As credit unions across the country gear up for another year ofnew marketing campaigns, CU Times asked experts what thetop marketing trends in credit union industry will be in 2015. Ourexperts also offered marketing advice, tips and ideas.

Digital AdvertisingDominates

Credit union marketing professionals expect to see credit unionsshift more dollars from traditional advertising to digitaladvertising.

Bo McDonald, president of Your Marketing Co. in Greenville,S.C., said he's had to hire more employees to keep up with thedigital advertising demands from his cooperative clients.

“We're allocating a lot of media dollars into digitaladvertising,” he said. “A lot of money has come out of traditionalradio and gone into Pandora (web radio). And a lot of money hascome out from billboards and other traditional media and intoonline remarketing.”

However, he said some credit union clients also continue to getstrong results using traditional marketing channels.

“Traditional media is by no means dead,” McDonald said. “We havea credit union that successfully uses traditional radio at its maindriver of traffic. It really comes down to specific markets and themarketing messages.”

While many credit union marketers are expected to invest more oftheir marketing dollars into digital marketing, the big questionoften heard is how much they should spend in digital, JamesRobert Lay, president of Pasadena, Texas-based CU Grow,said.

Because consumers, particularly millennials, are increasingtheir use of digital channels for banking transactions, Lay said hebelieves credit unions should invest at least one third of theirmarketing budget in digital.

A Gartner survey showed that digital advertisingspending averaged about 25% of a company's marketing budgetlast year. The survey also found that 51% of companies planned toincrease their digital marketing budget by 17% on average in2015.

Lay also noted credit unions should set aside more resources foreducation and training for their marketing professionals. An AdobeDigital study found that many marketers are learning about digitalmarketing on the go, but they still need to improve theirunderstanding and knowledge about online advertising, metrics andROI.

Making DigitalInvestments

Mark Arnold, a branding and marketing consultant at On the MarkStrategies in Carrollton, Texas, noted that credit unionsinvest more than $2 million to open a new branch and call it anasset, but they spend less than $20,000 for marketing ontheir website and call it an expense.

“Your members visit and spend more time on your website than anybranch you have, so why are credit unions not investing more intheir websites?” he asked.

Arnold believes that will change in 2015 because a website isthe central point of any credit union's digital marketingstrategy.

He said he expects more cooperatives to evolve their sites fromglorified online brochures into a sales tool that can capture whatmembers and non-members are looking at on the site. Credit unionscould then use that information to pitch content that consumersneed to help them make purchasing decisions.

One of the most effective ways to deliver that content is emaildespite annual predictions of the death of email.

“Everything that I am reading is that people are still morelikely to respond to email than any other type of promotion offerthat you have,” Arnold said.

Indeed, a McKinsey & Co. study found that email remains asignificantly more effective way to acquire customers than socialmedia.

“That's because 91% of U.S. consumers still use email daily andthe rate at which emails prompt purchases is not only estimated tobe at least three times that of social media, but the average ordervalue is also 17% higher,” according to McKinsey & Co.

Additionally, nearly 45% of all marketing emails are opened on amobile device.

Though an old digital marketing tool, Arnold said, email willremain effective in 2015 as long as credit unions leveragemarketing automation solutions to customize email messages formembers on products and services they may buy.

“You emails should be heavy on consumer content and light onsales pitch,” he said.

What's more, embedding an email link to a customized landingpage about a product or service can increase conversion rates by asmuch as 25%, according to McKinsey & Co.

Other digital marketing channels such as Pandora and onlineremarketing campaigns can generate a positive ROI for creditunions, according to McDonald.

McDonald said Pandora has been effective for his credit unionclients because it allows them to target market members andnon-members by local zip codes, track click-thru and conversionrates, and adjust the marketing messages when necessary.

McDonald said he has also seen online remarketing campaignsproduce good results. After members and non-members visit a creditunion site to look for a product or service, remarketing trackingsoftware codes allow credit unions to post their ads in front ofthose members and non-members when they visit other websites.

Predicting What MembersWant

Attempting to predict what products and services members andnon-members will want next has traditionally been a hit or missproposition.

However, recent advancements in software products around thecompilation of big data, or pulling consumer information fromvarious databases, and then utilizing predictive analyticsolutions, are now enabling financial institutions to anticipatethe next product or service their customers are most likely tobuy.

Alan Bergstrom, chief marketing officer for the $526 millionCommunity Choice Credit Union in Farmington Hills, Mich., saidhe expects more credit unions will be leveraging big data, orpsychographics, as well as predictive analytical solutions in2015.

“While I worked at the CUNA Mutual Group we were very quicklymoving toward big data and predictive analytics to be able to finetune and customize our messages,” he said. “In the past, thestandard approach was to take a (demographic) data base and marketa product or service to members on a data base who didn't have aproduct or service with the credit union. That is going away.”

Demographic data explains who the member is based on age,gender, education, income and marital status. But psychographics,which pulls information about consumers from a variety ofdatabases, can explain why consumers buy. Psychographicsclassifies people based on psychological and lifestyle traits suchas attitudes, habits, interests and opinions.

