• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, September 26, 2016

Banks are missing “the omni-channel opportunity to link digital and traditional channels,” according to a recent survey by Avoka. How do they reverse it? One solution may be closed-loop attribution. For advice on this discipline, we interviewed Jeff Sporn, SVP and GM, digital solutions at Equifax.

How do you define closed-loop attribution?
It’s not just online conversions but offline activity related to online activity. If a person sees an ad and buys a bag of Fritos, it makes sense to see the efficacy of the ad. But it’s not an ad-click buy in financial services — it’s a longer-term purchase. You see an ad, it prompts you to make you a phone call and finally to increase your investment. Financial institutions look at the size of the account and lifetime value, which is a little different from whether a sale was made or not.

What are the important metrics?
Account openings, changes in account size, open dates and initial deposits — things like that. Then we map that to what the consumer or the household was exposed to. You can tie it to true analysis and determine what worked and what didn’t. Most of these aren’t one-time purchases. In a perfect world, we’re looking at the account over time, not the norm for what the digital world and the agencies expect. Financial institutions look at multiple channels, including addressable TV, and all the creative, and they’re able to compare people who never saw any type of ad or saw one type of ad that led them to open large accounts. Again, it takes a little longer, but you can apply it to the bigger spend, and put the money into creative that will deliver ROI.

That said, just how good are financial institutions at cross-channel marketing?
It depends on the type of institution and the lines of business within it. Brokerages are more aggressive in digital, likely because of the competition they feel. They’re more out-front in investment and tailoring the message to the audience. Generally speaking, some banks tend to be more conservative with regards to change. They’re getting into digital, but they don’t think as aggressively. There are exceptions. But I don’t see as much of that tailored messaging; maybe they’re spending more on brand.

Are they aware of this lag?
The sentiment from some banks is, ‘I know we’re behind.’ But usually they’re aren’t — not with their competition.

What do you recommend?
Retargeting, for one thing. If you look at shoes from Nordstrom’s, you get the idea you know about those even after you’ve bought them. The best consumer is the interested consumer. The clay [holding it together] is behavioral: watching where people are surfing and using third-party data.

Third-party data?
Yes, like micro neighborhoods with different investment styles and levels of wealth. It has to be aggregated — you cannot use credit data this way. But you can look at these neighborhoods, and create models for activities such as likelihood to respond to a credit card offer or transfer balances.

You say it takes longer. How much?
It may take four weeks for the consumer to take action on a brokerage ad, and maybe longer for the institution to take action. Let’s say a brokerage makes most of its money from trading. It will look at trading behavior and what marketing channel creates high volumes of trades — that type of consumer vs. one who puts down $50,000 and does nothing.

What’s next in cross-channel marketing?
We’re excited about addressable TV. Maybe it’s in 20 million households, but it’s going to grow, and it will allow you to target by household as opposed to the past where you’re watching everyone who’s watching “Hawaii Five-0.” It will thrive, especially with the Millennials as they keep moving toward the computer screen, tablets and mobile. Measurement is tied to that. We know it doesn’t work to just count clicks. People tend to think that digital must be more advanced: there are so many technologies. Direct mail is good in measurement. Finally, automated measurement allows you to change campaigns on the fly. In two or three years, it will be commonplace — easier and more accessible. You may not have to lift a finger.