattle became one of the first American credit unions to offer a blog, “Our Voice,” which can be found at http://blog.veritycu.com/. The first U.S. bank to offer a blog, “Guided by History,” was Wells Fargo in 2005.
Verity has a unique approach to the time drain of a blog, and it uses some 10 to 20 volunteer CU employees to write entries at least once a month. If an employee is interested, VP-Markeing Shari Storm will meet with the new blogger for about 10 minutes to go over the rules.
“I give out the rules–don’t write anything controversial, avoid politics, religion, keep family secrets, be respectful,” she said. “I have administrative control and I read all posts, so I can delete if necessary. After some 225 posts, I’ve not had to delete any posts.”
These rules conflict with the social media purists, however, who believe that a blogger should say whatever is on their mind without filters. “They don’t understand the restrictions and regulations credit unions have, and we have to watch what we say,” said Storm.
There is anecdotal evidence that blogs may help attract that elusive demographic–the younger member. Storm wrote a post about her view that the credit union’s credit card portfolio shouldn’t be completely platinum. A 29-year-old member wrote that “Here is someone that finally gets it,” and passed the word along to his friends.
Blogging and word of mouth can help to develop awareness of an organization to lay the groundwork for permission based marketing. Storm predicts that financial services marketing will shift to permission based within five years and replace much of traditional marketing. Certainly TiVo and DVR technology are lessening the effectiveness of TV commercials.
“The only time someone would try to sell me something is when I am in the market and state my preferences,” said Storm. “The rest of marketing and advertising would depend on word of mouth.”
Blogs allow the organization to explain the rationale for policies or practices in a humane and friendly manner. One doesn’t get the sense of an uptight bureaucrat lurking in the background from reading a blog entry.
The $1-bilion FORUM Credit Union in Indianapolis has multiple blogs. The first is “Aware,” a blog for an advisory group of teenagers. The group was formed as a focus group to help the credit union develop products and services for young members. But it was a challenge attempting to schedule meetings with sports, band practice and other activities competing for their time.
Aware is open to any teenager who wants to participate. Points are sometimes awarded for posts, depending on the subject. Points are also awarded to young members who deposit money in their savings account. The points are redeemed later for prizes.
FORUM Solutions, a CUSO owned by the credit union, has minimal resources for advertising, so a blog at www.forumsolutions.com seemed a natural choice, according to President Doug True.
“The purpose is to give us a platform, to increase awareness of FORUM Solutions,” said True. “A lot of the credit union trade publications monitor the blogs. We announce new things; we get feedback, comments from existing customers, vendors and credit unions.”
True started a personal blog in 2004 www.dougtrue.net which gave him the “ability to network, learn about blogs and the best way to use them.” He also writes freely about credit union topics without being monitored. Colleagues would ask if he was getting a return on investment from his blog, but that is missing the point according to True.
Veteran bloggers tend to agree with True. It would be difficult to obtain ROI from an organization’s blog, or staff time spent blogging. Rather, a blog should be viewed as a vehicle to communicate with members and the many people the credit union would like to reach. It could be viewed as similar to giving a presentation to community group.
“I use it as a tool to meet new people,” said True. “I post about once a week or if I read something that is compelling. People get hung up on quantity, I don’t post unless I have something to say. The function of a blog for a credit union is to get feedback and create awareness about products and services.”