Psychographics can help credit unions define their targetmarkets, enable the credit union to establish a distinctive brandand allow employees to clearly communicate and deliver that brandvalue to members, Matt Purvis, a brand and marketing consultant in Eugene, Ore.,explained.

“Many institutions resist this essential step, feeling that byestablishing precise bulls-eye – even multiple targets – too manyconsumers will be left out of play,” Purvis said. “The paradox isthat by marketing too generally, we fail to make a deep impact onanyone. Today, general brand positions and mass-market messagesland unnoticed.”

Nonetheless, effectively leveraging these new tools will requirethe investment of additional resources.

An Accenture survey of more than 600 executives, including thosein the financial services industry, showed they increased their useof predictive analytics from just 12% in 2009 to 33% in 2012.However, the survey also found there is an analytics capability gapamong companies. Six out of 10 firms reported turning to externalanalysts or consultants, for assistance.

Even with outside help, however, there is no guarantee ofearning a positive ROI.

The Accenture survey also found only 22% of executives were verysatisfied with their predictive analytic results while 35% saidthey were quite satisfied. However, 43% of executives said theywere not very satisfied, not at all satisfied or didn't know.

Making It Real With VideoMarketing

Bergstrom also foresees that more credit unions will usevideo marketing to tell their story in 2015.

“There are a number of social media platforms that are capableof supporting video content, and I think consumers are more andmore comfortable engaging with video content,” he said. “I think in2015 we are going to see more credit union video content from amarketing perspective and from a brand-building perspective.”

More than 188 million Americans watched 52 billion videos by theend of 2013. That is projected to increase by more than 201 millionby 2017, according to Invodo, a visual content company in Austin,Texas. Moreover, in October 2014, YouTube revealed more than halfof all video views originated from mobile devices, which taps intoa younger audience of consumers.

But in today's marketplace, it's not enough to postrun-of-the-mill videos such as television commercials on YouTube ormember testimonials on Facebook.

“People are responding to video that contains some element ofemotion that engages them,” Bergstrom explained.

What Bergstrom sees emerging among large companies is“storymonials,” which is telling the story about the brand and howit affects or engages the lives of customers.

“There is too much marketing sameness out there,” he said. “Sobringing that relevance, that emotional nature of real membersdealing with real issues that we all face would be perfect to breakthrough that clutter of marketing sameness.”

For example, what might break through that clutter could bereality-TV style videos that track the financial challenges ofmembers and how a credit union helps address those challenges. Thistype of video content could engage members and non-members alikebecause they face similar financial issues, Bergstromexplained.

The Latino Market IsCalling

President Obama initiated executive orders two months ago thatwould allow nearly 5 million of the 11 million undocumentedimmigrants to continue living in the U.S.

John Andrade, CEO of Andrade Communicators and Lionel Sosa,founder of Sosa & Sosa Consultation and Design, said thepresident's new policy represents a huge opportunity for credit unions.Both companies based in San Antonio collaborate on credit unionmarketing projects.

“These are acculturated upwardly mobile, family-oriented,hard-working Latinos, which makes them a natural fit for creditunions,” said Sosa, who is an acknowledged expert in Hispanicconsumers and voter behavior. He was named one of the 25 mostinfluential Hispanics in America by Time magazine in2005.

Though serving the undocumented Hispanic market has been met recently with controversy in thecredit union industry, Andrade and Sosa said they believe theoverall social and political awareness of immigration issues willlead some cooperatives to step up their marketing messages toattract new Hispanic members.

Coopera, a Hispanic market solutions company in Des Moines,Iowa, announced in early January a national campaign with theNational Federation of Community Development Credit Unions in NewYork to reach unbanked and underbanked immigrants in the U.S. withcredit union products and services linked to immigration andlegalization efforts.

The campaign addresses immigrant needs regardless of country oforigin but includes a special focus on Hispanic immigrants, thenation's largest minority and one of the fastest growing. Eventsinclude webinars hosted by CUNA and roundtables in California, NewYork and Texas, which are states with some of the largest Hispanicpopulations in the U.S.

“Immigrants are a vibrant, dynamic part of our nation's economyand represent a tremendous untapped and emerging market for creditunions, particularly those serving low- and moderate-incomecommunities,” Cathie Mahon, president/CEO of the federation, said.“Immigrant communities are quite heterogeneous in terms of theirneeds and interests in financial products and services. Members areconsumers, homeowners, small business owners, and perhaps someday,large business owners.”

While Hispanics have the same financial needs as the generalpopulation, Sosa said credit unions still need to develop precisemarketing messages because of the various cultural cues and othernuances of acculturated Hispanics who are second, third or fourthgeneration immigrants.

“There are a lot of cultural cues that still apply to thispopulation even though they carry an iPhone 6 and watch “The Voice”on TV,” he explained. “They maintain two distinct cultures in thepsyches. For example, when it comes to Thanksgiving, they maynot have a turkey but Hispanic food. They may not watchSpanish-speaking TV but they may still listen to Spanishmusic.”