In 2014, Coca-Cola globally launched the “Share a Coke” campaign after seeing Australian sales rise as a direct result of its efforts in 2011. If you’ve seen or drank a Coke in the last year you’ve probably noticed a name, a title of endearment or even popular jargon slapped on the side of the red aluminum can. The “Share a Coke” marketing campaign was so successful it boosted Coke’s plummeting sales that had lasted about a decade. So, what was the reason for the iconic brand’s widely successful marketing campaign? Personalization. Consumers respond positively to one-to-one marketing campaigns. Just how positively? To get an idea, Hubspot wrote a great article which includes 22 stats that will convince any marketing team to personalize their efforts. As for Coke, the internationally-recognized brand personalized their marketing in the most literal sense — by using popular names and titles.
As we’ve mentioned before, inspiration for new marketing ideas can often times come from outside of the financial industry. Fund marketers can learn from this clever Coke campaign by devising ways to get closer to potential investors and advisors. There are techniques to directly personalize fund marketing by actually using names (without the can) and then there are ways to personalize by catering to the profile of the potential investor. Check out these four tactics to individualize your fund marketing efforts and reach through to your target:
Get personal by tying in prospects’ names
1. Email marketing
Try individualizing your email campaigns by directly addressing the recipient by name in the subject line or in the salutation of the email’s body. For many, this type of personalization does increase open rates. According to Aberdeen, personalized emails improve click-through rates by an average of 14% and conversion rates by 10%.
It’s a good idea to a/b test subject lines to get the best open rates possible. Test first name only, last name only and full name to figure out what works best with the contacts in your marketing automation software.
2. Dynamic retargeting
There are quite a few retargeting platforms out there. Some platforms, like ListenLoop, have the ability to personalize messages to individuals by using the name of the company or the name of the individual at the company. Even the message in the ads is tailored to the products or services the prospect previously viewed on the site — all in hope to peak the user’s interest again.
Get personal by appealing to users’ interests
3. Relevant content
With the help of a trusty tool called marketing automation, marketers can track what content specific website visitors are reading. There are different ways to deliver more targeted content to site users too. For instance, if an investor reads a blog article on the fundamentals of investing in a certain market, he or she is probably interested in a white paper around the same topic for more insight.
[Read our article on content recommendation to find out more on how to tailor content to end users]
4. Client portal
Whereas the methods that have been mentioned are for attracting new customers, this one different — it’s to better service existing clients (Remember, it’s critical to use marketing to nurture your awesome clients and keep their business!). Consider building or buying a digital hub so investors and advisors can access targeted content and up-to-date account information whenever and wherever they want.
You don’t need to be one of the world’s most famous brands like Coca-Cola to personalize your fund marketing and reap the benefits from it. Fund marketers can step up their game with these four personalization tactics. Give one or all of them a try, and tell us your results!
