54% of financial shoppers report using only their mobile devices to research and purchase services. Financial services include banking institutions, investment firms, financial advisors, and more. With so much research and purchasing occurring on mobile devices, it’s more important than ever for financial marketers to come up with new strategies to convert these mobile browsers into customers.
A mobile-first mentality for converting website traffic into customers is important for financial services marketers. The three strategies I describe below help financial marketers (and marketers across a variety of industries) convert more mobile browsers into business.
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Stay Top of Mind on Every Mobile Channel
Financial shoppers often have a sense of urgency when researching and making a purchase. Research shows that 67% of mobile shoppers are looking to make a purchase within a day. Being aware of this urgency and working to stay top of mind across all channels is key to converting mobile browsers into customers.
One way to stay top of mind is with retargeting. You can set up a retargeting program in Google AdWords, AdRoll, or another third party tool. You can display your ads to users who have searched for your business specifically, your competitors’ businesses, and keywords related to your business. As long as they have cookies enabled, these users will begin seeing your ads across the web as they continue their research or move on to social apps (like Facebook) and other browsing.
You can also work to stay top of mind through search engine optimization. SEO is probably already part of your marketing strategy, but it’s important to note here that as shoppers perform Google searches about your business and/or service, the closer you appear to the top of the results the more likely it is that they will visit your website. Optimize your website for the keywords your customers use to describe the service you offer.
Since organic search engine rankings can be difficult to control, you can supplement your organic strategy with Google paid search ads to stay top of mind. Bid on relevant keywords, competitors’ names, your own brand terms, and more to ensure your business ads are displayed to the right users. Since these searchers (both from paid and organic) are probably searching on their mobile devices, you should consider the conversion action they are most likely to take to get in touch with your business.
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Make it Easy for Mobile Browsers to Call
Research shows that mobile users are more likely call a business, rather than fill out a form, to ask a question or complete their purchase. On smartphone devices it’s just easier to quickly connect in a phone call with a business to get your questions answered. That’s why making it easy for mobile browsers to call is key to converting them into leads. This is especially true in the financial services industry: 68% of financial services shoppers report that it is very important to be able to call a bank while researching a purchase and 57% find it very important to be able to call when making an investment purchase.
These stats demonstrate how important it is for financial marketers to make it easy for shoppers to call, but it’s important for marketers in all industries. Research firm BIA/Kelsey reports that the number in inbound calls from mobile search to businesses is expected to reach 32 billion by the end of 2015 – and that number is growing.
With inbound calls on the rise, it’s more important than ever to optimize your website to drive phone calls from mobile search. Making it easy for mobile users to call can be as simple as having your phone number prominently displayed on your website, but keep in mind here that it’s important to be able to track the mobile channel that generates each call. With call tracking sotware you can display unique phone numbers to all of your website visitors so that you can track which channels are driving the most calls.
For Google paid search, you can use call attribution for Google call extensions to make it easy for mobile searchers to call you – they don’t even have to click on your ad, they can just click on your call extension to be connected immediately with your business.
We’ve covered how financial marketers can increase conversions from mobile shoppers through retargeting, SEO, and Google paid search. Now let’s talk about how useful Facebook Advertising can be for financial marketers.
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Reach a Targeted Audience with Facebook Advertising
One way financial services marketers are reaching their mobile audience is through Facebook Advertising. In January 2015 Facebook reported that 84% of its 890 million daily users accessed its site from a phone. With the majority of Facebook traffic coming from mobile devices, it’s the perfect place for financial services marketers to reach the right browsers.
News feed ads, location targeting, call now campaigns, and interests and behaviors audience segmentation makes Facebook the ideal platform for financial services marketers. To learn more about converting mobile shoppers using Facebook Advertising, get the guide: New Facebook Ad Strategies to Convert Mobile-First Financial Shoppers.