Episode 77 - Internal Buy-In is Key to Social Media Success for Your Bank or Credit Union

In this podcast, Meredith Olmstead, CEO of FI GROW Solutions, and social media expert Sophie Bawany discuss why social media remains vital for banks and credit unions in 2024. They explore how social media humanizes financial institutions, helps them engage with customers where they are, and fosters a unified brand experience. Additionally, they delve into the importance of internal collaboration, employee empowerment, and adapting to shifting social media platforms to maintain a strong digital presence.

Key Takeaways:

• Be Where Your Customers Are: Social media remains a key platform where customers and members spend significant time. Financial institutions must maintain a presence on these platforms to engage with their audience, offer authentic financial advice, and control their narrative in an environment where information is rapidly shared.

• Humanize Your Brand: Social media helps humanize banks and credit unions, allowing them to showcase the people behind the brand. By featuring real employees and sharing authentic stories, institutions can build trust and foster a sense of community, differentiating themselves from larger, less personal financial entities.

• Encourage Internal Collaboration and Morale: Engaging employees in social media efforts can break down departmental silos and enhance internal morale. By involving team members across departments in content creation, institutions can create a unified brand message while promoting a more inclusive and collaborative workplace culture.

Transcription:

Meredith Olmstead:
Hi there. I'm Meredith Olmstead, CEO and founder of FI GROW Solutions. We are a digital marketing and sales consulting agency. We work exclusively with banks and credit unions. And I am here with Sophie Bawany. Sophie is one of our inbound marketing specialists and social media gurus. Say Hi, Sophie.

Sophie Bawany:
Hi.

Meredith Olmstead:
Sophie Social. Okay. So Sophie and I were just chatting about really big picture stuff, but then also very specifically about social media, but we were talking about why banks and credit unions or pretty much any financial institution out there, still needs to be on social media. It's like, is this ever going to change? We don't really call it social media marketing anymore. We call it digital marketing, inbound marketing, content marketing. But we still tell all of our clients that they need to be on social media. And so what I wanted us to unpack is why do they still need to be there, and then what actually needs to happen internally at those banks and credit unions for them to be successful? So first thing is, Sophie, we talked about a bunch of different reasons. Why are they there in the first place? Why do they still need to be there in 2024? And on and on.

Sophie Bawany:
That's where your customers are at, your members, your customers, they're not going anywhere. Social media is not going anywhere. It's where your average person is still consuming information, authentic, inauthentic. So if you want to control the narrative and information and the facts and give good financial advice, you need to be on social media.

Meredith Olmstead:
Okay. So first thing is you want to use channels where people are. Where your customers or your members are spending their time online. We know crazy numbers of people, like 85, 90%, of Americans even, just Americans, are on a social media platform on a daily basis, basically. And then we were talking about what else it does for bank brands or credit union brands, like for a financial institution, what does being on social media, what can it do for them that would maybe set them apart from a bigger financial institution?

Sophie Bawany:
I think it humanizes them. We talk about how if you're putting your money somewhere, if you're investing, if you're saving, you want to know that there's a person on the other side. And the best way to do that is to hop on Instagram or TikTok and be like, oh my credit union's posting content and I see people. So it really humanizes and increases the trust level for somebody who wants to be a customer or a member.

Meredith Olmstead:
Nobody wants bots or AI generated chat machines or live chats to be the only way that they can get any information about how to manage their auto loan or their checking account or open a new account. And they want to be able to pick up the phone or open up a website and chat in and have an actual person with a face and who's able to be contacted and get back to them quickly and actually interact. So a great point. So it humanizes them and shows them that there are people there if they need them. Very, very important. Also a really, really important source of information. So even though we don't really think of it that way, people do still research financial brands, financial products and services, and they sometimes often get reviews, feedback, suggestions on social media platforms from friends, from connections, followers. So that is another reason why you want to make sure you're there. And then so is it still the same? Are they the same networks? Like it used to be Facebook and Instagram and Twitter, and now everything seems to have shifted slightly. So what's happening with platform, social media platforms, that people need to be aware of?

Sophie Bawany:
It's interesting because platform-wise, Facebook still has a lot of the middle age to older age demographic, which may be your current audience or your current members or customers. And then you kind of want to look at Instagram and TikTok for the on-trend. As long as you have the content, that's where your Millennials, Gen Z, Alpha, your younger generation, your future members, or the people, and most of our clients are saying the people they want to target. So you want to be on all three platforms ideally.

