Customer retention is more critical than ever for banks and credit unions, especially as acquiring new clients can cost significantly more than keeping existing ones. With 13% of retail banking customers likely to switch within two years and ongoing marketing challenges, financial institutions must take a strategic approach. This playbook outlines five proven customer retention strategies for banks to boost engagement, reduce churn, and increase customer lifetime value.

The level of effort that financial institutions place on developing engaging content has sky-rocketed in recent years. This isn’t surprising, given that an effective content strategy can help attract new customers and retain existing ones. It also serves as an opportunity to educate your community on financial matters. But with so many institutions taking this approach, what sets the winners apart from the losers? The most successful content marketers in the financial industry have one thing in common—a great strategic foundation for their content. In this edition of Compound Interest, we examine what goes into a content marketing strategy for financial services that will set you up for success.

Community banks have long been a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, yet as Gen Z’s banking needs continue to grow and diversify, many community banks struggle to capture their attention. In this edition of Compound Interest we’ll examine why a generation known for its values-driven decision-making has not been choosing community banks and how these institutions might succeed at attracting them.

Many advantages come from the modern marketing landscape due to the technologies and data that marketers possess. Unfortunately, truly fair lenders can potentially put themselves at serious risk by unintentionally excluding certain populations from their marketing offers as a result of targeting what they view as desirable audiences. In this installment of Compound Interest, we will examine how financial institutions can steer clear of redlining risks from purely a marketing perspective.

Silent attrition, also referred to as silent switching or silent churn, is when customers of a bank fragment their banking activities by using secondary institutions for financial services offered by their primary institution. This growing phenomenon is tough to detect because the customer doesn’t close their account at their main institution, so unlike when a customer moves their account from one primary bank to another, the losses incurred from silent switching are more gradual and frequently fly under the radar. In this Compound Interest, we’ll examine silent attrition and what to do when customers stop doing business without closing the relationship.

From investment strategies and risk management to services for individuals, businesses, nonprofits, and governments—money and finances touch every aspect of life. If you’re a retail, commercial, or investment bank, credit union, savings and loan association, brokerage firm, or insurance or mortgage company, your website needs to be optimized for organic search. If you know this but don’t know where to start, read on. In this edition of Plain Talk, we will address things to consider before implementing SEO for financial services.

Ah, summer. The weather is warmer, schools are out, barbecues are firing up, vacations are occurring, and pools and camps are opening. All these good vibrations have a ripple effect, though, as they create behavioral, economic, and psychological shifts in society that financial institutions must be mindful of for a few months on an annual basis. But what better opportunity for strategic banks and credit unions to craft meaningful marketing strategies than a known period where society changes in a predictable manner for a finite time? In this issue of Compound Interest, we will some bank promotional ideas for summer that banks and credit unions can take advantage of.

In March 2023, Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank got clobbered, giving Wall Street the jitters and sending the press into a frenzy. Given this frenzy, we were curious if U.S. banks were cracking under the pressure of the 24-hour news cycle, so we sent out a simple one-question survey to bank CEOs across the country. “Will your 2023 bank marketing be less, about the same, or more than in 2022?” To our surprise, not a single bank that responded said that their budgets would be lower than those in 2022. Not one. In this edition of Compound Interest, we’ll touch on some quick tips for bank marketing budgets. We’ll also discuss why banks are not flinching and how smart marketing might be just the ticket for banks looking to grow in 2023 and beyond.

Every bank and credit union communicates with customers/members around holidays, whether through holiday promotions, bank holiday hours, or fun social posts that tie into the spirit of the season. In this edition of Compound Interest, we will discuss bank marketing tactics that financial institutions can implement to make the most of holiday communications.

If there is a big news story in banking so far this year, it’s the failure of the 16th largest bank in the United States. Silicon Valley Bank out of Santa Clara, California, failed on March 10, 2023. The SVB collapse, which took place over the course of roughly 48 hours, reverberated through the banking world. It has caused a number of ripple effects over the last week. Despite the good news for depositors from the government, the days and weeks ahead of us are sure to produce a litany of analyses focused on the financial fundamentals of the institution, the impact on the startup community, and the human cost of lost jobs. We believe there is some value in spending a few moments talking about this near tragedy from a communications perspective. In this edition of Compound Interest, we examine the communication collapse that contributed to the Silicon Valley Bank crisis. More importantly, we share 10 crisis PR tips for banks to follow. Don’t let what happened to SVB doesn’t happen to you.