It sure feels like marketers are facing an uphill battlewhen it comes to marketing these days. And that includes creditunion marketers! Consumers are becoming more and more dependent ontheir mobile devices to conduct a majority of their financialtransactions. Attention spans have gotten shorter. And we're allsuffering from information overload due to the explosion of digitalmedia channels that has occurred over the last few years. Add thatto the threat of new competition in the financial services spacefrom disruptors such as Apple Pay and Google Wallet, and you have aperfect storm.

So what's a marketer to do? What can a credit union marketer doto compete in this changing landscape? What strategies, channelsand programs should you utilize to effectively reach your members?One suggestion is to look to your current data. There are likely tobe valuable nuggets of information already at your disposal to helpyou reach out and connect with your members in an unforgettableway.

Here are some of the most commonplace areas to investigate tolearn more about your members:

Your existing CRM: Your first step inuncovering more about your members is to scrub and strengthen thehealth of your existing marketing database or data warehouse. Cleandata can make all the difference in the effectiveness of yourtargeting and segmentation, not to mention the accuracy of yourreporting and analysis.

Face-to-face branch interactions: Is your staffrequired to make notations after they meet with a member? Whatproducts did they purchase or inquire about? Did they mention theyare considering buying a home in the near future? What about a newcar? While in-branch interactions have declined, they still remainone of the most valuable sources of member data available…as longyou're capturing and integrating this information into yourdatabase.

Email click-through: While it's great to know amember has opened your email, it's not enough to take real action.Click-through rates provide insights into what your members aremost interested in and then allow us to take action and customizecontent for subsequent email campaigns. Do your emailcommunications generate decent click-through rates? If not, you mayneed to modify your emails to make them more contextually relevantfor the member. Emails can be both data-driven and datagenerating.

Web traffic: Where are your members spendingmost of their time on your site? What products and services arethey investigating? How much time are they spending on each productpage? Can you track site visits at the individual consumer level?If not, this should be high on your priority list. Tracking thisbehavior creates valuable insights to inform a more holistic viewof the member.

I understand sorting through and dealing with all this data canseem overwhelming. It can be daunting to figure outwhere to start, determine what data you have and identify what youmight still need. The key is to dedicate time and resources topulling this all together to identify opportunities latent in yourcurrent data…or just on the periphery of your data you could easilycollect. The payoff is the creation of insights that can increaseROI on your marketing campaigns by making them more relevant. Thebottom line is, relevance boosts response. Just like a branchassociate needs to be able to shift gears and talk about everythingfrom car loans to a line of home equity, your marketing needs to beadaptable and significant in order to drive sales.

Data, when stored and used in the appropriate way, can be yourbiggest ally in a highly competitive marketplace. You can learnmore about your members, have the ability to deliver highlyrelevant and personalized information about your products andservices and create a more positive member experience whilebuilding loyalty. So jump into your customer data a bit deeper. Youmight just find some amazing treasures buried in there!

Michele Fitzpatrick is vice president for Harte Hanks. Shecan be reached at 215-944-9688 [email protected].