writes eMarketer citing a Nielsen Online AdRelevance report
Although this graphic covers December 2007 only, I do think the lead over the other industry categories would be similar the rest of the year.
The big question here is what share of this significant online ad spend is by credit unions?
My guess - a very small amount, which relates to my earlier post today about blogs and attitude to the web in general.
For credit unions to compete effectively in this tough market for financial services they will have to make a strong effort here and shift marketing dollars online to get share of voice. If they do start to spend money on web based marketing, they also better have a website capable of converting those dollars spent into new customers and share of wallet by existing customers.
This report covered recently in Marketing Pilgrim contains some interesting facts that support the idea of maintaining a corporate blog, combined with a website, as an effective business tool.
Not only will it increase your visibility in Google but there are a number of side effects that might well get you wider attention beyond just the immediate blog readership. Definitely worth consideration.
is the issue addressed in CU Brand Blog a post on Currency Marketing.
From the evidence presented only a tiny number of credit unions are blogging and for others - how many is unknown - it seems to be on the radar screen but not a high priority.
To me the larger issue than blogs, is the one of how most CUs are looking at the web itself as a business driver today. It seems that many consider the fact that they now have had a website for a number of years as good enough and the issue of “the web” is ticked off on the to-do list. How many CEOs and VPs of Marketing do realize that merely having a presence on the web in the form of a static website is far from enough? My guess would be a minority, still.
Now that the web has entered the mainstream - and the more than 100 million blogs is just one manifestation of this fact - and social networking, social media, user generated content, viral marketing etc. are here to stay, the website needs to be at the core of any credit union strategy and by this I mean overall business strategy, not only marketing strategy.
Once this fact has sunken in, the question of whether having a blog is the right thing to do or not is then at least asked in the right context. As long as a truly customer focused web strategy, anchored by a solid, enterprise strength, interactive, dynamic website, is not at the core of a credit union’s overall strategy, talking about blogging is a mere side show.
With the web moving as fast as it is now and with consumer behavior being influenced in more fundamental ways than ever before, important decisions in this key area need to be made sooner rather than later.
