Financial services industry gets the message

People’s preferences for mobile devices and connectivity have transformed how businesses engage with their customers. Mobile as a platform has experienced the fastest adoption in the history of communication technology.

In the region, we see smartphone penetration rates reaching over 84 per cent; mobile is where most people increasingly spend their time. This has led to drastic shifts in how people do business with financial services institutions, and in many cases, has replaced the bank branch with mobile transactions, especially for younger generations who indicate they want to be in control of their finances on their mobile devices.

For context, in the US, 77 per cent of millennials’ financial conversations take place on mobile and 49 per cent prefer banking on their smartphones. From a business standpoint, this underscores the notion that mobile has become a must-do, rather than a nice-to-do, as digitisation drives the transformation of the financial services industry.

With 152 plus million people on Facebook in the region, amid one of the world’s youngest populations, financial services marketers have a distinct opportunity to connect with people and drive awareness of their products on an unprecedented scale.

Mobile devices have become many people’s constant throughout their day — from when they wake up to when they end their day. For the financial services industry, this creates an opportunity to create rich, meaningful experiences for people and to reach people where they increasingly spend their time.

The industry in its early years was predicated on personal relationships, which helped established trust. However, as it the industry grew and as types of media evolved, that personal element associated with the industry diminished. With the powerful combination of mobile and Facebook, financial institutions can, in a privacy-safe way, reintroduce this component.

Banks and insurance and credit card institutions can engage with people and deliver experiences at moments that matter most to customers — and they can do so at scale. This not only delivers business value and robust returns for marketers, all built on data-driven insights, but creates better experiences for people.

The first steps in this journey have already begun, with banks developing mobile applications for smartphone users. But instead of driving customers to and investing in physical locations, they direct customers to these very applications and websites.

For example, by using Facebook’s Mobile App Engagement ads, which allows businesses to send people to a specific area of an already-installed mobile app (e.g. a loan application page within an app), QNB Finansbank was able to reach 40 per cent of existing customers who use its mobile banking app.

This not only resulted in a frictionless experience for customers, but five times better performance than QNB Finansbank’s traditional media channels. Additionally, availability of multiple content formats such as video allows for more immersive and compelling experiences between people and businesses.

However, in today’s connected world, people are rightfully concerned about their privacy and the safety of their finances. Having adopted technology at massive scale, the banking industry has access to industry-leading security standards.

As marketers look for new avenues to drive customer engagement, the efficacy of those efforts becomes increasingly important. Businesses now have access to digital measurement tools to track conversion and lift on large, digital platforms. Marketers can also use third-party measurement tools to validate and better understand their results.

So, what does this mean for businesses in the region? In a marketplace widely considered “unbanked”, the increased awareness of financial services will allow for adoption of digitised services, in particular for sectors like e-commerce whose success depends on modern finance services.

For an industry looking to grow and market to a younger audience, marketing to people on mobile makes for greater efficiency, scale, and profitability. When you consider implementing more personalised customer experiences that allow for strengthening trust, the use of bots on Messenger is worth exploring.

Although early days, businesses are already seeing success here.

Neil Hiltz is Facebook’s Global Head of Financial Services Strategy. Eleni Kitra is the Head of Automotive and Financial Services Verticals in MENA.