COLUMNS • SALES & MARKETING
‘What used to work is the thing that will put you out of business’ Gary Vaynerchuck
Paul Watkins is a marketing adviser to the financial services industry.
How to communicate… let me count the ways! Paul Watkins takes a look at who uses what forms of digital marketing and how to manage multiple platforms.
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n recent months there’s been the ‘perfect storm’ of changes, adversely impacting both existing and prospective clients. As you know, these include changes to LVR (Loan to Value Ratio), the introduction of the CCCFA (Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act), interest rate rises, and of course the ever-rising (and apparently not able to be checked) price of houses. Added to the list are Brightline tests, high density-enabled plans for Auckland, a nationwide foreignbuyer ban, the current building boom, the failed KiwiBuild scheme and tax changes targeting property investors and speculators. While any one of these could have an impact on the home-buying public, all at the same time can cause stress and frustration. So what is your role in all of this? The answer is by communicating these changes to clients and empathising with them, thereby being seen as the sympathetic expert in their eyes. How to communicate is also changing. The proven platforms are your website
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blog, client newsletters, LinkedIn and Facebook. I do hope you are using all of the above, as not only do they all work well, they are how the world now gets information. Using them also helps draw search results in Google. Add in the new kids on the promotion block, such as Pinterest and TikTok, and it can all become confusing.
Who uses what This article will briefly explain each of these platforms, who uses them, and what your message should be, in light of recent changes. Facebook is still the 90-pound gorilla in the room. The biggest users are those aged 25-34 (first-home buyers) followed by 35-44-year-olds. If you also offer investment products, the 55+ group accounts for 11% of all daily users, so don’t write them off on this medium. Gender-wise, Facebook is 43% male and 57% female. This should form the basis of your promotional activities.
‘Facebook is still the 90-pound gorilla in the room’ As discussed many times, short videos on Facebook are very powerful. Instagram is owned by Facebook and its use is steadily rising (up 18% in the last two years). When you place Facebook ads, you can click on Instagram during the placement and your short video will show there too. The biggest users are those aged 25-34 (once again, first-home buyers), with females representing 57% of those who look at it daily and males 43%. Twitter is, I think, an annoying platform, or at least the last US President made it so; interestingly, it has an above-average number of users with degrees, at 42%, and two-thirds of its users are male, aged 30-49. Its growth has been static, but I’m not sure how it fits with a mortgage broker’s promotional plan.