Meredith Olmstead:
Gotcha. So basically over the course of time and over the last 10 years, we've seen platforms, new platforms, emerge and user behavior shift. Younger people shift to some of these new platforms, potentially. Regardless, they're still somewhere. So they're still social media platforms. They might shift and change over time, but they're not going away. People aren't just going to wholesale pull out and be like, "I'm no longer going to be interacting with people on social media." All right, so then we were talking about the importance of internal buy-in and support internally throughout your leadership, all the way down through all of your departments, even tellers and everybody in frontline staff, loans by phone people, for social media because, and you said the first reason was trying to create a unified brand experience. Tell me a little bit more about that specifically.

Sophie Bawany:
We really want to encourage our clients to have a unified brand message. You have a vision, you've spent years trying to develop it. You teach your coworkers and your team members about the culture. This is a great way to showcase that culture. It's a great way to back up what you've told your members or customers, that we are community oriented. This is your way to show it. It's a way for your team members to come to the forefront, showcase their personalities, their humor, while still being part of a culture that's giving you the same brand and the same loyalty and kind of that vision and mission.

Meredith Olmstead:
Yeah, that makes sense. I've heard people talk about this with credit unions and community banking as a lot of times those regional or local institutions are walking the walk. They're doing really great things for their customers and their members, but they're not talking the talk. They're not talking about what they're doing for people as much as they should be, because they feel like maybe it's bragging or maybe it's not really in line with who they are. It's more of like a sales culture. But honestly, in today's day and age, social media is a great way to authentically talk about what you're doing with people and show the positive impact you're having. Okay, very interesting.
And then also, empowering employees and their personal voices. I think we don't really think about that sometimes with social media, and it's as a potential, could people get worried about their employees getting on social media? But what's the flip side of that that can be seen as a positive?

Sophie Bawany:
Yeah, I think a lot of times when we think about somebody working in a financial institution, we think of somebody that's very stuffy, in a box. But then when you give them a chance, you find out, oh, this person has a really good sense of humor, or this person can dance. And it really lets the people that are watching know that again, they're dealing with a person. So your employees feel like they're part of a bigger picture and they're allowed to be individuals as well. And that does so much for your internal morale and just boosting everyone's feelings towards the credit union or the bank.

Meredith Olmstead:
Yeah, great for morale, great for trust. Again, humanizing that brand, really showing people in the community that you're real people too, that you're fun or that you're engaging and that you can connect with them on a personal level as well as a trusted financial advisor. Awesome. And then you also talked about the last two things we talked about, were cross departmental collaborating, where a lot of times people are sitting in their little departments and they're only talking to their own individual team members, but social media can break down those barriers and get people to be more aware of what's going on from one department to another.

Sophie Bawany:
Nothing brings you together like you have a reel that you guys need to create, and I need one person from each department to volunteer. Everyone gets together, they create this piece of content, but while they're creating it, they're having conversations. They're discussing good, bad, pros, cons, and it really breaks down a lot of those communication barriers. Sometimes we're all in silos and we don't realize it, and this is a chance to really get together and again, have conversations you might not be having because you just don't have the opportunity to meet.

Meredith Olmstead:
Yeah. The other thing too is if you're getting feedback on social media about products or services or a branch experience that's maybe positive, maybe not so positive. It's a great opportunity to get more information, feedback, experiences from staff, from people who are coming in, your customers, your members, and really share that internally and treat it as a learning opportunity to make your services better, to make your products better, to customize and personalize the experience that you're offering for customers. So awesome stuff. All right, well, social media is not going anywhere. It's clear, that's clear, but I think it is really still important that financial institutions are prioritizing it. And from the top to the bottom, when you're seeing your executive team and people throughout your organization involved in that social media content, that is going to help promote buy-in and just a more authentic experience. So thank you for sharing your tips. I appreciate it.

I hope you guys enjoyed this. If you're interested in learning more about social media for banks and credit unions, please visit us at figrow.com. We have lots of other blogs, case studies, eBooks. We also have lots of other topics around digital marketing, sales, coaching, branding, digital ads. So please visit us at FI GROW when you have a moment, and otherwise, let's just get out there and make it happen.