Advocating for Content Budget

It’s a tough time for fintech marketers to make the case for budget and content creation resources.

Almost 30 percent of B2B marketers said their organization decreased content marketing spending in the second half of 2020, recent Content Marketing Institute (CMI) research shows.

If you’re reading this, you already know cutting down on content marketing or abandoning well-laid plans could chip away at the gains of content programs.

But you also know budget conversations can be tricky.

Here’s how content marketing leaders can make a case for budget and content production resources in a tougher economy.

1. Explain How Content Marketing Underpins Growth

Content has become more sophisticated than corporate blogs. Mature marketing operations know content is a business driver and they use metrics to track content performance.

In fact, the CMI research shows content marketing has helped B2B companies:

• Generate sales and revenue (51 per cent)
• Build a subscribed audience (47 per cent)
• Support a product launch (45 per cent)
• Build loyalty with customers (68 per cent)
• Educate audiences (79 per cent).

Show these figures to your CFO and other key colleagues who hold the purse strings. Explain traffic to a company blog is only one way to generate leads and sales.

Yes, you could ask a B2B fintech writer to produce a long-form blog post about an industry issue like digital payment methods or business tips for international ecommerce merchants. But as the CMI screengrab above shows, you can also give them useful information through a diverse content marketing program with newsletters, case studies, ebooks, and whitepapers.

2. Talk About the Potential Return on Investment

Marketing is often seen as a cost centre. Flip that script if you can, by bringing up return on investment (ROI) in budget discussions.

Up to 95% of financial institutions rely on their websites and social media to engage consumers. And 86% of these institutions describe the ROI on digital financial education and resources as ‘positive’ or ‘very positive’.

But what if you’re a marketer who wants to scale a fledgling fintech content marketing program, with new formats that are more suitable for your audience? Let’s take video, as an example. Data shows 87% of video marketers in 2020 earned positive ROI, up from 33% in 2015. And 84% of them say video has been an effective way to generate leads, with 78% of marketers reporting video marketing boosted bottom lines.

3. Point to Content Spending by Competitors

Pointing out how content marketing is working for competitors can also send a clear message: get on board or get left behind.

Take Investopedia. The financial website has a content strategy so powerful it brings in more than 33 million website visitors every month. They generate content that consistently shows up at the top of search engines, by explaining complicated financial topics clearly. Investopedia has earned over $70 million per month in traffic value — without paying Google anything.

Or look at UK challenger Starling Bank. By installing Facebook SDK, a feature enabling app developers to integrate Facebook into Starling’s app, the challenger bank could easily share engaging content with its audience. In November 2017, 32% of Facebook leads converted to new accounts and 44% of all accounts opened came from Facebook or Instagram. Presenting senior management with the results of competitors’ content programs can be a powerful way to prove that a well-run content marketing program is not a nice-to-have, but a business necessity.

Investing in Fintech Content Marketing

Yes, marketing often involves soft science and hard-to-measure goals like brand awareness. But there’s no denying key stakeholders want to see good links to lead volume, sales, and revenue.

It’s definitely a marathon and not a sprint, when you’re bringing your company around to seeing content marketing as an investment, rather than a cost. But it’s a race worth having runners in across every quarter. Because the sooner your organisation puts its weight behind delivering a content marketing program well, the more likely it is customers will choose you.