Commentary

Industry Watch: Checks and Balances

A competitive marketplace demands innovation, reinvention. 

Financial-services companies have long been big online marketers, accounting for an estimated 12 percent of all Web advertising last year, according to research firm eMarketer. By 2010, financial-services companies are expected to spend at least $3.5 billion advertising online.

From e-mail campaigns to banner ads to podcasts to social networks, financial-services marketers are making use of an array of online advertising strategies.

At the same time, many financial-services firms lag in their adoption of online methods, say industry watchers like Evelyn Ehrlich, co-author of The Financial Services Marketing Handbook. "Credit card companies and mortgage companies are using it more than others," she says. "Are they doing a good job? In my opinion, they could be doing a better job."

Credit card giant Visa, which embraced the Internet early on, remains an active digital marketer. The company, which made a big splash last year with its "Life Takes Visa" campaign, has broken several new Web initiatives in the last few months. Recently, Visa made a big online push for its "Signature" card, aimed at consumers who earn more than $125,000 yearly. The online "Visa Signature Living" campaign - part of the overall "Life Takes Visa" initiative - is running on travel, food, sports and lifestyle Web sites. Also, the company arranged to integrate content from sites including nationalgeographic.com, epicurious.com and newyorker.com into visa.com/ signature and visasignatureliving.com.

Visa also signed on to sponsor Yahoo's Small Business Exchange - a relatively new site within Yahoo Finance that features information aimed at entrepreneurs. Visa was the site's presenting sponsor, with branding and display advertising promoting its small business and merchants' center. In addition to having its logo on the site, Visa sponsors an interactive poll at the exchange. It also signed on as one of the initial sponsors of AOL's video download store, launched last year.

Given such extensive branding campaigns, it's not surprising that the company views online marketing as more than a matter of obtaining clicks on an ad. "Back when most companies were consumed with lifting click-through rates, we were looking for an online branding strategy," says Susanne D. Lyons, executive vice president and chief marketing officer for Visa USA. "During the past six years, we have learned a great deal about using the Web for branding purposes, and we believe that has given us a competitive advantage."

American Express is once again sponsoring the Tribeca Film Festival, running in New York City from April 25 through May 6. As part of the sponsorship, tickets went on sale to American Express cardholders about one week before they were made available to the general public.

The festival's logo refers to American Express as the "founding sponsor." In a departure from last year, however, AmEx isn't sponsoring Tribeca-related material on AOL's Moviefone. Last year, AmEx sponsored a Moviefone site that included episodes of the AOL-Moviefone "Unscripted" series.

American Express also just retired its "My life, my card," campaign, in favor of a campaign that asks, "Are you a cardmember?" AmEx launched TV ads showing Olympic snowboarder Shaun White buying plane tickets to follow the snow with his AmEx points. The company also is redesigning its Web site for the initiative.

AmEx might have Tribeca cornered, but other financial marketers have found different entertainment events to sponsor. This year, MasterCard was one of five sponsors for the Screen Actors Guild Awards broadcast and the exclusive sponsor of streaming coverage from the sag awards on TNT.TV and AOL Broadband.

MasterCard also is testing a new mobile application, MasterCard Nearby, which will enable cardholders to use their mobile phones to access information like store locations, driving directions and special offers. After users set specific preferences, the results will be text-messaged to phones. Local-search and content provider Go2 Directory Services in Irvine, Calif., is supplying the technology.

MasterCard last year teamed up with Yahoo on a pair of promotions. One was a music-related effort, in which people who purchased a one-year subscription to Yahoo Music Unlimited with the card got a second year free. Another was tied to the launch of Yahoo Travel's new Trip Planner feature; with each MasterCard purchase, cardholders were entered in a sweepstakes for a chance to win 500 round-trip flights to anywhere in the world.

Social media and virtual-reality games are still mostly untapped vehicles, but some financial-services companies have started experimenting. KeyBank, for one, webcasts its virtual seminar series and podcasts "Economic Insights." Wells Fargo also has stepped up its use of social media, setting up shop in the online virtual reality world Second Life. The initiative, "Stagecoach Island," is overseen by three Wells employees who also blog about its population and events. Second Life denizens invited to join Stagecoach Island can get answers to money management questions, helping Wells build relationships with the young adults who generally populate the virtual world.

To date, more than 12,000 people have joined Stagecoach, which focuses on teaching young adults about personal finance. More than $1 million in "assets" have been accumulated by 158 players, according to the game's blog.

Wachovia is another financial giant that's thinking about going social. "We're evaluating social networks from the perspective of advertising within [them], as well as developing online communities for our customers," says Vivian Lytle, senior vice president and director of Wachovia's online sales and marketing group.

At the same time, Lytle says she's concerned about potential damage to the company's brand or reputation by being aligned with a social network that may have a questionable reputation, or where user-generated content could potentially reflect poorly on the brand.

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